Jericho Mountain State Park and the ATV Rides That Helped Us Survive Rumford, Maine (July 2, 2011)

ATVing at Jericho Mountain State Park, New Hampshire (June 6, 2011)

In 2010, Lee and I brought our ATVs to Jericho Mountain State Park in Berlin, New Hampshire, for our first ride, and we fell in love. By 2011, we both purchased our dream machine for retirement, and we were ready to enjoy what we had worked for. For the next couple of years, we hauled our ATVs into the New Hampshire woods, camped, and spent our days exploring the trails. Sometimes it was just the two of us; other times, we rode with a pack. We loved ATVing, and we had a need for speed. Those trips gave us time together when having fun still felt possible.

ATVing at Jericho Mountain State Park, New Hampshire (June 6, 2011)

Berlin was familiar country for two people coming from another mill town. Known as “The City That Trees Built,” it grew around the forests and the waterpower of the Androscoggin River. The railroad arrived in 1851, and sawmills gave way to a major pulp and paper industry. The Berlin Mills Company, later renamed the Brown Company, became central to the city’s economy, drawing workers from Quebec and Europe. When Fraser Papers closed Berlin’s pulp mill in 2006, the loss forced a difficult reckoning with that dependence. It was a reminder of how much a community risks when its future rests so heavily on one industry.

New Honda 700xx on the Trails at at Jericho Mountain State Park, NH (June 6, 2011)

Jericho offered Berlin an opportunity to build another kind of business around its woods. In August 2006, the state and volunteers from the Androscoggin Valley ATV Club opened the first fourteen miles of trails, largely along existing logging roads. The park became part of a broader effort to draw visitors and diversify the local economy. Riders needed fuel, food, places to stay, and repairs, creating customers for businesses throughout the area. Berlin’s December 2024 economic impact study identifies Jericho as the city’s biggest tourism draw. Our trips were part of that shift, as people came to enjoy woods that had long supplied its mills.

ATVing at Jericho Mountain State Park, New Hampshire (June 6, 2011)

Berlin’s transition also connects to the river that runs through Rumford. Maine’s 2014 Upper Androscoggin River Fishery Management Plan describes improvements in water quality and appearance following Berlin’s mill closure, and says the shutdown likely contributed to better river conditions. It also notes reduced organic matter and nutrient loading afterward. These changes added to decades of progress through pollution controls and better wastewater treatment. The Androscoggin flows on toward Rumford, where the mill now operated by ND Paper, a Nine Dragons Paper subsidiary, has a permit to discharge treated industrial wastewater into the river. The river’s recovery remains an ongoing responsibility shared across town and state lines.

ATVing at Jericho Mountain State Park, New Hampshire (June 6, 2011)

For Lee and me, Jericho had a much more personal meaning. We arrived carrying anger over the cruelty we experienced in Rumford and the fear of being targeted by its police. Riding gave that anger somewhere to go. We could concentrate on the trail ahead, enjoy being together, and get some distance from the town where we felt hunted. We couldn’t fight Town Hall on equal terms, and we weren’t yet able to tell the full story of what had happened to both of us. We could keep living, though. Every trip helped us do that.

ATVing at Jericho Mountain State Park, New Hampshire (June 6, 2011)

We remember those years for how much fun we had together. We bought our dream machines, and riding them let us enjoy the life we wanted. Camping and ATVing gave us days we could look forward to and memories that still belong to us. Jericho Mountain State Park was a saving grace during a time when we badly needed one. Berlin was finding new uses for its woods, and we were finding enough freedom in them to keep going. We made it to the day when we could finally speak.