At 67, Grandma Gatewood became first woman to solo thru-hike Appalachian Trail

In 1955, 67-year-old Emma Gatewood became the first woman to complete a solo thru-hike of the Appalachian Trail in a single season, walking all 2,190 miles in 146 days. Known as Grandma Gatewood, she started at Mount Oglethorpe in Georgia and kept her plans secret from her adult children, fearing they would stop her. She carried a handmade denim sack with simple gear, a wool blanket, plastic shower curtain, tin cup, and canvas Keds shoes, and relied on wild plants and whatever shelter she could find, from porch swings to piles of leaves.

Gatewood first attempted the trail in 1953 but got lost and broke her glasses in Maine. Park rangers advised her to give up. Two years later, she returned and succeeded. Born in 1887 on an Ohio farm, she endured over 30 years of domestic violence before obtaining a rare divorce in 1940. After her historic hike, she walked the entire trail again in 1957, becoming the first person to complete it twice. In 1964, at age 76, she finished it a third time in sections.

Gatewood's story, documented in Ben Montgomery's book Grandma Gatewood's Walk and archives including the Appalachian Mountain Club Library & Archives, changed perceptions of long-distance hiking and endurance. She was inspired by a National Geographic article about Earl Shaffer's 1948 thru-hike and noticed no woman had done it alone. When asked why she took on the journey, she said simply: 'Because I wanted to.'