The Kimball graphic. (Kimball, Brule County, Dakota [S.D.]) 1883-1905, 1883-08-24
THROUGH MICHIGAN WILDS.
Lights il: the Wilderness-A Back
woodman's Home-A Cyclone OF

Fire.
The following extracts are from a let
ter ola voyager down the river Au Sable,
to the New York Evening Post:
An area of ten counties in the north
eastern corner ofthe southern peninsula
of Michigan may-though on much
more ample scale-be likened to the
Adirondack region of New York state
The tract includes region of not less
than 5000 square miles, or nearly twice
the area ofConnecticut Vast land tracts
covered by scrawny oaks and under
brush are succeeded by hills crested
with pine. Then came tangled forests
ofmixed growths or dense cedar swamps,
almost impossible even to the foot of
the hardened backwoodsman One may
travel for dozens of miles without seeing
house or other sign of human habita-
ton, and whole counties in some
instances contain only few hun
dred settlers altogether and not single
village worth the name.
During four days water trip for
distance of 140 miles, the traces of man
were scant and at far intervals. Three
or four farm-houses, tented party from
Detroit with whom we passed hospit-
able hour, and small lumber camp
were the only visible human signs.
Every half mile or SO brings to the sight
Of the floating yoyager on the Au Sable
in extent. There are thick, blackened
tree-trunks on the ground, protruding
in all directions from their shroud of
,cl A
spectacle are the dead pine trees still
standing in these open areas, black
around the roots, but reaching, straight
as dart, for hundred feet in air,
These are the gaunt skeletons of what
were once splendid living pines, now
killed by the forest fires which periodi-
cally sweep through the Michigan wood
lands during drought. Not far below
the mouth of the Au Sable, and on the
other side of,Saginaw bay, is the region
where the deadly fires two
years ago devastated the
wood lands so terribly, causing the loss
of hundreds of lives and million of dol
lars worth ofproperty. Awell.informed
resident of Michigan, who lives but a
few miles away from the scene of that
horror, has described it to me, not as
burning forest in the ordinary sense,
but a cyclone of fame, marked by char
acters of fire by many of the phenome-
na of wind tornadoes. In some way the
forces generated powerful volume
of air, filled with gases in combustion,
and penetrated with almost supernatur-
al heat. 1t was sort of earthly coun-
terpart of those tornadoes of fiery gas
which men of science tell us sweep over
the incandescent envelope of the sun.
Wherever it touched the ground this
flaming destroyer consumed. Woods,
fences, houses, cattle, and human beings
were not merely burned but almost va
porized. Often the whirlwind left be-
hind marked track of ruin, with clear
ly delineated sides. One man would be
taken; another few feet away LETT.
Half of line of fence " uld
be destroyed utterly, while
the remaining half would not be
even scorched. The whirlwind of heat,
like a cyclone of wind, sometimes
bounded from the earth only to descend
again and lick up the house and forest.
1t leaped open fields and rivers in an
instant, converting the surface waters
into steam, and finally stopped its ca
reer of destruction, not because of lack
of fuel, but because its strange fiery en-
ergy was in some occult way exhausted.
As proving its peculiar cyclonic quality,
there IS wei-authenticated story of a
farmer who had left his pantaoons in
the middle of ten-acre lot. In the
pockets were five trade dollars, and
when he returned after the swift pas
sage Of the flaming whirlwind he found
only a lump of melted silver where he
had left the coins. Looking upon the
enormous masses of pine trees and veg
citation which line the Au Sable, con-
celving their int1ammable condition
during drought, and then glancing anew
at the open burned spaces, with their
huge charred tree trunks, one could
easily imagine that the stories about the
Michigan forest fires were neither fan
ciful nor exaggerated,
To the Eastern eye how rough in its
outfit and how pathetic in its lack of
comforts is the home of one of these pi-
oneers. The one have in mind stands
close to the brink of the river, so near
the waters that the rise of last sprins
swept up to the door sills. 1t is made
Of logs squared and fitted at the ends,
with the long interstices between the
tlrnbers closed by wooden wedges and
mud work. Two or three rugged ont
houses similarly constructed give shelter
to the farm cattle. The half-cleared
tract of l60 acres, taken by the settler
under the Homestead Act, is thickly
scared with blackened stumps, between
which rise struggling patches Of grass or
grain. Nearer the dwelling is scrubby
garden covered with a weak growth of
circled by the ghost-like array of those
dead pines which all over Michigan re-
cord the sweep of the forest fires. The
dismal environment of the settlers
home has its counterpart in the rough
walls, the uncarpted floor, the squalid
children chasing each other from corner
to corner, the flock of frowsy chickens
that enter and go out at will, and, most
pathetic of all. the house. wife, worn
with toll and child. bearing, who, with.
an infant at breast, pulls wearily through
her dreary round Of drudg cry. In a
closet fitted with dirty Der this sleep the
children. Go up now to the upper story
next the roof where the grown people
and visitors sleep. The garret, for it is
nothing else, runs the whole length and
breadth of the structure. In each corn
er is a rude bed fit d with sheets and
coverlids on which seem to have gathered
the dirt ofages. On one of these in the
open room slept my comrade and my
self. In another was the mistress of the
fnanse, whose husband was away in one
Of the lumber towns; and in a third mar
row couch slumbered two hired men.
With one exception the nearest
neighbor of this backwoods
family was some ten miles
away; all supplies had to come from
the lake town of Au Sable, fifty or sixty
miles distant. over sandy roads; and the
only visitors were the rude luinbermen
or an occas.onalsportsman from Saginaw
or Detroit. Yet. amid all these shadows
of poverty, hardship, and squalor. there
were some riffs of lipht Faint oliunses