A NATIONAL PLAN FOR AMERICAN FORESTRY 805 



susceptibility of the forests to fire damage and the exposure to fires 

 are greatest. 



Protection the major activity of State forestry departments. In a con- 

 siderable number of States, forestry departments were first brought 

 into existence to provide for organized systems of protection against 

 forest fires. This is particularly true in the South and the far West. 

 In some other States great fire disasters that caused terrible losses of 

 property and life so aroused public sentiment as to cause very sub- 

 stantial increases of appropriations and authority. In nearly all 

 States the maintenance of the protective system is the most out- 

 standing form of forestry activity. The problems of protection are 

 still for most States urgent, and in many cases will probably con- 

 tinue for years to demand major attention. While protection is not 

 as yet generally adequate, it is the greatest accomplishment of State 

 forestry. More constructive effort has been put into it and more 

 money spent on it than on any other form of forest activity. It has 

 demanded the services of both administrators and investigators. 

 The development of its technique has been one of the most notable 

 achievements of forestry in the United States. 



While State forest protection has been immensely stimulated by 

 the Federal aid offered under the Weeks law of 1911 and the Clarke- 

 McNary law of 1924, progress in efficiency has not come about merely 

 because there was more money to spend. It has been no less due to 

 the ability and determination of the State forestry officers. A number 

 have built up forest fire organizations that use practically all of the 

 most up-to-date methods; others have made substantial progress 

 even under very discouraging conditions. 



Organization and methods. Thirty years ago forest fires were rarely 

 fought at all except as they endangered other property. Then it was 

 a case of neighbor help neighbor when a fire became an obvious 

 menace; and the equipment and methods used were of the crudest. 

 A forked stick for clearing a line through the leaves, a piece of brush 

 or a wet gunny sack to beat down the blaze, and garden shovels, hoes, 

 and rakes were the common implements. There was no order, no 

 planned organization, no conception of the strategy and methods 

 necessary in fighting big fires, no knowledge of their behavior, no 

 system of detection and speedy alarm, no preparation beforehand for 

 swift attack, and only the most elementary beginnings of fire pre- 

 vention. 



All of this has changed . State and Federal agencies working together 

 have evolved organizations, equipment, and methods that work with 

 precision and dispatch and are fairly well standardized throughout 

 the country. Observation stations of steel or wood placed high enough 

 to command an extensive view, often on towers rising more than 

 100 feet from the ground, now dot much of the wooded area of the 

 country. When the systems are completed these stations will afford 

 a coordinated and interlocking oversight of entire regions from stra- 

 tegic points 15 to 20 miles apart on an average though the distances 

 vary greatly with the topography and other factors that determine the 

 range of visibility. Already the stations embraced in the State pro- 

 tective systems number more than 800. In some localities they dove- 

 tail with the detection systems maintained by the Federal Government 

 on the national forests, now equipped with nearly 1,400 lookout 

 stations. 



