I have never been a drinker myself, although for some years there after the Second War, I had word that Timothy had turned to the bottle. After what we had been through together, this saddened me. Later, I learned that the stories were only half true, and I felt a lot better. Though Timothy is only my stepbrother, we have loved and trusted each other ever since that terrible winter in 1921. We’ve taken different paths in life, but it has always been a comfort to me to know that somewhere there has been a person who would drop everything and fly to me if I ever became ill or found myself in danger. Of course, I would—and have—done the same. In the matter of Tim’s drunkenness, I soon learned that these were merely stories being circulated by his jealous wife in hopes of securing a large divorce settlement, that while Tim had perhaps been out on the town with the boys on one or two occasions, he was anything but a habitual drunkard. I put that lady straight, I can tell you. After I was done, Mrs. High and Mighty was lucky to get fifteen dollars a week temporary support. We Allisons have never been much for higher education and fancy clothes, but when trouble comes, we stick together.

I do not know how many millions of acres there are now in the Adirondack Mountain Preserve. Despite the constant efforts of the land developers to chop it up for their profitable schemes, the country there has been declared “forever green.” Even with the politicians whittling away at the charter, I think that it will remain so. Our world has shrunk so small that even the greediest of us are forced to see that it is high time we stopped destroying that which cannot be replaced in our lifetimes. In Albany, where I live and work, I am known as the Dragon Lady of the conservationists, a nickname that doesn’t bother me a bit. I have bearded Mr. Governor in his den, as well as those mealymouthed little senators from downstate who buzz around, hoping to get kickbacks from the developers.

The New York Times once put my photograph across three columns of their second section when I smuggled a nesting blue heron into the governor’s office and set her up at housekeeping. She nested there for three weeks, until the eggs hatched. There were many who laughed and poked fun at me. The governor was fit to be tied, but I made my point. A swamp-drainage program near Watertown, which would have disturbed thousands of nesting birds, was not approved. I still have the newspaper clipping, which says, in part: