Campsite 17

The tallest ground on this site's horizon stands 3.2° above level, to the northwest.

On the March equinox direct sun reaches the pitch at 7:30 am and leaves it at 7:10 pm: 11 h 42 m of it, against 12 h 12 m of daylight on an open horizon.

By the end of the 1920s most of the failed orchard land belonged to the Allegany Orchards Corporation, and the Depression ended any revival. The land was cutover, burned, and planted with failing orchards. In 1931 the state forestry service under State Forester Fred W. Besley took an interest in it, and in August 1932 the deed to the State for 11,616 acres was recorded. DNR's own publications give other figures for the first purchase, about 2,000 acres in 1931 and about 14,400 acres; the 1932 deed is the only figure tied to a record. The first state work on the land was done by the Civilian Conservation Corps from 1933, chiefly fire control. The State kept adding land. By DNR's 2019 plan the forest covers 47,560 acres, the second-largest state forest in Maryland and about 12 percent of all the land DNR manages. Most of it is the even-aged oak that grew up after the clearing.

When the State took the deed for 11,616 acres in 1932, the land was cutover, burned and planted with failing orchards. The Civilian Conservation Corps spent the 1930s on fire control, roads and trails, and the forest grew back as even-aged oak. As it grew, hunters and the local wood industry used more of it. The first commercial regeneration harvest after state purchase was a 200-acre clear-cut in 1969 on Oldtown Orleans Road; that stand was thinned in 2010. Forest managers stayed long: John Mash ran the forest from 1975 to 1988, and Francis 'Champ' Zumbrun from 1978 to 2009. In 2007 a stand on Tower Road was cut by variable retention, taking most trees over two inches but leaving islands of old trees, and DNR maps about 250 acres of mature forest a year into this rotation, though not all of it is cut. The State has also set land aside. Under the Wildlands Act of 1971 three wildlands were designated here: Maple Run (2,760 acres), Deep Run (1,260) and Potomac Bends (2,034). DNR counts 14 small old-growth remnants, about 198 acres. The forest was first evaluated for dual certification under the Forest Stewardship Council and Sustainable Forestry Initiative standards in spring 2011 and is audited every year. The hiking trail system, about 40 miles, became a National Recreation Trail on 3 June 2005; the 12-mile mountain bike loop and the Maryland section of the Great Eastern Trail came after.