The Big Burn

The Big Burn

Author: Timothy Egan

Publisher: HarperCollins

Published: 2009-10-19

Total Pages: 349

ISBN-13: 0547416865

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National Book Award–winner Timothy Egan turns his historian's eye to the largest-ever forest fire in America and offers an epic, cautionary tale for our time. On the afternoon of August 20, 1910, a battering ram of wind moved through the drought-stricken national forests of Washington, Idaho, and Montana, whipping the hundreds of small blazes burning across the forest floor into a roaring inferno that jumped from treetop to ridge as it raged, destroying towns and timber in the blink of an eye. Forest rangers had assembled nearly ten thousand men to fight the fires, but no living person had seen anything like those flames, and neither the rangers nor anyone else knew how to subdue them. Egan recreates the struggles of the overmatched rangers against the implacable fire with unstoppable dramatic force, and the larger story of outsized president Teddy Roosevelt and his chief forester, Gifford Pinchot, that follows is equally resonant. Pioneering the notion of conservation, Roosevelt and Pinchot did nothing less than create the idea of public land as our national treasure, owned by every citizen. Even as TR's national forests were smoldering they were saved: The heroism shown by his rangers turned public opinion permanently in favor of the forests, though it changed the mission of the forest service in ways we can still witness today. This e-book includes a sample chapter of SHORT NIGHTS OF THE SHADOW CATCHER.


Year of the Fires

Year of the Fires

Author: Stephen J. Pyne

Publisher:

Published: 2008

Total Pages: 0

ISBN-13: 9780878425440

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"In the summer of 1910, wildfires scorched millions of acres in the West, darkened skies in New England, and deposited soot on the ice of Greenland. The flames ravaged pristine wilderness along with farms, towns, and mining camps, culminating in the deaths of seventy-eight firefighters in the Big Blowup along the Montana-Idaho border. The blazes also illuminated a national debate raging about fire policy. Year of the Fires is the fascinating story of that catastrophic year and its pivotal role in establishing how we deal with forest fire in this country. Everything from the tools firefighters carry to strategies of land management was shaped by the fires of 1910. Stephen Pyne, acclaimed by the Journal of American History as America?s foremost historian of fire, not only explains how the fires occurred, how they were fought, and who fought them, but puts the event in the context of America?s changing attitudes about forests and fires. In 1910 steam-powered trains were spewing sparks across the West while homesteaders were burning their way into the woods to create farms and settlements. Teddy Roosevelt had just doubled the size of the forest reserves, and the idea that timber is finite was just entering American consciousness. The Forest Service, only five years old, was struggling to solidify its role. And even as the country?s first foresters were facing the question of how to protect the new public lands, the West exploded in fire. Pyne brings that astonishing year to life in a riveting narrative of the fires, the people, and the decisions that continue to affect American life"--Amazon.com.


The Big Burn

The Big Burn

Author: Jeanette Ingold

Publisher: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

Published: 2002-06-01

Total Pages: 319

ISBN-13: 054774594X

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Winner of the Western Writers of America Spur Award for Teen Fiction from the author of Hitch and Paper Daughter. “A must-read for adrenaline junkies.”—VOYA On a hot summer day in 1910 a teenage soldier assembled his rifle. A girl argued to save trees on a mountain homestead. A young man set out to fight fire. None knew that soon the many blazes burning across northern Idaho would blow up and send a wall of flame racing their way. Portraying a natural disaster that would dictate how the United States would fight wildfire in the 20th century, The Big Burn brings to life a turning point in fire science, forestry, and history. Richly drawn characters doing their best against gigantic odds will grip your heart. The realistic depiction of wildfire will make you feel you were there. With non-fiction Field Notes and an Afterword about firefighting today, it’s a novel that moves from the 1900s into the 21st century. Whether you’re an adult or young adult reader, you’ll come away with a new understanding of nature and a “heighten[ed] appreciation for the courage and sacrifice of firefighters and settlers” (Publishers Weekly). Montana Book Award Honor “Historically accurate and dramatically engaging.”—Teen Reads “Presents a vivid picture of a natural disaster while skillfully conveying in fluid prose the individual stories of the three young people.”—Horn Book “Fascinating and harrowing . . . for any kid whose tastes run to disaster and survival, mixed into a coming of age story.”—Richie’s Picks “A solid adventure story with a well-realized setting.”—Booklist


America's Fires

America's Fires

Author: Stephen J. Pyne

Publisher:

Published: 2009

Total Pages: 116

ISBN-13:

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"America's Fires reviews the historical context of our fire issues and policies that can inform the current and future debate. The forecast makes it imperative that the nation review its policies toward wildland fires and find ways to live with them more intelligently"--Provided by publisher.


Between Two Fires

Between Two Fires

Author: Stephen J. Pyne

Publisher: University of Arizona Press

Published: 2015-10-15

Total Pages: 550

ISBN-13: 0816532141

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From a fire policy of prevention at all costs to today's restored burning, Between Two Fires is America's history channeled through the story of wildland fire management. Stephen J. Pyne tells of a fire revolution that began in the 1960s as a reaction to simple suppression and single-agency hegemony, and then matured into more enlightened programs of fire management. It describes the counterrevolution of the 1980s that stalled the movement, the revival of reform after 1994, and the fire scene that has evolved since then. Pyne is uniquely qualified to tell America’s fire story. The author of more than a score of books, he has told fire’s history in the United States, Australia, Canada, Europe, and the Earth overall. In his earlier life, he spent fifteen seasons with the North Rim Longshots at Grand Canyon National Park. In Between Two Fires, Pyne recounts how, after the Great Fires of 1910, a policy of fire suppression spread from America’s founding corps of foresters into a national policy that manifested itself as a costly all-out war on fire. After fifty years of attempted fire suppression, a revolution in thinking led to a more pluralistic strategy for fire’s restoration. The revolution succeeded in displacing suppression as a sole strategy, but it has failed to fully integrate fire and land management and has fallen short of its goals. Today, the nation’s backcountry and increasingly its exurban fringe are threatened by larger and more damaging burns, fire agencies are scrambling for funds, firefighters continue to die, and the country seems unable to come to grips with the fundamentals behind a rising tide of megafires. Pyne has once again constructed a history of record that will shape our next century of fire management. Between Two Fires is a story of ideas, institutions, and fires. It’s America’s story told through the nation’s flames.


This Is Montana

This Is Montana

Author: Rick Graetz

Publisher: Farcountry Press

Published: 2003-01

Total Pages: 448

ISBN-13: 9781891152184

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A comprehensive look at the geographic beauty of the state through 151 lively essays. Features 124 black-and-white photographs.


The Northern Rockies

The Northern Rockies

Author: Stephen J. Pyne

Publisher: University of Arizona Press

Published: 2016-09-13

Total Pages: 158

ISBN-13: 0816533512

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"The Northern Rockies is part of the multivolume series describing the nation's fire scene region by region. The volumes in To the Last Smoke also cover Florida, the Northern Rockies, the Great Plains, the Southwest, and several other critical fire regions"--Provided by publisher.


Forty Years a Forester

Forty Years a Forester

Author: Elers Koch

Publisher: U of Nebraska Press

Published: 2019-10-01

Total Pages: 246

ISBN-13: 1496217268

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Elers Koch, a key figure in the early days of the U.S. Forest Service, was among the first American-trained silviculturists, a pioneering forest manager, and a master firefighter. By horse and on foot, he helped establish the boundaries of most of our national forests in the West, designed new fire-control strategies and equipment, and served during the formative years of the agency. Forty Years a Forester, Koch’s entertaining and illuminating memoir, reveals one remarkable man’s contributions to the incipient science of forest management and his role in building the human relationships and policies that helped make the U.S. Forest Service, prior to World War II, the most respected bureau in the federal government. This new, fully annotated edition of Koch’s memoir offers an unparalleled look at the Forest Service’s formative ambitions to regulate the national forests and grasslands and reminds us of the principled commitment that Koch and his peers exemplified as they built the national forest system and nurtured the essential conservation ethic that continues to guide our use of the public lands.