EDITORIAL 



The Forest Fires 



AL]\IOST without interruption the 

 reports of forest fires continue to 

 occupy the columns of the daily news- 

 papers. When the final reports for the 

 year 1908 are received and the figures 

 tabulated, it will be found that never 

 in the nation's history have forest fires 

 been so numerous, or their consequences 

 so disastrous as in the year now draw- 

 ing to a close. No sooner have the 

 fires died out in one region than they 

 have sprung up in another. The fires 

 in the far West and Northwest are ex- 

 tinguished and immediately we read re- 

 ports of forest conflagrations farther 

 east. The ravaging flames in Minne- 

 sota, Wisconsin and ]\Iichigan burn 

 themselves out and Maine takes up the 

 story. Back again to the Adirondacks 

 and the White Mountains; then the tel- 

 egraph tells us of the wasting of Penn- 

 sylvania's scanty forests, and before the 

 smoke has pased aw^ay, the scene shifts 

 again to Michigan. ]\Iaryland and New 

 Jersey also suffer, and the National Cap- 

 ital itself is shrouded in a pall of smoke 

 from burning forests within fifty miles 

 of the W^ashington Monument. 



Thirty Years' Fire Damage 



WITHIN the last thirty years, and 

 not including the fatalities for 

 1908, 1,956 people have perished in for- 

 est fires or fires caused by burning for- 

 ests. I^p to the time of waiting, the 

 death list for 1908 totals 296, as re- 

 ported by the newspapers, or about 

 seventy-two human lives per year 

 lost in the flames of burning forests and 

 the conflagrations arising from them. 



In 1 89 1 the Division of Forestry col- 

 lected authentic records of 12,000.000 

 acres burned over in a single year. The 

 value of the timber destroyed that vear 

 was estimated at $50,000,000. The of- 

 ficial census of 1880 estimated the area 



burned per year as lo.ooo.ooo acres. 

 While now^ the acreage of forest burned 

 over every year is undoubtedly smaller, 

 the k)ss is nut decreased, but is even 

 greater, because the value of stumpage 

 has increased since 1880 at least Ave 

 times, and it is, therefore, only neces- 

 sary to burn 2,000,000 acres annually to 

 cause the same amount of loss. 



«? J^' i^ 



Estimate Not Excessive 



CITING a few examples of individ- 

 ual fires, it will be seen that the 

 Census Bureau and Forest Service es- 

 timates of fire loss are not at all exag- 

 gerated. For instance, in 1894. the 

 Hinckley fire in ^Minnesota burned over 

 an area of 250 square miles, killed 418 

 people, and destroyed $750000 worth 

 of property, this being entirely apart 

 from the vast amount of timber and 

 lumber that was burned. In 1902 a 

 fire on the dividing line between Wash- 

 ington and Oregon destroyed propert}- 

 amounting in value to $12,000,000. 



During the whole of the month of 

 September, this year, forest fires raged 

 in northeastern j\Iinnesota. The towns 

 of Hibbing and Chisholm, which were 

 in the paths of these fires, were prac- 

 tically wiped out. and the total loss, as 

 conservatively figured, amounted to 

 nearly $10 ooo.ooo. The town of Chis- 

 holm alone suffered a loss to property, 

 stocks of merchandise, and other items 

 of direct loss, amounting to about 

 $1,500,000. 



The fires that are raging in northern 

 Michigan at this writing have already 

 caused losses estimated at anywhere 

 from $1.500000 to $3,000,000. accord- 

 ing to the newspaper reports. One of 

 the appalling features of this great 

 Michigan fire was the derailment and 

 destruction of a train loaded with fugi- 

 tives from the fire districts. The train, 

 speeding over a track hemmed in on 



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