The Big Burn: Teddy Roosevelt and the Fire that Saved America
Where to buy The Huge Burn: teddy bear Roosevelt and the Fire that Saved America books online?
- ISBN13: 9780618968411
- Condition: NEW
- Notes: Brand New from Publisher. No Remainder Mark.
Product Description
Amazon Best of the Month, October 2009: When Theodore Roosevelt vacated the Oval Office, he left a vast legacy of public lands under the stewardship of the newly made jungle Service. Immediately, political enemies of the nascent conservation movement chipped away at the foundations of the untested agency, lobbying for a return of the land to private interests and development. Then, in 1910, several tiny wildfires in the Pacific Northwest merge into one massive, swift, and unstoppable blaze, and the jungle Service is pushed into a futile effort to douse the flames. Over 100 firefighters died heroically, galvanizing public opinion in favor of the forests–with unexpected ramifications exposed in today’s proliferation of destructive fires. Just as he recounted the Dust Bowl experience in The Worst Hard Time (a National Book Award winner), The Huge Burn vividly recreates disaster through the eyes of the men and women who veteran it (though this time lacking the benefit of first-hand accounts). It’s another incredible–and incredibly compelling–feat of past television journalism. –Jon Foro
Amazon Exclusive Essay: “The Ghosts of 1910″ by Timothy Egan, Leader of The Huge Burn
Nearly a hundred years ago, a huge piece of Rocky Mountain high country fell to a fire that has never been matched–in size, ferocity, or how it changed the country. I was drawn to this fire in part because of its mythic status among my fellow Westerners. But I was reluctant to try and tell this tale because everyone who had lived through it had gone to their grave. With The Worst Hard Time, I could look into the eyes of people who survived the Dust Bowl and hear their tales–firsthand. They were pleased to pass them on. I was the baton.
With The Huge Burn, the tales would have to come from ghosts. That fire burned 3 million acres and five towns to the ground in the hot sweep of a single weekend. It also killed nearly a hundred people. So, my task was to listen to the dead–persons Italian and Irish immigrant firefighters in their letters home, persons first forest rangers in memories collected in volumes stashed away in mountain towns, and in the notes and diaries of two fantastic men who founded the jungle Service. One, teddy bear Roosevelt, is a voice that lives nearly as loud today as when he bestrode the world stage. The additional, Gifford Pinchot, was less known, but his legacy, like that of Roosevelt, is everywhere in the public land that Americans now aver as a birthright. And what’s more, Pinchot himself was married to a ghost for nearly 20 years, one of the more fascinating things I establish in the haunt of the Huge Burn.
(Photo © Sophie Egan)
Photographs from The Huge Burn
(Click to Enlarge)
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| President Theodore Roosevelt and John Muir atop Glacier Point in Yosemite National Park | Ranger Ed Pulaski, whose actions saved many lives | Ranger Joe Halm after the fire. Like Ranger Pulaski, he helped save many lives |
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| Men standing amid downed timber after the Huge Burn of 1910 | Young Gifford Pinchot, a close friend and personal aide of Roosevelt’s and the first Chief of the U.S. jungle Service | A ForestService fire make the rounds in 1914 |
A Q&A with Timothy Egan
Q: Tell us something about that fantastic fire.
A: Well, it was the largest wildfire in American history, based on size. In less than two days, it torched more than three million acres, burned five towns to the ground, and killed nearly one hundred people.
Q: Wow. How huge is three million acres?
A: Imagine if the entire state of Connecticut burned in a weekend–that’s what you have here.
Q: And yet in your subtitle you call this the fire that saved America.
A: That’s right. This happened in August 1910–next year will be the one hundredth anniversary. It came just after teddy bear Roosevelt had left office, and left a legacy of public land nearly the size of France. But after Roosevelt was gone from Washington, in 1909, the jungle Service, the stewards of his legacy, came under attack. Gilded Age money wanted the rangers gone, the land placed in private hands. Enemies in Congress were constantly sniping at the young agency. And people out west were suspicious of the value of “teddy bear’s green rangers,” as they called them. They thought they were all college boys, softies, city kids.
Q: So how did the fire change that image?
A: It made heroes–nearly mythic heroes–of the young men who led platoons of firefighters into a sea of flames. The government had marshaled ten thousand people, an army of young men, immigrants, and volunteers, to fight the fire. It was the first large-scale effort to battle a wildfire in U.S. history. The huge-city daily newspapers here and abroad covered it like a war. The firefighters failed, because the Huge Burn was so huge and stirred so quickly. But they succeeded in one respect: it turned the tide of public opinion, and Roosevelt’s “Fantastic Campaign” was saved. But at an dreadful cost. Persons men should never have died. The fire was a once-in-a-century force of scenery, and nothing could have stopped it.
Q: How so?
A: The fire stirred quicker than a horse at full dash. It’s been estimated that it consumed enough trees to erect a city the size of Chicago. And it burned at nearly 2,000 degrees Fahrenheit in spots, incinerating the ground down to levelheaded rock. No army of bedraggled men with shovels and picks could stop that.
Q: After writing a book about the Dust Bowl, what drew you to a fire from 1910?
A: I guess I’m effective my way through the fundamentals, going from dust to fire! Narrative history, basically just storytelling, is such a thrill to renovate. You relive several lives through this drama. You inhabit their time. Like The Worst Hard Time, this book follows a dual-track tale and several real-life people through this event.
Q: How did you hear about the Fantastic Fire?
A: I’ve heard about the Huge Burn since I was a small kid, camping in Montana and Idaho with my family tree. It had this larger-than-life status. And then, as a New York Times reporter covering the West and many wildfires, I establish that this fire was a sacred text.
Q: What surprised you about the tale?
A: I reflect it was Voltaire who said history never repeats itself, but man permanently does. As with the tale I tried to tell in The Worst Hard Time, here you have a classic tale of human beings against scenery. Hubris plays a huge role. In the end, scenery wins, of course. Scenery permanently bats last, as they said after the Bay Area earthquake that disrupted the World Series.
Q: What else came as a surprise?
A: I was hugely impressed with Roosevelt and his chief forester, a very weird and original American now nearly lost to our history named Gifford Pinchot. These were two easterners, born into wealth, who crusaded a century ago for the Progressive Era thought that a democracy and public land were inextricably linked. They permanently talked about land belonging to “the small guy.” It was a radical thought then, at a time when the gulf between the rich and poor was never greater. Roosevelt and Pinchot were both traitors to their class, in that sense. And both were–how to say this–odd people.
Q: What do you mean by that?
A: I mean it in a positive sense. They went emaciated-dipping together in the Potomac, boxed and wrestled, climbed rocks and rode horses through Rock Creek Park, all while at the pinnacle of power, while hatching these conservation ideals. And Pinchot, the founding forester, on top of everything else, was married to a ghost–a dead woman, a right spiritual union–for nearly twenty years.
Q: What was that all about?
A: He was a odd guy, very smart but also very spiritual.
Q: And teddy bear Roosevelt, did he live up to the image carved on Mount Rushmore?
A: More so. He was such a…multitasker! A presidential polymorph! He wrote something like fifteen books before the age of forty. He climbed the Matterhorn after doctors told him he was doomed to a sickly, indoors life. And he took on the entrenched, powerful moguls and politicians of the Gilded Age.
Q: So the tale you tell is really two tales, as you mentioned earlier: the founding of American conservation and how this fire saved it?
A: Precisely. I’m permanently interested in the crash between man and scenery. But again, what struck me as unusual in this case was how the crash preserved something larger, more lasting–the thought of conservation itself.
Q: So the fire was a excellent thing?
A: I don’t reflect the families who lost their loved ones would say that. I try to focus on five or so people who faced this beast on the ground. You know, history is not permanently about Fantastic Men. It’s also about people in the margins, who rarely get recognition, who make it turn. And in this case, you had some Italian and Irish immigrants, a tough female homesteader, some African-American soldiers, some courageous and young forest rangers–all of whom were heroes, as vital to how this fire changed history as were Roosevelt and Pinchot.
Q: Aside from the conservation legacy, why is a fire from a hundred years ago vital today?
A: We’re entering an age of catastrophic wildfires, so the experts say. Huge parts of the West will burn over the next decade. In persons forests you have all this fuel built up: dead and dying trees. The land wants to burn, perhaps needs to burn. A huge part of the reason why goes back to the Huge Burn. I don’t want to give away a tale twist, but you’ll see late in the book that another lesson–perhaps tragic, certainly misguided–was taken away from the Huge Burn. It’s with us in a very huge way.
Q: How, specifically?
A: We’re seeing larger, hotter, longer, earlier wildfires around the country today, and much of them can be traced to the incorrect lessons of the Huge Burn. Firefighting now accounts for nearly half of the jungle Service budget. This was not what Roosevelt had in mind.
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I just heard an interview Egan, which left me less than likely to read this book. While it at first sounded appealing, the more the leader spoke, the less interested I was. He claimed the fire in 1910 had a huge and negative impact on the US Forestry Service. When pushed by the interviewer he couldn’t really come up with anything concrete. This sounded very much like wanting to make something that wasn’t there. No doubt the 1910 had a huge impact on the Forestry Service, but I doubt a negative one. Furthermore he kept claiming that Roosevelt had initiated this conversion of public land into Federally owned forest land, building the assertion that it was unowned. Not to belabor the point, but it had been owned by various American Indian tribes, whose possession of the land had been eradicated by the US government. In fact, the leader kept up the ongoing American like affair with Roosevelt, who would today be called a supporter of genocide. It was, after all, Roosevelt who said that the American Indian should be wiped out and that their lands all converted into national parks. The final nail in the coffin was that while recounting the conversion of land into Federal land he tried to recall the date of the Louisiana Buy, concluded in 1803, and couldn’t do it. What all this says to me that he has probably not done his homework and written an engaging book that involves Roosevelt (permanently excellent for book sales) but doesn’t really have much of a tale to tell.
Reader’s Rating: 2 / 5
I’m still in the middle of reviewing and reading this book, but it has been rather dull. Reading beware!
Reader’s Rating: 3 / 5
The Huge Burn Timothy Egan
Advance Reading Copy: Pub date 10/19/2009
I have come to the conclusion some of the greatest books are by newspaper journalist.
They have a way of retrieving data and present archives in a engaging manner.
Newspaper journalist fight for space and write with a certain economy to get their message across.
The Huge Burn: teddy bear Roosevelt & The Fire That Saved America is a very warm read. (no pun proposed)
Associates could tell I was pumped to be in the middle of a excellent book.
It took me roughly thirteen hours over seven days to end.
The prologue opens to a wall of flame where there are no additional choices except face the fire, or seek to escape by way of train.
A wildfire which ravaged over 3 million acres and a number of states in one weekend.
Colorful narrative is used to clarify the force and hurt.
One official assigned to assess the hurt and explore preventative measures will come to the conclusion, “Fire is neither excellent or terrible, it simply is”.
I deem the book a major literary work.
Early on, the reader is thrown into the ring, elbow to elbow with President Roosevelt, sitting in a overstuffed recliner in his upstate home, discussing national policy.
Gifford Pinchot proves to be a fantastic fan for the nation’s fledgling jungle Service.
John Muir is their guiding light, a simple man who made it a practice to throw some bread and tea in a pack for a hike in the country.
An Administration reliable for allocating a forest preserve a small over one and a half the size of Texas.
In matters involving corporate greed there are no gray lines.
Villains are well defined.
Evil runs rampant where a check on greed is not relegated.
Who are our fantastic American contemporary heroes.
Who controls private interest.
Are we governing responsibly, how are resources being divided.
Fresh air, clean water, abundant wildlife.
Is there hope for the common man to not be overrun, and live the fantastic American dream.
Pertinent issues to face at the advent of each ensuing century.
2010 inscription the hundred year anniversary of the men and women who help shape Theodore Roosevelt’s vision of a thriving Parks Department.
Their faces and names won’t be forgotten because Timothy Egan work to record their tale.
Imagine corrupt Senators effective to undermine child labor laws and force minors to work twelve to fifteen hour days.
Jobs with no medical benefits and laborers who have no choice to return to work before injuries are healed.
Vast tracts of land awarded to railroad and mining interest to sell for profit, and strip away resources that can’t be replaced.
Agreed the choice, would you make Mount Rainer and the Grand Gap a wildlife preserve.
It’s been many years since Theodore Roosevelt had a say in the matter.
I hope all the legislation his Administration work to pass doesn’t fall by the wayside.
After reading The Fantastic Burn by Timothy Egan, I feel our country is sorely in need of some more heroes like the ones recorded here.
Entire chapters devoted to the devastating fire had a way of building the pores of my skin buckle and detect a devious ghostly smoke in the air.
Only human scenery to want to avoid such a suffering.
A couple passages near the end of the book surrounding Franklin Roosevelt unwittingly help piece together a few threads of my life.
During the early 80’s, I was a member of the Washington State Young Adult Conservation Corps.
I was among a group of kids who worked alongside jungle Rangers struggle forest fires overlooking Mount Baker.
I was in my early twenties, but the majority of the kids were in their teens, we never got to see any real firefighting action.
My first week I questioned how come all the trees were cut down at the opening of the park.
My Superintendent said the lumber industry has timber rights on the perimeters.
Our job titles included Grub Hoe Attendant and Slash Burner.
Our main occupation was to drive up to sides of hill and inspect dwindling fires ongoing by Rangers.
We were impressionable children agreed bladder bags of water to carry on our back and hoes to poke around the last embers.
I can feel President Franklin Roosevelt’s lasting effect, he wanted future generations to experience a well designed program first hand.
Many years later, I had a job at a local Cannery that was originally a Works Project for prisoners to can fruit for local inhabitants.
Eleanore Roosevelt dedicated the building, the bronze plaque is still on spectacle, she planted a tiny rose hyacinth not more than the upper porch.
When I applied in the 90’s, the hyacinth had grown 15 feet, near the banister of the second tale.
In the time I spent effective at the cannery I witnessed the runs for Coho deplete, in addition to all the snow melting off my beloved Olympic Mountains.
They are the same sort of issues residents of Alaska are suffering with the snow pack gone and a mud polished stretching to their front door.
Timothy Egan The Huge Burn poses some serious issues our country should be exploring if we are to come out of the 21st Century in one piece.
It’s exciting to read such marvelous literature, Amazon is a fantastic place to learn different titles.
Reader’s Rating: 5 / 5
As others have pointed out, this book is written with such a bias politically and cost-effectively that it suffers in the telling. Persons gosh darn robber barons, ancestors of all of today’s Republicans, robbing the excellent citizens of the US from their natural resources. Well, they did that, sure. And lacking most of the individuals named, the country would still be huddled behind wooden stockades and starving in the winter. While not defending these people, seems to me that some of their contributions to the growth of our nation might have been acknowledged. On the additional side, he paints an overly satisfying portrait of Roosevelt, Pinchot and others; all of whom are the ancestors of today’s Progressives.
Not surprising really when you know who Egan works for.
The additional thing I didn’t like was the book failed to place me into the catastrophe. I can remember books I’ve read about additional man-made and natural disasters that made me feel as if I was there. This was cold and detached somehow. A bring shame on really since I want to read a better book on the theme.
Reader’s Rating: 1 / 5
Timothy Egan is one of our most perceptive writers about the West. In The Excellent Rain, he explored the Pacific Northwest and in Lasso the Wind he wrote about issues facing the modern-day West, from water in Nevada to disputes over grazing rights. Then in 2006’s The Worst Hard Time, he explored the lives of people who remained in the Dust Bowl rather than traveling West during the fantastic depression. Now, in Huge Burn, he turns his observant eye to a force that has long shaped the West: fire. Huge Burn tells a riveting tale of a huge fire in August 1910 that engulfed swaths of forest in Washington, Idaho, and Montana. He complements his tale of the fire with a parallel tale how President teddy bear Roosevelt and his chief forester, Gifford Pinchot, made national forests-against fantastic challenger–for all Americans. First rate.
Reader’s Rating: 5 / 5