by Dave Shors
As time passed, new roads were built, timber stands logged, and mining claims staked. That, coupled with the increase of cabins, homes, and campsites being built and developed on nearly every available piece of private land that ran along Poorman Creek and near his home, dramatically cut into the wild areas available to Ted. And made him angry enough to take chances.
OCT. 23, 1979. [KACZYNSKI JOURNAL]
…I wanted to shoot some of those miners who were [expletive] things up down around [name] Creek, if I could get an opporunity that the looked [sic] safe from the point of view of not getting caught. One day I went down there and watched, from cover, a guy with a bulldozer who was tearing a hung chunk out of a hillside that was otherwise very beautiful…. It made me sad to see a big old Douglas fir that this fool had torn up by the roots with his machine. But I didn’t shoot at him after all. In part this was due to the inhibitions that are trained into us in modern society, and which are very difficult to overcome. But I have advanced far enough now in that respect so that I might have been able to overcome the inhibitions except for the fact that…I had thought-out as well as instinctive reasons for not wanting to get caught; and I was afraid this guy might have a partner somewhere. Through the trees I had only a very fragmentary view of the site; the guy running the bulldozer might not be the only one there; if I crept close enough for a clear shot at the bulldozer-man, I might have been seen by another man who was nearby in another place without my knowing it. The woods were quite open—no good hiding. So I satisfied myself by going back a couple of days later when I correctly figured no one was there, and sabotaging the bulldozer. It was hard to do any thing to it because of its sturdy, tank-like construction, but I cut the fan-belt, cut some tubes, put dirt in the place where oil goes in, and a few other such things. Besides that, there was a nice new pickup down by the road, I think belonging to some of these mining-fools, and I smashed the windshield and cut some belts and tubes on it….
CODED JOURNAL
…SUMMER OF 1981 I BEGAN HEARING DISAGREABLE [sic] NOISES OF MACHINERY, SOMETIMES SURPRISINGLY LOUD, DEPENDING APPARENTLY ON METEOROLOICAL [sic] CONDITIONS.-OFTEN BUT OTHERWISE BEAUTIFUL, SILENT MORNING WAS-RUINED FOR ME WHEN THESE NOISES STARTEDUP. THE FOLLOWING WINTER MANY OTHERWISE PLEASANT EXCURSIONS-WERE RUINED FOR ME BY THE MOANING AND HOWLING OF THOSE IRON MONSTERS, AUDIBLE BUT OFTEN LOUDLY)[sic] FOR MILES OVER THE HILLS. MADEUP MY MIND TO GET REVENGE,-BUT IT WAS DIFFICULT TO DETERMINE JUST WHERE NOISE WAS COMING FROM. HAD TO WAIT FOR SUMMER ANYWAY, SINCE MY TRACKS COULD EASILY BE FOLLOWED IN SNOW, BUT NOISE SEEMED TO STOP INSPRING. THEN I BEGAN HEARING IT AGAIN IN LATE SUMMER, 1982. I THINK IT WAS IN SEPTEMBER THAT-I TOOK BLANKET, PISTOL, 1 DAYS RATIONS AND FOLLOWED-NOISE TO FIND IT CAME FROM A LOGGING OPERATION IN [name] CREEK DRAINAGE, LOGGING OFF ONE OF MY FAVORITE-WILDSPOTS. THEIR METHOD WAS HORRIBLE. AS FAR AS I COULD-TELL WITHOUT GOINGCLOSE ENOUGH TO RISK BEING-SEEN, THEY WERE JUST PUSHING TREES OVER WITH BULLDOZERS INSTEAD OF CUTTING WITH SAWS. WHEN THEY LEFT FOR THE DAY I WENT IN AND FOUND THE WHOLE SURFACE OF THE GROUND STRIPPED RIGHT OFF LEAVING UGLY TANGLE OF LIMBS, UPROOTED TRUNKS, AND DIRT. THEY LEFT A 5 GALLON CAN OF OIL SITTING ON THEIR MACHINE THAT THEY USE TO PICKUP LOGS AND LOAD THEM ON TRUCK. I POURED THE OIL OVER THE MACHINES ENGINE AND SET FIRE TO IT. I BET IT COST THEM OVER 1000 BUCKS TO FIX IT. SPENT PLEASANT NIGHT SLEEPING OUT ON TOP OF THE MOUNTAIN AND CAME HOME LEISURELY IN THE MORNING. I FELT SO GOOD AFTER HAVING DONE THIS. THOUGH A MITE UNEASY OVER THE RISK OF BEING SUSPECTED.
Besides the timber burned in Ted’s fire, the cost to the logging contractor to replace his equipment was $75,000—far beyond Ted’s thousand-dollar estimate.
He would write about each area as the changes took place and how they affected his way of life.
[FROM KACZINSKY’S SPANISH-LANGUAGE JOURNAL,
TRANSLATED BY LANGUAGE SERVICES UNIT]
JAN. 31, 1982
This winter, hunting in the long hill which extends towards the south from the first peak to the east of Baldy, I have seen many colored stripes on trees. I think that this means that they will cut wood there, which will ruin the area. That one is my favorite area which can be reached easily from my ranch without staying in the woods overnight. Besides it is also the best area to hunt for rabbits on this side of Stemple Pass Road. The ruin of this area will make it more difficult for me to get enough meat during the winter.
Further encroachment on Ted’s own side of Stemple Pass Road led him to state: “I have practically written off the entire area around my home as a total loss.”
The south side of Stemple Pass Road, my side, was another story. He knew my large block of land was protected, no matter how many people moved into our area, no matter how many new roads or logging sales. I would keep it a safe haven, the one place where Ted could be assured of privacy, the one place he could freely hunt year-round without the danger of being caught.
Ted wrote extensively in his journals about how much he valued this gulch, extolling the silence, the total privacy, the mountain grouse that were so tame since they were never hunted, and the beauty and unspoiled nature of the area.
He used words like “special,” “magical,” “most favorite,” and “most secret” to describe the camps and his secret cabin there. He also used poetic and romantic words and phrases to describe his feelings: “tranquillity,” “sensitive to the silence,” “beauty and mystery of the wild,” and even “sacred.”
All these places he described were located in McClellan Gulch and the small tributaries that flow into it from the east and west. In fact, within ten pages of his Spanish-language journals, Ted described fourteen of his most special, secret, and favorite places, excluding his home cabin. Twelve were located within my drainage.
[FROM KACZINSKY’S SPANISH-LANGUAGE JOURNAL,
TRANSLATED BY LANGUAGE SERVICES UNIT]
JULY 25, 1982
I first went to my camp in the dry and open slope that faces McClellan’s stream. Since the weather appeared to be good when I was going to bed, I did not unwrap my coat cloth. It rained during the night; I had to get up, make fire, and unwrap my cloth; and I was wet nevertheless.
JULY, 1982
…Another following day, the day appearing much better, and I having found that it was possible to bring my bundles with less difficulty then [sic] before, encouraged myself and went to my high camp over McClellan.
OCTOBER 1982
In the first half of October, feeling nervous and tired due to difficulties and anxiety that had to do with my cellar to store roots, and other anxieties too, I picked up only the more essential things and I took off for my favorite place: the stream that flows into the McClellan Stream…
NOVEMBER 15, 1982
… I headed south walking…across the slope of the mountain, on top of McClellan, very high. The morning was very beautiful and I was very happy…Afterwards, I walked a little bit down to the stream, so as to enjoy the wonderful and dark beauty of the place…I wish I could express the wonderful mystery of that stream.
AUGUST 1982
The weather still looked bad in the morning; I was discouraged because of this and because of the difficulty of bringing my bundles and as a consequence I went to my most secret camp…McClellan; when it makes rain this camp is much better than the other one….
Another following day I took a stroll uphill on the opposite side of the camp. By good fortune I was able to kill a blue partridge. I picked up a few wild onions too. For me that place is somewhat sacred, because it had not been touched too much by the hands of men.
JULY 29-30, 1982
Another following day I went to my high camp over McClellan; it turned out to be hotter than the day before and even though I had with me approximately half a canteen (or a “quart”) of water, I still suffered from more thirst and tiredness than the day before.
NOVEMBER 1982
Upon arriving to my old camp in that place near the stream that flows in the McClellan Stream, I began to feel the tranquillity of the forest. I did not care that the forest
was cold or wet, with an inch of snow that covered the ground. As always, I enjoyed the wild beauty of that area.
NOVEMBER 29, 1981
In my earlier notes I mentioned that I built a very small cabin in an isolated site several years ago. Near my cabin was a favorite place of mine where I would usually camp out. Here an owl would usually sing for me at night…It is tranquil here; there is peace here. The soft sound of the wind in the pines increases the feeling of peace.
APRIL 29, 1983
The twenty ninth of April the sky was clear and the weather was pleasant, and I transferred my [secret cabin] camp out to the next cliff [direction] from where the [cabin] is. After raising my coat and making a layer of branches to protect myself from the wet floor, I ate and went to sleep on the slope that was up higher from the camp. (This slope provided me with an abundance of herbs), [sic] The view seen from this slope is extremely beautiful. I enjoyed being there very much. After resting for a while, I walked barefoot from one side to the other of the hill and forest that borders with it, in a very silent way. I like very much to walk slowly and silently through the wild. The following day I went up the mountain at daybreak. I felt very happy and energetic. I walked on top of the mountain…It was a magical morning; I was very sensitive to the silence, to the beauty, and to the mystery of the wild. I was very happy.
MAY 1983
When the sun was setting towards the west, I went down to the Barranca Soslaya (slanting cliff) and then cliff up to the fountain [sic] to get water to drink. On the way, I stopped to dig some Lomatium roots. I got some big ones. I was tired when I arrived to camp. By the way, this camp is on a beautiful cliff, with a beautiful clear water stream. Up higher, the cliff is narrow and the slope is strong; further below,…the cliff is narrow there too and not too easy to access, so that it does not invite whoever passes through the Barranca Soslaya to go up there.
Ted caught a last glimpse of the country he loved as he rode handcuffed in the dark along the gravel Stemple Pass road toward Helena, knowing he would never again see the small cabin he had called home for twenty-five years.
He was carried over the rutted road that led across the Continental Divide he had explored so many times, into the Helena Valley and Helena Federal District Court, then to Sacramento, and finally to federal prison. There would be no “plan B.”
The freedom and personal autonomy Ted so adamantly sought were the same freedom and personal autonomy he chose to take from others. The rules Ted laid out for everyone else did not apply to himself.
But as he pleaded guilty in exchange for life in prison, society finally gained the upper hand.
The former resident of Montana’s Florence Gulch boarded a small aircraft that transported him from Sacramento to the maximum security facility in Florence, Colorado, where he would be spending the rest of his life.
As he entered the prison he paused and took one last long look at the Rocky Mountains, the northern part of which he had called home for nearly half of his adult life.
The cell that was to become his home would have no window to the surrounding mountains. A skylight to the outside world would be his only view; the small window directly overhead would offer him only a glimpse of the clouds and sky, not the mountains he had loved.
Ted had used the freedom our Constitution guarantees every citizen to carve a path of violence and hatred, a path that led him to a small cell in a facility that epitomizes the very technological society he loathed.
JAN. 21, 1978 [WRITTEN AT SECRET CABIN]
Our Society allows us great freedom to do nothing or to dream or to play games. But I consider these trivial freedoms and have little interest in them. What I want is the opportunity to make the practical decisions affecting the physical conditions of my own existence. For example: consider the risk of worldwide famine. Probably a small risk at present, so that modern society probably gives me better assurance of food supply than I could give myself as a primitive hunter-gatherer. But that’s beside the point. As a primitive I would have the right to deal with the problem myself and make my own decisions regarding it. As it is, the system makes all the decisions for me and I can do nothing about it. Another example: the system makes all the decisions influencing air pollution (and noise pollution!) and it galls me that I can do nothing to change these decisions. All practical decisions are made by the system. I want personal autonomy in making such decisions. But that is impossible in a technological society.
By his own hand, Ted destroyed his own personal autonomy—but what a wasteful wreckage he had made along the way, of himself and so many others.
Kaczynski on the way to one of his first appearances in Helena’s federal court.
One of the roads to Kaczynski’s home cabin, blocked off by FBI agents just after his arrest.
View to the west over Lincoln, Montana
By the time this photo of Kaczynski’s root cellar was made, officials had fenced off his Florence Gulch home.
Kaczynski’s fair-weather shower.
Kaczynski’s home-built fence stile shows his usual mixture of scrounged materials.
A typical Kaczynski trash dump, recognizable from the cans’ jagged openings and attached lids and the fact that they had been burned.
Chemicals found inside Kaczynski’s root cellar.
A buried food and ammunition cache.
Residents of Lincoln built their Community Center in the 1910s, using Model T’s to raise the eight log walls.
Chris Waits’ former shop where Kaczynski visited is now Waits’ “true Lincoln Center. ”
Lincoln’s Post Office.
Lincoln’s small branch library.
FBI agent Max Noel, left, with Chris Waits exploring the gulch.
Tasha, the malamute adopted to replace the first of Betty Waits’ dogs that were killed, would meet a similar fate.
Chris Waits’ storage areas allowed him to recycle materials, but also provided “one-stop shopping ” for the Unabomber.
A game trail through the woods near the secret cabin.
Kaczynski left tree blazes that gradually would blend in and other blazes that seemed like cryptic maps to special sites.
FBI agent Dave Weber and Chris Waits explored this old mine for Unabomber evidence.
The old miner’s cabin that Kaczynski cannibalized to build his hideout collapsed shortly after this picture was made, because Kaczynski had stolen enough structural parts. Note the missing roof truss in next photo.
From inside the old miner’s cabin. Kaczynski removed plywood (still in place at left) to roll up as chinking for his secret cabin.
Nearly invisible entrances to caves in the argillite cliffs, where Kaczynski stored materials.
This plastic container held solder and miniature wire connectors. Max Noel thought that Kaczynski had dropped it; Waits thought an animal had opened a cache.
To the casual observer, the remains of animals that Kaczynski poached might look like natural deaths. This site is near Ted’s “most secret camp.”
After months of disuse, the secret cabin was succumbing to weather and animals. Picture was made days after its discovery. Plastic tarp once had covered the roof; jeans were probably pulled out by animals.
The secret cabin’s homemade wood stove (above) photographed through roof timbers, and the piece of Phillips 66 can cut out for its door opening.
Going-to-town clothes were left to the elements, which included wild animals. Note fingerprinted brush handle at left.
Gloves for bomb-building.
Inside the secret cabin, evidence emerged as the ice and snow melted, including a serrated hunting knife. Duff on the floor is from the camouflaging branches that once covered the roof.
Evidence inside the secret cabin was being destroyed for months before the FBI arrived, as the rodent-nibbled shirt next photo.
Only very close to the secret cabin can you begin to see the “ghostly image of horizontal logs in a vertical world of tree trunks. ”
Chris Waits, left
, watches as Dave Weber sites the Global Positioning System unit near the secret cabin.
FBI agents Max Noel and Dave Weber with Chris Waits.
The secret cabin and a trademark can-burning site.
Kaczynski’s mountain-top view onto one of Waits’ logging sites, bare and snow-covered when this was shot.
Betty Waits and Bobby Didriksen.
Low-level aerial of Stemple Pass area.
Typical of the country Kaczynski loved to hike.
The Authors
Chris Waits (left) and Dave Shors.
As you turn off Stemple Pass Road and head up the lane that parallels McClellan Gulch you see a scattering of old vehicles and parts and—most imposing—an assembly of heavy equipment that includes giant Cats, semi-tractors, road graders, draglines, and gravel conveyors. It’s obvious these are tools of the trade for a man who makes his living off the land.