Yesterday, as I awoke to smoke drifting south from over 70 forest fires in Quebec, I was reminded of Tarzan.

Not the Johnny Weissmüller films, but one of the last scenes from the original book by Edgar Rice Burroughs in which Tarzan rescues Jane one last time by swinging through the trees – “with the speed of a squirrel” – the trees of Wisconsin. Yup. Wisconsin. In a forest fire.

The book was first published in the pulp magazine All-Story Magazine in October, 1912. Scholars often link the final fire rescue of Jane to a similar scene (without the tree-swinging) in James Fenimore Cooper’s Pioneers, but it seems to me a bit of stretch. More likely, is the possibility that the scene draws on what is considered the largest and one of the deadliest forest fires in American history – the Big Blow Up of 1910.

The Big Blow Up, also known as the Great Fire of 1910, burned over about three million acres (an area about the size of Connecticut) in northeast Washington, northern Idaho, and western Montana. In the 48 hours the fire burned out of control, eighty seven people were killed, including 78 firefighters. That October another large wildfire, the Baudette Fire of 1910, burned a million acres of Wisconsin and killed between 29 and 42 people. Both fires were entered into evidence as reasons for the US. Forest Service to fight forest fires, rather than let them burn as a natural process.

In the Adirondacks, that lesson was learned somewhat earlier. Large forest fires ravaged the region periodically in the late 19th and early 20th century, most dramatically in 1903 and 1908. Those conflagrations led to a system of fire detection which included the building of fire towers. The first were built in 1909 on Mount Morris in Franklin County, Gore Mountain in Warren County, and West, Snowy and Hamilton mountains in Hamilton County.

According to the Department of Conservation (DEC), over the last 25 years DEC Forest Rangers responded to an average of 330 wildland fires a year. Two-thirds of those fires occurred in March, April, and May; 85% were are smaller than 10 acres, but six fires burned more than a thousand acres. The main cause of local wildland fires has traditionally been the burning of yard debris (no longer allowed), but arson, campfires and lightning have been the causes of the most damaging fires.

You can read more about Adirondack forest fires here; the recent controversy over the historic nature of the fire towers and whether they should stay in wilderness areas is covered here.

Photos: Lake George before and after the smoke from the Quebec fires rolled into the Lake George basin photographed by and used courtesy of regular reader, Enid Mastrianni.