Barry Blackwell Tolman

He was born on March 22, 1933, and grew up in Nelson. He attended the Dublin School in Dublin, NH, followed by a short stint at Dartmouth College and a longer stint in the US Navy. He later attended Paul Smith's College in NY, where he earned a degree in forestry. Over the years, he worked in the forestry industry for Weyerhaeuser in Oregon; John Calhoun, a forester from Gilsum, NH; Bill House, a forester from Chesham, NH, and as land manager for Tri-State Timber in Hartland, VT.

He met Karen Hyman, from Dublin, NH, at a local contra dance and they were married in 1969, shortly after his father’s death. They settled on the family homestead, on Tolman Pond in Nelson, and were entrusted with management of the dozen year­round and summer rental properties that defined their lives at Tolman Pond for 50 years. In the 1970s he started his own construction business, Mosquitobush, Inc., which he operated for 35 years. He primarily did site work in the summer and logging in the winter, and was licensed by the State of NH as a forester, a land surveyor, and a septic system designer and installer.

During this time, he built his shop to house and work on his machinery. He gradually added outbuildings, including the Rube Goldberg cordwood-processing machine that he built from found pieces, and more buildings to dry the cordwood and store equipment.

With friends he bought a Bombardier logging tractor and rebuilt it into a ski tow to haul the kids up Tolman Pond’s Jack Rabbit ski hill, reviving an earlier ski hill tradition at Tolman Pond. He was co-plaintiff in reversing the development sale of about 500 acres of prime Nelson land, with over a mile of undeveloped shorefront on Spoonwood Pond, all now protected by the Harris Center.

After retiring his construction business, he built another building for an antique sawmill that he bought with the promise to his wife of building them a small "retirement" home at Tolman Pond. He said that the sawmill would pay for itself! He learned the sawyer's trade by milling out lumber used to build the new house, using his love of working with the forests and their products. Later he replaced his antique sawmill with a new one and operated it until he died.

His life was filled with the lifelong friends who shared the Nelson and Tolman Pond communities with him.

He was predeceased by his wife Karen, and survived by his children: Kirsten (Bee) Tolman and husband Simon Hurley of Cazenovia, NY; Stacia Tolman of Nelson; Ebenezer Tolman and wife Patricia Millan of Chestnut Hill, MA; Thomas Tolman of Nelson; two grandchildren: Wayland Tolman-Anderson and Francis Hurley Tolman; and his cousin Renn Tolman of Homer, AK.

A celebration of his life will be held later in the summer.

Memorial gifts may go to Historic Harrisville, Inc., PO Box 79, Harrisville, NH 03450 or to Nelson Conservation (Trails) Committee, c/o Town of Nelson, Nelson, NH 03457.