HOW TELEPHONES SAVED LIVESBy C. J. BUCK

Assistant District Forester, U. S. Forest Service, Portland

(From tile Pittsfield (Moss.) J01l1"1l01 of October 5.)

(The following account of the fight against the destructive fires in sOllthern Oregondemonstrates by experimental proof what the value of prompt communication is in emergell M

cies such as arc likely to arise at any time during the danger season in the rugged country ofthe \Vest. Mr. Buck, who tells the story, is at present assigned as chief of the Office of Landsin his district, but assumed charge of the fire-fighting force, as described, when the need ofgood gCllcralshil) became great.-Ed.)

HOW telephones saved settlers fromdeath in forest fires," is the at­tractive title of a story told by

Assistant District Forester C. J. Buckin the O,-egon S""day !o"rnal of Sep­tember 25, when he returned from suc­cessful generalship of the southernOregon fire situation.

The timber loss in southern Oregonwas 800,000,000 feet on Governmentand private holdings, yet not a Ii fe waslost. It was the worst fire in north­west history, out telephones carryingwarnings with electric speed warne,!the settlers and the hunters and thecampers so that they got safely eachtime from the path of the devouringdestruction.

There were fires that raced fasterthan a man could run and burned withsuch tremendous' ferocity that- greenforests were completely burned. Whe(~1great trees had towered to magnificeri'tfheights, only smoking stumps' wereleft. The breath of the Aame in thecanyon like a furnace heated seventimes laughed derisively at the punyefforts of puny men to stay its courseand reached out a menace of death, toenfold them.

Here and there were the isolatedhomes of lonely settlers; out in thewoods were hunters; along the streamswere fishermen. Over the countryhung the smoke pall. The great areawith its clustering towns and its scat-

648

tered people had never known such adrought. It was as dryas the sandsof Sahara where rains never fall.The sun had been shining down dayafter day its heat unbearable and theforests were like tinder, ready to blazefrom a spark. The hot winds raged.too, day after day, ready to fan thespark into a roaring torrent of madlyspreading fire.

This was the condition found byForester Buck when he stepped off thetrain at Medford, going from Port­land to respond to urgent calls for as­sistance. The people were almostscared to death. The country was sodry,' the winds so high and so unceas­ing, and the smoke cloud so dense thatno one knew just when the Aamewould reach out hungrily in his direc­tion.

FIRES ALL AROUND

"Fires were buring at Mount Pitts,Anderson Creek, Wagner Creek nearAshland, near Butte Falls, on CloverCreek, Elk Creek, and at Cat Creek,"said Mr. Buck. "There had been nopreparation for so many fires. Theywere all unexpected. There were notby any manner of means enough of afire-fighting force on the ground tohandle the blazes, even had they bee\lof the ordinary controllable sort. Con­fusion was added to apprehension by

Company G, 25th Regiment (tom Fort George Wright, Washington

reports constantly beil1(T received ornew fires. I'm going to say frankly,n w that the dano'er is over, that for atime we thought the whole countrywould go.

wfo get an organization under suchconditions was as imperative as itseemed impossible. Never at the bestof the time could we get enough mento fight the fires and get the kind of acontinued patrol we neede~1.

"Right here is where the telephonessaved the day. In the Crater Nationalforest the government has spent $3,500in constructing 60 miles of telephonelines between the various outposts ofthe patrol rangers. "Ve also had freeuse of such private telephones asthere were. The fire situation waseonstantly. ehanging. '/Vhen a fewhours before it might have been clear,a carelessly dropped cigar might havebeen fanned into a raging fire. At apoint a little distant, where the fire hadbeen scrious, control of the situationmight have been obtained. So by aeonstant system of telephone reportswc wcre enabled to know where the

need for fire fighters was greatest andto keep them moving accordingly.

"The fire at Deadwood, a small butserious blazeJ will serve as an instance.Dc;td Indian J a few miles to the north,had been pretty well burned. over,when in the middle of the night, newsof the fire at Deadwood came. Ifound it possible to move men fromDead Indian and from Ashland at thesame time by using tl,e telephone. In24 hours the situation was under con­trol. Had messengers been trusted tobring the newsJ and other messengersbeen necessary to gather up the menand send them to the fire front, theblaze might have spread beyond allcontrol. At Deadwood the settlerscame near losing their property. Fireburned clear up to the baek yards andthe fire-fighting that was done, beforethe blaze could be controlled, was ofthe heroic kind.

THE WORST FIRE

"The worst of all the fires was onthe South Fork of Rogue river. A for­

649

650 AMERICAN FORESTRY

est officer told me that at a distance ofa mile the roar of the flames soundedlike an express train crossing a trestlenear at hand. I do not believe anotherfire in this district destroyed so muchtimber. The total loss was not lessthan 350,000,000 feet, worth on thestump about a million dollars. Herethe flames, racing through the tre·~

tops when the wind blew at all, spread­ing along the ground when the air wascalm, burned down the green timber,absolutely destroying its merchantablevalue.

"The pick of Jackson county timber,to be brief, was destroyed. Much of itwas in private ownership.

"Two companies of soldiers weresent to help the local fire fighters. Theyspent a good deal of their time pro­tecting the settlers' houses, but theydid splendid work. Unorganized workon the Rogue river fire would havedone little good. The thing that puz­zled them most was the way the firesspread. They arrived first at thenorthwest corner of the burning areathen began the work toward the east,trenching and back-firing.

"Occasionally they sent ahead tolearn how the fire was spreading. Inthe morning it was about a mile aheadof them. This gave confidence. Theythougllt by night they would surelyhave caught up. Night came, and im­agine the chagrin of the fighters whenthey found that the blaze was fivemiles ahead of them. It was burningaround them and coming back towardthem. It was then found necessary toimmediately move camp a distance of12 miles before they could get at thefire front. But there is no doubt thatthe soldiers saved in this locality 300.­000,000 feet of timber. They certainlyearned their transportation and theirwages many times over.

"As much could be said for all thesoldiers sent to fight fire in the Craterforest. They worked as hard as mencould work, unmindful of the dangeror the exposure. Some of them plead.ed that they might be allowed to workextra hours in order that there mightbe a greater certainty of bringing theflames under control.

PRAISE FOR THE SOLDIERS

"Particular credit is due their com­mander, Major Martin, for the master­ly way in which he handled his men.He inaugurated a system of keeping inclose touch with all points of dangerthat was well nigh perfect. He co­operated closely with the Forest Ser­vice. He kept in constant communi­cation with me, so that he might knowwhere to send his men to work themost effectively. It would take a long­time to tell how they worked eagerlyand uncomplainingly, with perfect sys­tem and discipline and with organiza­tion impossible to the volunteer firefighters or to the laborers that we has­tily employed.

"To say that no lives were lost doesnot imply that there was no danger.Ashland was in serious danger. It wasa wild and dramatic time when th~

fire bells rang and the people assem­bled on the public square. No wonderthe faces of the men grew pale as theyheard Ranger Gribble tell them that ifthe wind kept blowing, their homesand the city might go.

"Ashland, understand, is a fine littlecity of between eight and ten thous­and population. But from the edge ofthe town to dense timber is not morethan a mile and a half. There is agreat area on other sides of the townthat is overgrown with brush tremen­dously inflammable in such a season asthis. The business men closed theirstores and went out to fight fire in theforest. They did good work, for theywere fighting for their families andtheir property. A foggy day came,when in other places it rained, and thefires subsided. Fear was relieved, thetension relaxed. Then the wind cameagain, and again the town was in dan­ger. So the people fought their battlesagainst the fire fiend all over, and theywon.

"In the office there was press of bus­iness and dramatic scenes: It waslike headquarters in war time. Italked on the telephone on an averageof six hours a day. When I got awayfrom that job. I had scarcely any voiceleft.·

HOW TELEPHONES S.\ VEO LIVES

"Telegrams poured in from everypart of the United States. They wereinquiries from people who had friendsout in the forests. These had to beanswered. A local paper printed astory about settlers being endangered.A man stumbled into' the office, hisface blanched. He could not speak.In his hand he held a copy of thatpaper. 'My family is there,' he finallyo-asped. It took a lot of work to reas­sure that man and send him on his wayagain.

" .p at :'I fosquito Ranger's Post,:'III'S. Holts, the ranger's wife with herchildren were hemmed in by the flames.VOl' a while we thought them burned.But finally they got out alive. But itwould be hard to picture the grief andthe worry that attended all thesethings.

"There were so many reports oflives endangered, lives lost, settlers,fire-fighters and hunters hemmed in bytI,e flames, that we never knew what tobelieve. It was such a time as a mannever forgets.

THE FmES' LESSON

"Now that the danger is past, wewho fought the fires are left with cer­tain conclusions concerning the way inwhich the situation must be handledanother time.

"There must, in the first place, bebetter fire protection. More rangersare needed. This not alone for thesouthern Oregon country. No one cantell where the fire will be worst nextyear.

"Crater national forest has an areaof over I,OOO,()()() acres. At the timethe fires broke out there were between25 and 30 rangers for the whole vastarea. There should at least be a

ranger for each township of 36 sec­tions. There hould be more completeprovisions for the reporting of fires.The telephone service, such as we had,undoubtedly was the agent of preser­vation from double tI,e destruction re­corded. But there should be at least250 miles more of telephone lines. Thi,costs $60 a mile-cheap compared tothe value of the service.

liThe most essential thing in forestfire fighting is getting men. on theground. Ten men to handle the blazein its incipiency arc worth more than200 after the flames gain headway.

~:Alld, of course, the great thillO'" inpreventing destruction of forests byfires is precaution. Campers andhunters set most of the blazes. Thereseem to be indications in southernOregon that some of the forest fireswere purposely set. Some of them or­iginated in slashings. But the peopletell me that when the,' have learnedof a hunter or a campe"r moving fromtheir vicinity they go to look at thesite of his camp, and, ten chances toone, they will find embers, which ifcaught up by the wind constitute thebeginning of an uncontrollatle fire."

Assistant District vorester Buck isaccredited by the people 011 the groundwho watched his work and by otherswho know of the mellace of the fireswith having given an almost super­human service in preventing greaterdestruction. It was a time when aman needed to keep his head cool andhis mind working rapidly. Orderneeded to be worked out of confusion.This the assistant district forester did.Had it not been for his work un­doubtedly the timber loss, great as itis, would have been doubled.