Northeast's Largest Privately Owned Lake Preserved

Ralph Waldo Emerson visited Follensby Pond, and it was important in the recovery of the bald eagle.

Photo: Carl Heilman II / Wild Visions Inc.

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Follensby Pond, thought to be the largest privately owned lake in the Northeast, and the 14,600 acres surrounding it, have been preserved in one of the largest recent conservation deals in New York's Adirondack Mountains.

The 1,000-acre pond was visited by Transcendentalist Ralph Waldo Emerson, and he wrote a poem, The Adirondacs, about it and his meeting there with other 19th Century scholars.

Follensby Pond also played an important role in the recovery of the bald eagle. In the 1950s, when hunting, habitat destruction and the pesticide DDT had all but wiped out eagles from the Northeast, some of the last nesting sets were found on the remote lake. State wildlife biologist Peter Nye, a central figure in the recovery of the eagle, incubated the national symbol's recovery in the state and region by rearing Alaskan eaglets there.

Eagles are now so abundant that they've been removed from the Endangered Species List.

You may never have heard of Follensby Pond, but for its inspiration for some of America's most influential thinkers and for its role in the recovery of its national symbol, it has a historical place that is important, but fittingly quiet.

The land was in the stewardship of the McCormick family for more than 50 years, and The Nature Conservancy expects to sell it to New York as an addition to the Adirondack State Wilderness in the coming years.

Read more about Follensby here.

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