Los Angeles herald., 1910-09-06
PINCHOT RECALLS
HISTORIC FIRES
Forestry Primer Tells of Flames
That Swept New BrunS-
wick in 1926
COVERS 2,500,000 ACRES
Former Forester Claims North
west HoIoCauStS Have No
Equal in History
COVERS 2,5oo,00o ACRES

WASHINGTON, Sept. 5.-The Hinck-
ley, Peshtigo and Miramichi forest
fires are the only fires of past years,
according to Clifford Pinchot, which
| have attained the historic Importance
| to be compared with this summers
| holocausts of the northwest. The man
who was chief forester of the United
States under three administrations
wrote a primer of forestry when he
was in office and included a forest fire
history, in tabloid form, in which he
says:
when all the conditions are favor
able forest fires sometimes reach gi-
gantic proportions. One of these is the
MiramiChi fire of 1925. 1t began its
greatest destruction about l o'clock in
the afternoon of October of that year
at d place about sixty miles above the
town of Newcastle, on the Miramichi
river. in New Brunswick. Before 10
o'clock at night it was twenty miles
below Newcastle. In nine hours it had
destroyed a belt of forest eighty miles
long and twenty-five miles wide. Over
more than two and a half million acres
almost every living thing was killed
Even the fish were afterward found
dead in heaps on the river banks Five
hundred and ninety buildings We're
burned, and a number of towns, includ-
ing Newcastle, Chatham and Douglas
town, were destroyed. One hundred
and sixty persons perished and nearly
a thousand head of stock. The loss
from the Miramichi fire is estimated
at 100000, not including the value of
the timber.
RECALLS 1871 FIRE
"The Peshtigo fire of October 1871,
was still more severe than the Mira
michi. 1t covered an area of over 1000
square miles in Wisconsin and involved
a loss in timber and other property of
many millions of dollars. Between 1900
and 1900 persons perished, including
nearly half the population of Peshtigo,
at that time a town of 1000 inhabitants.
other fires of about the same time were
most destructive in Michigan. A strip
about forty miles wide and 1S0 miles
long, extending across the central part
of the state from Lake Michigan to
Lake Huron, was devastated. The es-
timated loss in timber was about 4,000,
900, 900 feet board measure, and in
money over $40, 900, 900. Several hundred
persons perished.
I'm the early part of September, 1881.
great fires covered more than 1900
square miles in various parts of Michi-
gan. The estimated loss in property,
in addition to many hundred thousand
acres of valuable timber, was more
than 81 300, 900. Over 5000 people were
made destitute, and the number of lives
lost is variously estimated at from 150
to 500
"The most destructive fire of more
recent years was that which started
near Hinckley, Mimi, September 1,
1894 While the area burned over was
less than in some other great fires, the
loss of life and property was very
heavy. Hinckley and six other towns
were destroyed, about 500 lives were
lost, more than 1000 persons were left
destitute and the estimated loss in
property of various kinds was $25,000,-
000 Except for the heroic conduct of
locomotive engineers and other rail-
road men the loss of life would have
been far greater.
BLAZE UNNECESSARY
"Ths fire was all the more deplor-
able because it was wholly unneces-
sary. For many days before the high
wind came and drove it into uncon-
trollable fury it was burning slowly
close to the town of Hinckley and
could have been put out.
I'm the majority of such forest fires
as these the destruction of the timber
is a more serious loss by far than that
of the cattle and buildings, for it car
ries with it the impoverishment of
whole region for ten or even hundreds
of years afterwards. The loss of the
stumpage value of the timber at the
time of the fire is but a small part of
the damage to the neighborhood. The
wages that would have been earned i'll
numbering, added to the value of the
produce that would have been pur-
chased to supply the lumber camps,
and the taxes that would have been de-
voted to roads and other public i'm
provements, furnish a much truer mea-
sure of how much, sooner or later it
costs region when its forests are de-
stroyed by fire"