1900. 



AMERICAN FORESTRY ASSOCIATION. 



219 



bred fellows had soft muscles, and we 

 couldn't keep up with him. Why, he 

 would walk up a perpendicular precipice 

 just like a fly, and look back at us, and 

 swear at us because we couldn't do it. He 

 is about six feet tall, and about two-thirds 

 legs anyway. Then he accused us of 

 sneaking back and lighting fires of our 

 own just to keep work going on in con- 

 venient places, where the climbing was 

 easy. So we said we would quit and we 

 wanted our pay. They begged us with 

 tears in their eyes to stay, but we wouldn't 

 do it." 



The last of this may be exaggerated but 

 there is probably some truth in it. When 

 the country is rough, and the wind, which 

 may at any moment give the fire a new 

 direction, is changeable, such men may be 

 more than half exhausted before the actual 

 fight with the flames begins. When the 

 fire broke out some of those who went into 

 the woods were without food for twenty 

 hours. One man was discovered asleep, 

 almost surrounded by fire, and lying be- 

 side a log of which the other end was burn- 



ing. 



Considering these conditions it is not 

 strange that most of the many reports of 

 the Santa Anita fire should have been 



taken up with descriptions, not of the 

 struggle with the flames, but of the many 

 difficulties under which the fire fighters had 

 to work. It is not too much to say that 

 fifty experienced men thoroughly familiar 

 with the lay of the land could, if given the 

 advantage of a few trails and well-cleared 

 fire lanes, have accomplished much more 

 than the several times as many people who 

 were actually engaged. When a fire is 

 going through the tops before a strong 

 wind nothing can stop it. But such a 

 condition cannot last for many hours, and 

 there are times and places in the history of 

 every fire in which its strength is measured 

 by the weakness of the forces that attack 

 it. If all unnecessary obstacles to effective 

 work at these times and places were elimi- 

 nated many a sad report of destruction 

 could be made shorter. The Santa Anita 

 fire differed from many others only in that 

 it occurred in a forest reserve, near towns 

 like Pasadena and Los Angeles, and under 

 conditions which led to its being photo- 

 graphed and reported fully. It pointed 

 the lesson again that if a forest fire is to 

 be controlled it must be dealt with, not 

 merely soon after it has been set, nor yet 

 in its very beginning, but long before it 

 has started. 



Victor B. Fay. 



Hiram Hurlbut. 



Victor Bradshaw Fay, a student-assist- Hiram Hurlbut, of Utica, N. Y., also a 



ant in the Division of Forestry, died of student-assistant in theDivisionof Forestry, 



typhoid-malaria at Pine Bluff, Arkansas, died at Holland Patent, N. Y., on August 



011 the sixth of August. At the time of 3oth. He had been at work on the field ex- 



his death he was on a field party from the pedition in Arkansas, and, though he came 



Division of Forestry which was surveying north with the rest of the party at the time of 



a lumber tract near Pine Bluff. His ill- Mr. Fay's death, wastaken ill with the fever, 



ness was sudden and short. On Jnly 3ist After going through the Utica Free 



he left camp and went to the hotel at Pine Academy, from which he graduated in 



Bluff ; on the 6th he died. 1899, Mr. Hurlbut entered the Division of 



Mr. Fay's home was at Washington, Forestry as a student-assistant in Decem- 



D.C. After spending two years at Har- her of the same year. He was much in- 



vard he studied forestry for a year at Bilt- terested in forestry, and quickly showed an 



more in North Carolina, and then en- exceptional capacity for earnest and perse- 



tered the Division of Forestry. He was 

 much interested in his work, and left 

 many friends to whom his death is a se- 

 vere loss. 



vering w r ork. Although he was without 

 special training and still under twenty, the 

 record of his short connection with the 

 division promised much for the future. 



