Paul Doherty 6/19/1919 – 06/18/2000.
A memorial service was held for Paul, 81, July 22 in Gorham. Though not a hutman, his activities during a busy outdoors career were intertwined with the huts. After WWII serving as a Navy volunteer (precursor to the SEALS), he became a NH Conservation Office moving through the ranks until 1973. He became the first director of Off-Highway Vehicles (snow mobiles), then followed as director of Parks and Recreation until his retirement in 1982.
Still active, he became a consultant during the construction of the Franconia Notch Parkway.
Many of us remember him for his unique Limmers, perhaps the only pair that laced up to just below the knees. He and George Hamilton guided Justice William O. Douglas around the huts in the summers of ‘59 and ‘60 which was later written up by the judge in the August 1961 National Geographic article The Friendly Huts of the White Mountains. Paul’s autobiography Smoke from a Thousand Campfires covers his life in the New Hampshire woods and the personalities he met along the way including Eisenhower, Douglas, Sherm Adams and Joe Dodge.