Reuben Sanford, one of Wilmington's first settlers, was an instrumental force in the town's development, building mills, an iron forge, stores, and distilleries. Even when travel to the Adirondacks required many challenging miles by train and stagecoach, Wilmington's hotels and resorts made it a popular tourist destination, with local guides serving visiting hunters and fishermen and leading horseback rides and hikes to the top of Whiteface Mountain. As roads improved and automobiles came to the Adirondacks, Wilmington entered a new age of tourism with the construction of motor hotels and attractions such as Santa's workshop and the Whiteface Mountain Ski Resort. In every season, skiing, fly fishing, hiking, kayaking, and cycling continue to draw people to Wilmington. The Ausable River is home to some of the most famous fly fishing in the United States, with numerous Brown, Brook, and Rainbow Trout caught each year, and many popular fly fishing pools lie along the West Branch on NY Route 86. From 1934-1935, the Wilmington Stone Bridge was built over the West Branch of the Ausable River to complement construction of the Whiteface Memorial Highway by the Work Projects Administration. The concrete bridge was faced with anorthosite granite quarried from construction of the Whiteface Memorial Highway. The National Wild and Scenic Ausable River is 94 miles long and drains a watershed of 516 square miles. Its East and West branches join at Ausable Forks and plunge through Ausable Chasm before emptying into Lake Champlain. The West Branch begins at Marcy Brook near Heart Lake in the Town of North Elba, flows past John Brown's Farm and the Olympic Training Center south of Lake Placid, drops through falls at High Falls Gorge, and supplies water for snow-making at the Whiteface Ski Resort on the way to Wilmington, while the East Branch starts at Lower Ausable Lake, passes through Keene, and joins the West Branch at Ausable Forks.