Smoke on Skookum Creek: Crews Catch a Kaniksu Fire Before It Runs
A blaze on the east fork of Skookum Creek draws men from the Forest Service and two lumber companies — while more fires burn near Priest Lake and the supervisor heads in with a crew.
The Pend Oreille valley has been remarkably lucky in the matter of forest fires this year, no serious damage having been done thus far. Last week a fire started on Section 22, on the east fork of Skookum creek, east of Lenora. Supervisor Millar, of the Kaniksu National Forest, the Fidelity Lumber Co. and the Panhandle Lumber Co. promptly sent men to the scene of the fire and now have it under control, with men guarding against further spread.
Several fires are reported from the vicinity of Granite creek, near Priest Lake, in the Kaniksu National Forest, and Supervisor Millar has gone in with a force of men to fight the fire.
“The Pend Oreille valley has been remarkably lucky in the matter of forest fires this year, no serious damage having been done this far.”
In 1915 a fire season that produced no catastrophe counted as a lucky year in Pend Oreille County; today the same timberland faces longer, hotter seasons and the same hurried alliance of federal rangers and private timber crews. The cooperative defence described here — Forest Service, Fidelity, Panhandle — is still essentially how wildfire is fought, only at vastly greater scale and cost.
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