To the untiring efforts of those rangers in the west- 

 ern districts who drove their own cars night and day 

 on the state's business, suppressing incipient fires at 

 all costs and urging the careless people to more 

 thoughtfulness, belongs the glory of having prevented 

 the conflagration from starting there. Many and many 

 a family between the western prairies and the Bow- 

 string owe their lives, and everything else they have, 

 to the unselfish loyalty of those few men. 



In the larger districts of the east the suppression of 

 all the fires was beyond the power of a single man, but 

 many a fire was put out so that when the dreaded wind 

 came there was no great unbroken front from which 

 there would have been no escape. The conflagration 

 ran in narrow strips and many a settler found safety 

 in the unburned lands between them. 



To the ranger at Cloquet, working alone in a district 

 as large as the state of Connecticut, belongs a large 

 share of the credit the timely warning that enabled 

 hundreds of settlers in the back districts to make their 

 escape, and for the foresight which made it possible to 

 evacuate a city of 8,000 inhabitants in an hour and a 

 half without the loss of a single life. 



Moose Lake burned, but no one knows how many 

 other towns in that same district might have shared 

 the same fate if the ranger there had not stuck to his 

 guns with almost superhuman efforts. No mention has 

 been made of the fact that twenty fire-fighters lost 

 their lives bravely fighting to protect the lives and 

 property of others. 



As these men are civilians, it is not likely that Con- 

 gress will confer any distinguished service medals, and 



17 



