My Side of the Mountain is a 1969 Panavision and Technicolor film adaptation of the 1959 novel of the same name, by Jean Craighead George. It was directed by James B. Clark.

The story revolves around twelve-year-old Sam Gribley (Teddy Eccles), a devotee of Thoreau (as many were back in the 1960s). He decides to leave Toronto to spend time alone in the Canadian woods to see if he can make it as a self-sufficient spirit after his parents' promised summer trip doesn't pan out. He also wants to work on an algae experiment while he is there.

Sam's immediate companion is Gus, his pet raccoon, which lives with him in the city. He gathers supplies at a local store, hops on a bus, and heads down the 401 with Gus to what he calls "the Laurentian Mountains of Quebec". In actuality he ends up in the picturesque town of Knowlton, Quebec, southeast of Montreal, in the Notre Dame Mountains Range of the northern Appalachian Mountains chain along the eastern coast of North America from northern Georgia. Here he finds the perfect mountain stream and pond location to build a home in an old dead tree. He begins his long-planned algae experiments and proves his ability as a solitary young Thoreau living off the land and communing fully with nature.

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