Day 5
A four mile run takes me out of Pittsfield and down Rte 8 through Dalton, Mass. As I click through town I notice a big mill building on the south side of the road. "Crane's Government Mill' the googlemap says. I had forgotten that Crane & Co - that company that seems to make all of the good stationery cards - was based in Dalton, Mass. What I didn't know was that Crane is responsible for making ALL of the paper that US Currency is printed on. All of it. Since the 19th century.
The rest of the run heads out of Dalton past Wahconah Regional High School. Wahconah, incidentally, after which the local baseball stadium and waterfall are also named, refers to a young Native American woman who was being courted by two different men. The chief and medicine man decided that fate should decide who gets to marry her and came up with some contest involving Wahconah in a canoe without a paddle, and whichever bank of the river she went toward, that would be the man she would marry. Of course, Wahconah managed to rig the contest and marry the guy she wanted.
The things you learn when you run across Massachusetts...
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