High Peak number twenty-six was named after Reverend Frederick Baylies Allen. A lifetime resident of Boston, Allen served as assistant minister of Trinity Church and later superintendent of the Episcopal City Mission, where he worked as executive secretary into his eighties. Allen frequently camped in the Adirondacks as a young man, where he also enjoyed sketching the landscapes and guides he came across during his adventures.

Allen endured a particularly nasty storm in the summer of 1869 (one that caused massive slides on Avalanche Lake and Big Slide Mountain) while camping on Upper Ausable Lake. After a member of his hiking party suggested a name be given as a reminder of the storm, his friend Dr. Twichell pointed to a nameless peak and suggested calling it “Allen Mountain.” Despite the spontaneity of this naming ceremony, Allen remained- though it would be over fifty years until the first recorded summit of this peak. On August 19th, 1921, the Marshall brothers and Herbert Clark reached the top of this mountain on their quest to conquer all forty-six High Peaks.

A trek up 4,340-foot Allen Mountain is anything but spontaneous, requiring seventeen miles and nine to eleven hours of hiking up unmarked trails to reach the summit. Due to its relative isolation from the rest of the High Peaks, Allen is usually hiked alone. The long hike and minimal summit views mean this mountain is almost exclusively hiked by aspiring and current forty-sixers, continuing the tradition of the first three men to summit the peak.

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_{“Allen Mountain.” Adirondack.net, www.adirondack.net/business/allen-mountain-11104/.}