Emma Gatewood’s Walk

by

Seventy years ago this May, a 67-year-old woman set out from the Georgia mountains in tennis shoes with the goal to walk until she got to Maine, something no other woman had done.

Emma Gatewood stood atop Mount Oglethorpe in Georgia facing north. She was wearing dungarees and tennis shoes and carrying a handstitched denim sack filled with minimal supplies that included neither map nor tent nor sleeping bag. Her 11 grown children back in her home state of Ohio thought she was just out for another walk in the woods. What they did not know was that Emma intended to “walk” the longest hiking-only trail in the world — 2,050 miles on the Appalachian Trail. It was May 3, 1955, and Gatewood was 67 years old.

This grandmother of 23 stood five-feet, two inches tall, came from a family of 15 children, survived the brutalities of a 30-year violent marriage and had a lifetime of hard work under her belt. Now a path of some five million steps lay before her.

Gatewood first heard about “The People’s Path” from an article in a famous magazine. She quickly learned, however, that reports of a wide, clear path with white blazes marking the way were more a fictionalization than a representation.

The trail, first conceived of by Benton MacKaye in 1921, was still a work in progress. Downed trees, flooding, underbrush, treacherous passes, incorrect or nonexistent blaze markers and continuous trail maintenance needs plagued hikers. Yet Gatewood stepped bravely onto this journey at the southern terminus despite her unsuccessful attempt the previous year when she “got lost” at Maine’s northern terminus and was told to “go home” by rangers.

This time would be different.

Emma Gatewood had an eighth-grade education, read encyclopedias and classic Greek tales, wrote poetry and utilized her skills of ingenuity and determination in the wilderness. Found items along the way became repurposed: a rubber sole taped to her own damaged shoe, a fork to comb her hair, sassafras leaves on her hat to keep the bugs away. And flat rocks heated on the fire to keep her warm at night.

As it became clear to her that reports of regular shelters along the way were also idyllic exaggerations, Gatewood found multiple ways to rest at the day’s end. She slept on piles of leaves trailside, in fire towers, sheds, cars and on and under picnic tables. When close to towns and settlements, she would stop at homes and ask to sleep on the porch or in a barn if a spare room indoors was not available.

Amid the deluge that accompanied epic hurricane Connie, which made landfall in North Carolina and Virginia during her hike, Gatewood found a trail shelter late one afternoon.

“[It] was occupied by a group of young black men and two slightly older white leaders from a Roman Catholic parish in Harlem. The men explained that they’d come up for a wilderness trip and found themselves stuck inside because of the storm.”

What Gatewood did not know was that the young men were the leaders of rival street gangs on a wilderness outing for the purpose of brokering peace. About this encounter, one of the priests later wrote, “[She] staggered into camp…bruised, exhausted, her gear and provisions washed away…she was in dire need. The brute force of nature so overwhelmed us it literally dissolved the tension in our lean-to. That hurricane … forced us all back to what we had in common, our humanity.”

The next day, “Emma piggybacked on a variety of youthful backs as we forded swollen torrents that would have swept her downstream had she attempted them on her own. Whoever she was piggybacking on had somehow to stay balanced mid-stream while enduring a tight, often suffocating neck squeeze from her two thin, bony arms.”

As Gatewood made her way north, there was an increasing number of interactions. A dog joined her for a while, fellow hikers came and went, teenagers and boy and girl scout troops would walk alongside her. And with each encounter, combined with the stories she told kind folks in towns along the way, word of the “Grandma” walking from Georgia to Maine began to spread.

Small town newspapers ran stories about her along her route. And when she came into the next town, she was famous to some and a “lady tramp” to others. (She surmised that the latter characterization was based on her bedraggled appearance — the fork for a comb.) Once the news hit national papers, reporters and photographers tried to anticipate her appearances for interviews on the trail.

At the beginning, Gatewood did not want publicity primarily because her family did not know where she was. But to remedy this she said, “I’ll send them a postcard.” Eventually though she did not mind answering their questions, yet remained humbly confounded as to why anyone would be interested in her story. When asked what “surprised her the most about the hike she said, ‘All the publicity the newspapers give me.’”

Throughout the entire journey, whether enjoying the kindness of strangers, a good meal at a diner or a rare stay at a budget motel, she always returned to the point where she left the trail to resume her hike. The only exception being a two-mile flooded area where she was forced to accept a ride around the impassable spot. And as she continued to do as her father had taught her — “pick up your feet” — Gatewood was becoming an ambassador for the AT and an inspiration for generations to come.

When she took her final steps at Mount Katahdin, Maine, on September 25, 1955, Emma Gatewood became the first woman to solo thru-hike the Appalachian Trail from start to finish in a single trip. “She planted her seventh pair of tennis shoes on the rocky top of the precipice, alone. Physically … she was a shadow of the woman who started walking 146 days before. She had lost 30 pounds. Her glasses were broken; her knee was sore. She … spoke aloud to an invisible audience. ‘I did it,’ she said, ‘I said I’d do it and I’ve done it.’” And she sang the first verse of “America the Beautiful.”

Two years later, at age 69, Emma Gatewood repeated this journey, making her the first person at the time, male or female, to thru-hike the AT twice. Saying, “I don’t want to sit and rock. I want to do something,” she broke a record again in 1964 (age 76) when she became the first person to complete three hikes of the entire trail (the final one in sections). Reportedly, the total elevation changes are equivalent to climbing Mt. Everest 16 times — for each hike!

During these years it seemed that there was an insatiable curiosity about Gatewood, specifically why she set upon these incredible hikes. According to the detailed research of Ben Montgomery in his book “Grandma Gatewood’s Walk,” this was “a question she’d playfully brush off every time they asked.” She would say, “Seemed like a good lark.” Or “I find solace in nature.” Or write in her trail journal “the petty entanglements of life are brushed aside like cobwebs.”

Or when asked about her decision to walk the Oregon Trail, which she did in 1959, she said, “I thought of all the women who walked behind the wagons when they went to settle the country. I was looking for something to do this summer [at age 71] and a walk to Oregon seemed like the best thing.” Once she told a reporter who asked why — “Because I wanted to.”

Perhaps ... just perhaps … we do not need to know why Emma Gatewood took those extraordinary journeys. It is enough to know that she did.

When Emma Gatewood passed away in 1973, she had hiked 14,000 miles in her lifetime.

All quotations are credited to Montgomery, B. (2016). Grandma Gatewood’s walk: The inspiring story of the woman who saved the Appalachian Trail. Chicago Review Press.

The story above first appeared in our May / June 2025 issue. For more like it subscribe today or log in with your active BRC+ Membership. Thank you for your support!