Dark Days in August
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The 1910 fires' legacy went beyond the lives and landscapes they touched in Idaho and Montana. Shocked by the horrific losses, the public cried out for action, and Congress quickly doubled the Forest Service budget. The fires helped break a legislative stalemate to pass the 1911 Weeks Act, a seminal piece of legislation that eventually brought more than 20 million acres in the East under Forest Service protection. According to fire historian Stephen Pyne, the "big blowup" of 1910 is the founding story of modern-day fire suppression: "August of 1910 was the single most important moment in American fire history. It burned a swath across the memory of a generation of foresters." Three successive Forest Service chiefs had battled on the firelines in 1910; the experience permanently stiffened their future resolve to make fire suppression the agency's foremost priority.
1910 also helped shape Canada's Dominion fire control efforts, but in more modest terms — the difference being that without an institution the size of the U.S. Forest Service for the government to shore up, the 1910 fires had far less to affect in Canada. The fires followed on the heels of the horrific 1909 fire season, which the Dominion Forest Branch had used to successfully argue that prevention efforts alone would not bring down timber losses to fire. In the coming years, the branch began bringing stability to the Western provinces through systematic regulations on burning; investment in permanent improvements such as lookouts, roads and telephone wires to aid fire detection and suppression; and extending its fire protection efforts beyond the boundaries of its parks.
Nature gradually healed the fires' wounds, but their effect on U.S. fire management lasted much longer. That summer in 1910, the Forest Service decided there was no value for fire in forest conservation. The aftermath of the fires created the policy and infrastructure necessary to permanently ban fire from the national forests, placing the nation on a permanent war-footing against wildfire. Although they burned 3 million acres in Idaho and Montana, the 1910 Northern Rockies fires affected all of the country's forestlands for the next century.
July 16, Savenac Nursery, Mineral County, Mont. Event to highlight effect of fires on tree nursery and reconstruction after 1910.
Aug. 19-21, Wallace, Idaho Community events including Wallace Museum tours, Pulaski Tunnel and Ninemile Cemetery tours (self-guided), reenactments, historical theater productions, guest speakers Timothy Egan and Stephen Pyne, along with a new memorial dedication.
Aug. 20, St. Maries, Idaho Rededication of Woodlawn Cemetery Memorial and Community Dinner.
Aug. 20, Thompson Falls, Mont. "Step Back in Time to 1910" program at the public library.
Aug. 21, Avery, Idaho Bike tours and community breakfast, dinner and day-long events including presentations and historical interpretation by Steve Coady.
Aug. 21, Savenac Nursery, Mineral County, Mont. Rededication of Savenac Nursery Memorial Grove, planted to honor fallen 1910 firefighters, and a Civilian Conservation Corps reunion.
Aug. 21, Trout Creek, Mont. Reenactment of 1910 fire camp, community events and rededication of Swamp Creek Fire Memorial.
For event updates, visit www.fs.fed.us/r1/1910centennial/events-links.html.
Dr. Lincoln Bramwell is chief historian of the U.S. Forest Service. He spent nine seasons fighting fires for the Forest Service, including the Sawtooth IHC. Additional article review provided by Dr. Peter Murphy, University of Alberta, and Rick Arthur, Alberta Sustainable Resource Development.
Betty Goodwin Spencer, The Big Blowup: The Northwest's Great Fire (Caldwell, Idaho: Caxton Printers, 1956).
Stephen J. Pyne, Awful Splendour: A Fire History of Canada (Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press, 2007).
Elers Koch, "History of the 1910 Forest Fires in Idaho and Western Montana," manuscript available at USFS archive, Missoula, Mont.
Stephen Pyne quoted in Sherry Devlin, "90 Years Ago," The Independent Record, Aug. 10, 2000.
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