This land is your land
From an overlook along the Fort River Birding and Nature Trail in Hadley, Massachusetts, you can see a turning point in Andy French’s career — a saddle in the Holyoke Mountain Range called “the Notch.”
“In 1979, when I was 21 years old and infallible, I was driving my motorcycle too fast on my way back from South Hadley at 2:30 in the morning,” recalled French, who is the manager of Silvio O. Conte National Wildlife Refuge today, but was a student at the University of Massachusetts Amherst at the time.
“Back when Route 116 was just about a hairpin at the Notch, I ran out of road on the left-hand side, went airborne, and took down the sign telling people coming from the other direction that a turn in the road was coming.”
Indeed it was. He severed both legs by 75 percent just above the knees, along with both femoral veins and arteries, the main arterial supply to the thigh and leg. “I ended up spending eight months in the hospital, and six months in a wheelchair,” he said. “They gave me a five-percent chance of keeping one leg, never mind walking again.”
Good doctors, good fortune, and a good attitude got him through, and he walked away from the ordeal with new perspective.
“I learned what a problem even two inches can be for someone with mobility challenges,” French said.
That realization turned into a commitment to universal access that has remained a priority throughout his career in the National Wildlife Refuge system.
“My strategy has been about making easier for everyone to connect with and enjoy the outdoors,” he said, noting, “What’s good for wheelchairs and walkers is also good for strollers, and if you can make getting out in nature a family event, all the better.”
Several years after his accident, French took the helm of Rachel Carson National Wildlife Refuge in Maine, and led the construction of the one-mile universally accessible Rachel Carson trail.
In his nearly two-decade tenure as the manager of Conte, he has overseen the construction of the universally accessible Mud Pond Trail at the Pondicherry Division, and the Fort River Birding and Nature Trail at the Fort River Division — the one with the view into his past. There are at least two more access opportunities in his future at the refuge’s Nulhegan Basin Division and the Fannie Stebbens Unit.
Like father, like son
French’s stint at Rachel Carson was the start of a career that has spanned seven refuges. It was also a sort of homecoming. His father, William French, also had a career in National Wildlife Refuges. When French was 10 or 11, his father did the ascertainment work to help set up Rachel Carson, including aerial surveys of the coastline. During these flights, French would sit in the back of the plane and hand his dad rolls of film — but pretend you didn’t read that.
Years later when French was managing Rachel Carson, he had cause to do an aerial survey himself. “It was like old home week,” he said. “As a kid, I had spent hours and hours in the air flying tight circles around all of these mini Maine estuaries.”
He had other formative experiences tagging along with his dad at work too, like working with Boy Scout troops to build trails. “It’s interesting how what you are exposed to when you are young changes your trajectory,” he observed.
Case in point, at Conte, French has focused on working with youth and young adults to build trails as part of his overarching strategy for connecting people to nature. “It builds relationships, gives them a sense of ownership, and increases awareness, because they will go home and talk about it to their families,” he said.
In addition to improving access to public lands, French has done his part to grow them. He served as the Chief of Realty in the North Atlantic-Appalachian Region for nearly seven years and helped set up three new refuges in the Service’s Midwest: Cypress Creek, Neil Smith, and Emiquon.
Now a large part of his job is figuring out what comes after protection. “Once you have acquired land, you have the ability to restore and manage it — to put the jigsaw puzzle of ecosystems back together.”
That big-picture view of the conservation landscapes allows him to think about public access strategically. “Our goal is to bring people into places that contributes to our visibility, value, and relevance,” he said.
During the pandemic, refuges have felt increasingly visible, valued, and relevant. “Our visitation went up two-and-a-half times — easy,” French said. Visitors would stop him on Fort River trail to tell him how thankful they were that it was there. He sees hope in the clear need for nature as a source of comfort and escape in these challenging times.
But he also hopes people don’t forget how important it was to have these public lands available when life goes back to “normal.”
“This has happened before, and it will happen again. When it does, there will probably be more people around,” he said. “If there’s more people, we need to have more public land to meet the demand. We have to be ready for it.”
That’s why prioritizing public access is so important. It’s not just about keeping pace with demand, it’s about sustaining it.
“If people don’t feel connected to the land, when it comes time to invest resources, they will invest elsewhere,” he said.
“We have a responsibility to be really good at what we do — not just managing land and studying flora and fauna, but figuring out how to connect the public with outdoor places in a way that’s compatible, appropriate, and sustainable.”
Luckily, French is really good at what he does, in part because he loves it.
“I’m really fortunate — about 90 percent of my career has been doing things that are pleasurable,” he said. “What do I do for fun? Part of that is going to work.”
