"Dudley" Shaw

The Angiers bought the cabin in 1969 and lived in it for the next few years, continuing to write their popular back-to-the-land books. A disciple of Henry David Thoreau, Bradford Angier moved from Boston to Hudson's Hope about 1947, leaving behind a career in advertising, and soon became a guru of wilderness survival skills and simplified living--increasingly relevant in the consumption-obsessed, Cold War 1950s. Wilderness Neighbors and At Home in the Woods are two of his myriad titles, many of which were illustrated by his wife Vena. I first bought one of his books, called How to Stay Alive in the Woods (originally published as Living Off the Country in 1956), around 1970 when I spent a summer working as a tour guide on the Bennett dam. Some people in Hudson's Hope today remark that Angier had a way of appropriating stories, telling them as if they had happened to him.

Another book that captured the romance and adventure of the Peace River country for an English audience was John Onslow's Bowler-Hatted Cowboy (William Blackwood and Sons, Edinburgh & London, 1962). Onslow was a British army officer in the Second World War; badly wounded, he eventually joined his brother-in-law R.D. Symons on a ranch in the Upper Cache Creek near Fort St. John.

Note from Tom Anderson, Summerland, BC [2006]: I was already ”living off the land” when I came across one of Bradford Angier’s books in Berkeley and took it back with me into the mountains.  I read it whenever a High-Sierra rainstorm kept me in my tent. I wrote to Angier while still camped in the Sierras and received a surprisingly prompt reply :  
 
   http://www.members.shaw.ca/fotofiles/angier.jpg  
 
Exactly one year later I was in Hudson Hope asking the postmaster where the Angiers lived.  She said they’d moved to California “years ago.”  I found their unoccupied cabin above the river not far from a new bridge.  Construction of the dam was going full blast and Hudson Hope was turned upside down. I stayed in the area until the weather got just a bit too nippy, then fled to the warmth and slow pace of the south Okanagan -- where I eventually settled down.  I’ll take peaches over moose any day.  
 
I read most of Angier’s other books, including the very first one which was written under Vena’s name.  Many of his later books were just minor revisions of earlier ones, but still written as though he and his wife were “roughing it” in the bush.
 
I wonder how many times successive Hudson Hope postmasters have been asked  that question?
 

Note from Bill Hunt: I read several books written by the Angiers about 30 years ago and recently got interested in them again. I've become curious about what happened to the Angiers. If you have any information about them or any leads, I would appreciate receiving them.

Note from David Belanger , Lincoln, Vermont: I, too, have been very curious about what ever happened to the Angiers. With the quantity of books that he wrote I find it amazing that there is no real biography, at least not beyond their days in Hudson Hope. I did hear years back that they had moved back to Boston. While doing a web search I found your page. Have you heard anything about them? ... [a couple of days later, David sent this]

Newspaper article from Weymouth, Massachusetts, apparently, on Vena Angier turning 90.

By Leeanne T. Stronach / Correspondent
Wednesday, December 17, 2003

To help her mark this occasion, some of her fellow members at the Weymouth Club celebrated with her after she completed a group exercise class. Angier who goes by the name Vena is a regular participant of the Young At Heart classes held at the gym three mornings a week. The classes consist of low impact aerobics, STEP aerobics, and muscle conditioning. ...

"The most inspirational woman I have met in my lifetime. I love her," said Marie Thompson of Braintree.

Vena was the youngest child of seven and was born in Hyde Park. She graduated from Hyde Park High School in 1932. She then attended Straton Business College and went to school for theater and voice in Boston.

Although she studied ballet, she enjoyed modern dance more.

As a young woman, Vena went on the road with a tap show, a musical comedy show that played in towns on the East Coast. She made about $22 a week, spending part of her earnings on hotel rooms .

During the summer of 1939, she meet Bradford Angier. She was a choreographer for a summer theater in Milton. Bradford was helping to finance the group but it wasn't until the following season when Vena was called back to be the choreographer again that Bradford expressed his interest in her.

At that time Bradford was a reporter for a Boston newspaper.

After they were married, the couple moved to British Columbia, Canada on the Peace River to "live off the land," Vena said.

Once there, Bradford began writing survival books. Vena who is artistic was asked by her husband to illustrate his first two books. At first she resisted saying "you're out of your mind," to her husband. She ended up submitting 200 pencil illustrations to the publisher for the books "A Personal Experience" and "How to Build a Home in the Woods" and 138 were used.

For the rest of his 35 books, photographs were used.

The couple stayed in Canada until a dam was to be built on the river. They moved to California where they built a house that was not quite 1,000 square feet. For ten years, Vena was a tour guide at the Hearst Castle.

In the early seventies, Vena and Bradford returned to Canada. At that time his books took hold with the back-to-the-earth movement. People tracked down Bradford "like he was their guru or something," Vena said.

The couple would talk to the visitors and when they would leave Vena and Bradford would discuss whether or not the visitors would make it living off the land or if they were dreamers.

Bradford died in 1997, a few months sort of their 50th anniversary. "We had a wonderful marriage," Vena said.

Vena stays busy doing crafts, drawing, using her computer and seeing relatives and friends. She lives in a condominium in Rockland.

"I think back and think how did I manage to do so many things. It's been wonderful."

***

I did not want to impose on their life so didn't make myself a nuisance, I remember his wife saying how much he appreciated my visits and interest. A truly Great Man, I owe part of what I am now to his teachings. A weird coincidence, I was back in Arizona, drove near their house from that era, when I got back home, I pulled out my tattered copy of "How to Stay Alive in the Woods" and re-read it. And most of his advice still holds true, for those of us interested in the wilds. He references Peace River frequently. I felt compelled to find out if anyone out there still thought about him, this is nice to know that you folks are out there.

Note from Alann B. Steen: A dear friend of mine sent your article that included Bradford and Vena Angier in "Vanishing British Columbia." My name is Alann Bradford Steen, named after Bradford when he and my parents were very close in New York in the late '30's. When I lived in California in the mid-60's I was able to meet him when he lived in Cambria. After that I moved all about, and we lost contact. I was sorry to read of his passing, but was happy to learn that Vena was living in Massachusetts--in Rockport, just a few miles from where I graduated from high school.

Note from Martin in Dorset, England: Hi there I read the note on your website about the Angiers. I only discovered them a few months ago though the books that they wrote. I got my first book, How to build your home in the woods, from a search on Ebay. I was instanstly hooked and have now collected most of the writings that I have found. 

Note from Laura Janes:  Ran across your article while looking up info on Vena and Brad Angier., and wanted to share a little of my story with you. My mom, Ada Guarisco was a avid fan of Brad and Vena, so in 1960, she resolved that we would take a trip to Hudson’s Hope to see for herself this pioneer land that she had dreamed of. Needless to say, she was also a great Thoreau reader.  We got to meet so many of  the townspeople described in the book and many more. We camped at Lynx Creek for several weeks, and became friends with the Neils, Mel and Bina and their daughters . For several more weeks we camped in the Glen where we were befriended by Bob and Harriet Birosh. Yes, we also knew Uncle Dudley. After we came back to California where my mom was an aerospace engineer, we started making plans to move to Hudson’s Hope. We left California in 1964, and settled in Lynx Creek at the bottom of the big hill and next to the Peace River. After settling in, Mom starting negotiations on the parcel of land she wanted very much, the property out at Chinaman Lake.
After many years of problems and anxiety, she finally got the deed, and we still have the property. We were living near the Hope during the time of the Dam project, but we moved back to California in 1968 due to my aunt’s health problems. Mom and I continued to go up every summer until I married, then she continued going either alone or later on with my son. Mom passed away in 2001, and now my family makes the yearly pilgrimage to our place in the woods. Growing up there, even though it was four short years and a month every summer, was the most defining time of my life. Mom tried to duplicate as much as she could of the Angiers ’ experience, so we hunted for deer/moose, grew our garden, chopped wood, learned to cook on a wood stove, snowshoe and so on. It was an amazing feat for two women and a little girl. My mom and Aunt Pat, were city girls originally from Tampa , Florida.   The locals knew us as “the crazy gals at Lynx Creek ” .
I don’t know if my mom ever met Brad and Vena or tried to contact them , but I wanted to let Vena know what a profound effect her books had on our lives and how we are forever grateful. If you have access to her mailing address I would like to drop her a note and tell her about us and let her know that all is well in Hudson’s Hope.

Note from Wes Harden: I was glad to see the update on the Angiers.  My mom, who died in 1995, purchased “Wilderness Wife” in 1977 and read it the last time again in 1992.  She loaned the book to me after she read it the first time.  I then found “At Home in the Woods” and read that a couple times. This week I am sitting in my cabin (Minnesota) with night temperatures getting down only to -15 and have been reading “Wilderness Wife” again.  I have a nice warm fire in the fireplace as well as “off peck electric” heat and a backup propane furnace, not as primitive as the other people who wrote, but I am in the woods.

I read “At home in the Woods” a second time a few years ago on a business trip to New Mexico.  They are both great reading. I have shared them both with my daughter and friends. I am going to order one of the other books I see listed by Angier.