Fire in the Skagit Woods
A fire in the Skagit Valley destroys Duncan's logging camp, dump and cedar logs, sending a smoke cloud over the valley.
The story, cleaned up
A cleaned-up reading of the newspaper page: spelling and layout repaired, one story lifted off a crowded page. It follows the original closely but it is not a transcription. The original page is below; read it if a detail matters.
WOOLLEY, July 24.—[Special.]—Fire has taken possession of the logging works in Skagit valley, and is proving especially destructive in the Duncan camp, midway between this place and Lyman, on the Seattle & Northern railway. The camp is destroyed, and today the flames have spread to the dump, three-fourths of a mile distant from camp, which is being rapidly consumed, together with one loaded car standing on the spur at the dump. Besides the loss of camp, dump and roadways, Duncan loses some 20,000 feet of nice cedar logs. The smoke arising from the fires fills the valley with a dense cloud of smoke. The damage as yet is chiefly confined to the Duncan works.
“The camp is destroyed, and today the flames have spread to the dump, three-fourths of a mile distant from camp.”
Logging camps were tinderboxes, and a single fire could wipe out a crew's camp, equipment and season's pay. As the West braces for longer, hotter fire seasons, the Skagit Valley's 1894 losses read less like a curiosity and more like an early warning.
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