by Drew Hanson
One of the common questions people ask about the Ice Age Trail is, "Why does it have a big loop in the middle?" Sometimes called
the doughnut or inaccurately called
the bifurcation, the big loop occupies a special chapter in the Ice Age Trail story.
Most of the general route of the Ice Age Trail is
due to the plan of Ray Zillmer. He
envisioned a long distance hiking trail following the interlobate ridges of
the Kettle Moraine in eastern Wisconsin and
the terminal moraine west to the border with
Minnesota. Without Ray Zillmer, there would be
no Ice Age Trail. But once Zillmer died in 1960,
the Ice Age Trail almost died with him. More than
10 years passed before Congressman Henry
Reuss stepped up to become the Trail’s greatest
champion.
For the next three decades, Congressman
Reuss was a major influence on most things
Ice Age Trail. The full body of his Ice Age Trail
accomplishments is far beyond the scope of this
article. While the big loop is something he did
not intend to create and something he at times
worked against in favor of his preferred eastern
leg, more than any single person we can thank
Congressman Reuss for the existence of the
big loop.
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| the Big Loop near the middle of the Ice Age Trail |
During the years following Ray Zillmer’s untimely
death, Ice Age Trail leaders increasingly
realized that one of the weaknesses of Zillmer’s
planned route was that it was not
really possible to tell the story of continental
glaciation if the Trail’s route adhered rigidly to
the interlobate and terminal moraines, not to
mention the fact that it would lack variety for
anyone walking more than a short segment.
Having the Ice Age Trail weave other types of
landforms not found on a terminal moraine into
the route would make for a better trail. Worth
noting is the fact that neither leg of the big loop
follows the terminal moraine.
One of Congressman Reuss’s many Ice
Age Trail accomplishments was the book,
On
the Trail of the Ice Age, which he authored
through three editions. Initially published in
January, 1976 it was the first guidebook on
the Ice Age Trail and it included the first set
of maps and detailed description of the entire
thousand mile
route. In the doughnut area, the
1976 edition shows the Trail entirely as a single
route of connecting roads between Sauk City
and Coloma, passing through the city of Portage.
The route skirts the edge of John Muir Park but
remarkably misses the Baraboo Hills and Devils
Lake Park entirely. The book gives no hint of
the western route shown two years earlier on
the official Ice Age Park and Trail Foundation
brochure of 1974.
 |
| Ice Age Trail map from 1974 |
A major milestone in the history of the Ice Age
Trail was the 1980 passage of the Ice Age Trail
Act by Congress and signed by the President the
same year. Although many people advocated
for its designation as a National Scenic Trail,
no one was more important to this effort than
Congressman Reuss. The law even states that
the Trail will be, “generally following the route
described in ‘On the Trail of the Ice Age...’ by
Henry S. Reuss, Member of Congress, dated
1980.” The route shown in the 1980 edition is
the eastern leg — none of the western leg.
As required by the National Trails System Act,
the National Park Service completed the
Ice
Age National Scenic Trail Comprehensive Plan
for Management and Use
in 1983. The route
shown on maps in the plan roughly follows
the eastern leg of the big loop but a note on
one map states, “The Ice Age Trail Council is
working on a rerouting of the trail from Devils
Lake to Greenwood Wildlife Area. The rerouting
would take the trail west into the Glacial Lake
Wisconsin area...” (i.e., the western leg of what
later became the big loop).
Also required by the National Trails System
Act was appointment of an Advisory Council to
assist the National Park Service “with respect to matters relating to the trail, including the selection of rights-of-way.”
Appointed by the U.S. Secretary of the Interior, the Advisory Council was
comprised of a dozen members including former Wisconsin Governor
Warren Knowles, prominent citizens and active Ice Age Trail supporters.
Given the conflicting ideas, the Advisory Council was not surprisingly
asked to weigh in on the route through the doughnut area. In mid-1984
the Advisory Council approved the western route “to take the trail into
the glacial Lake Wisconsin area” as the official route for the Ice Age
Trail. But leaders from the city of Portage felt left out of the decision and
Congressman Reuss remained unwilling to let go of his preferred route.
 |
| 1976 map from On the Trail of the Ice Age |
In a January 9, 1986 letter from Ice Age Park and Trail Foundation (later
renamed the Ice Age Trail Alliance) President John Zillmer (Ray’s son) to
Congressman Henry Reuss, John Zillmer addressed the Congressman’s
efforts. At the time, Congressman Reuss also sat on the board of directors
of the Ice Age Park and Trail Foundation. Referring to the route through
the city of Portage, John Zillmer wrote, “this route has repeatedly been
rejected by the Ice Age Park and Trail Foundation in spite of great pressure
by you to approve it. As a matter of fact, you have been the only director
to
support this route. Your planned route was unanimously rejected by the
Ice Age National Scenic Trail Advisory Council. It has been rejected by the
Ice Age Trail Council. It has been rejected by the National Park Service.
It has been rejected by the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources...
You have contributed so very much to what progress has been made.
Why in the world are you now undermining all that you have worked so
hard to accomplish?”
There was a lot of back and forth during those years about whether to
make either the eastern or western legs the official route of the Ice Age
Trail and designate the other one a National Side/Connecting Trail.
 |
| an Ice Age Trail map from 1986* |
At one point Congressman Reuss resigned in protest from the board of
directors of the Ice Age Park and Trail Foundation only to rejoin a few
months later. The issue remained a source of unrest. Some maps of
this era showed the eastern route through Portage while others showed
the western route into the Driftless Area and Glacial Lake Wisconsin,
depending on who created the map.
At last, an official effort to put the questions to bed reached fruition in
early 1987. Letters were exchanged between Congressman Bruce Vento,
Chairman of the Subcommittee on National Parks and Public Lands, and
William Penn Mott Jr., National Park Service Director, that outlined what
Congressman Vento called “a reasonable solution” of making the two legs
of the big loop both part of the official route of the Ice Age National Scenic
Trail. Thus the big loop was born out of compromise.
Still, in the 1990 edition of
On the Trail of the Ice Age, Congressman Reuss
showed none of the western leg of the big loop on any maps but he did
include a one-paragraph description of its general route.
In 1999 the Partnership for the National Trail System held its annual
conference at Lake Tahoe. Afterward a few of us accepted an invitation
from Congressman Reuss to meet at his retirement home in Belvedere,
CA. He and his wife were generous and delightful hosts. The elderly
statesman had a few Ice Age Trail business items he wanted to impress
upon us. One of these was the big loop. As he had done with me once before during a telephone call, at his dining room table he asked that we
remove the western leg of the big loop from all maps. Having not lost his
powers of persuasion, he made a strong case. But one of my companions
that day was a long-time Ice Age Trail board member who provided an
equally compelling counter argument. The retired Congressman elegantly
shifted the discussion to his next topic.
Questions about the big loop still arise from time to time. Aspiring
Thousand Milers sometimes ask if one must hike both legs of the big loop
to be considered a Thousand Miler. The answer is “no.” In this case, half a
doughnut is sufficient.
To some, the big loop remains a quirk in the Ice Age Trail.
Others embrace it as part of what makes the Trail unique and wonderful.
------------------------------------------
* 1986 map appeared in
Wisconsin's Foundations: A Review of the State's Geology and Its Influence on Geography and Human Activity, by Gwen Schultz, University of Wisconsin Press, 1986.
A version of this article first appeared in the Summer, 2016 edition of Mammoth Tales
, a quarterly publication of the Ice Age Trail Alliance.
