Whiteface Lodge was built in 1922 on the south slope of Whiteface Mountain, at an elevation of approximately 3,055 feet along the Long Trail in Division X — the stretch running from Bolton Lodge north to French Camp. It was constructed by F. W. (Fred) Mould of Morrisville, with assistance from the Green Mountain Club, as reported in the Green Mountain News of December 1922.
Fred Mould was already a significant figure in the development of the Long Trail north of Mount Mansfield. A Morrisville businessman, he had been supporting the GMC in this region since at least 1913, when he began converting an old logging camp into what became Shattuck Lodge (also called "Mould’s Shelter"), located on the approach trail below the main ridgeline near Chilcoot Pass. Through the 1910s and into the 1920s, Mould blazed trails, built and maintained shelters, and helped fund the Long Trail Patrol’s work in this corner of Lamoille County.
Whiteface Lodge was his most prominent contribution to the main Long Trail. The 4th edition of the Long Trail Guide Book (1922) describes it simply as "newly built" — the ink was barely dry when it went to press. By the 5th edition (1924), it was characterized as "an open-front lodge with metal roof and bunks for eight; more than eight can be accommodated. Excellent and permanent water nearby." The 1926 travel book Trails and Summits of the Green Mountains by Walter Collins O’Kane described it as "an open shelter owned by the Club and provided with bunks for eight persons," reached after a half-mile descent from the Whiteface summit.
Setting and Character
The lodge sat about a quarter mile south of the summit of Whiteface Mountain (3,715 feet) on the south slope, just off the Long Trail as it circled around the peak from the north. The 7th edition of the Long Trail Guide Book (1928) placed it at Long Trail mile 45.6 from the Massachusetts border and noted simply: "Open camp on south side, ¼ mile from summit. Good water."
The views from the shelter were exceptional. Editions of the guide from the 1930s through the 1950s consistently describe the same panorama: looking south from the lodge, "Madonna’s steep cone is directly above and behind Beaver Meadow, while Mansfield’s Nose is to the right of Madonna, then a shoulder of Morse Mountain and Mansfield’s Chin farther to the right. Both peaks of Mansfield are perfectly placed in depressions in the nearer range." The 1960 edition added that both summits were "perfectly placed above depressions in the nearer range" — a framing that suggests the view had a quality hikers returned to describe again and again.
Water was plentiful and permanent, flowing across the trail just to the west of the shelter — a notable feature on a ridgeline where reliable water was otherwise difficult to find between Whiteface Lodge and Sterling Pond, a stretch of three and a half miles.
A trail from Beaver Meadow (and later from Beaver Meadow Lodge, built by the Sterling Section in 1947) connected to the Long Trail at Whiteface Lodge, making the shelter a junction point as well as an overnight stop. The Sterling Section of the GMC, headquartered in Morrisville, was responsible for maintaining the Long Trail and its shelters from Chilcoot Pass to French Camp — including Whiteface Lodge — for much of the structure’s operational life.
Life at the Lodge
By August 1931, the Long Trail News could report that Whiteface Lodge was "in good shape" — a terse but reassuring notice in its shelter condition report. A photograph from the same year captures the structure in its prime, a spare but functional open-front building set among the trees of the south-facing slope.
The shelter’s open-front design, common to the era’s rustic trail camps, made it permeable to the mountain’s weather and wildlife. A vivid dispatch published in the Long Trail News of May 1952 captured what nights at Whiteface Lodge could be like: a hiker wrote of waking to find a rabbit stealing bread crumbs beside his bunk — only to see a wildcat leap through the open front and behead the rabbit in a single swing. "Second time this happened!" the hiker noted, adding, "And I almost died with him (of fright, not decapitation)." Porcupines, too, were a recurring presence at the shelter over the years, drawn to salt-soaked wood and food scraps.
The Long Trail Patrol continued to clear blowdowns and maintain the trail in the vicinity of Whiteface during the 1940s, as recorded in Patrol logs from 1942. The shelter remained a functional waypoint through the early 1950s, appearing without comment in the 1951 and 1956 editions of the Long Trail Guide.
Demolition and Replacement
By the late 1950s, the original lodge had deteriorated beyond practical repair. In 1958, the Long Trail Patrol demolished the old structure and built a new log lean-to at the same location, constructed in Adirondack style. The new shelter — called "Whiteface Shelter" in all subsequent guide editions — sleeps 6 to 10 persons, has no stove, and cost $556.16 to build, as reported in the Long Trail News of February 1959.
The 1960 Long Trail Guide Book (16th edition) marked the transition cleanly: "Whiteface Shelter, a log canto with bunks for 6 to 10, was completely rebuilt by the Long Trail Patrol in 1958, replacing the old structure which had sheltered hikers since 1922." The 1963 edition (17th) refined the description: "a log leanto with wire bunks for 5, was built by the Long Trail Patrol in 1958." The 1983 edition noted that the shelter was by then maintained by the Sterling Section.
Whiteface Lodge thus served hikers for 36 years — from 1922, when it was among the newest additions to the growing Long Trail shelter network, through 1958, when its replacement ushered in the modern era of Adirondack-style construction that became the GMC standard.
Sources
Long Trail News, August 1931, p. 3. Green Mountain Club. ("Whiteface Lodge—In good shape.")
Long Trail News, May 1952, p. 5. Green Mountain Club. (Wildcat and rabbit account.)
Long Trail News, February 1959. Green Mountain Club. (New shelter construction cost and details.)
Long Trail News, 1961, p. 6. Green Mountain Club.
Long Trail News, 1971, p. 6. Green Mountain Club. (Porcupine/inspection account.)
Ridgelines (Burlington), 1980, p. 3. Burlington Section, Green Mountain Club.
Long Trail News, 2009, p. 16. Green Mountain Club.
Green Mountain Club. Long Trail Guide Book, 4th ed. (1922), p. 12.
Green Mountain Club. Long Trail Guide Book, 5th ed. (1924), p. 15.
Green Mountain Club. Long Trail Guide Book, 6th ed. (1924), pp. 17, 19.
Green Mountain Club. Long Trail Guide Book, 7th ed. (1928), pp. 19–21.
Green Mountain Club. Long Trail Guide Book, 8th ed. (1930), pp. 14–15, 19.
Green Mountain Club. Long Trail Guide Book, 9th ed. (1932), pp. 51–53.
Green Mountain Club. Long Trail Guide Book, 16th ed. (1960), p. 56.
Walter Collins O’Kane. Trails and Summits of the Green Mountains. The Riverside Press, 1926. Pp. 418–436.
Woodward, Paul & Joanne. Long Trail System Shelter History, 2nd ed. Green Mountain Club, 1999. P. 133.
Long Trail System Shelter History – GMC Burlington
