Forest Lookout Bv Erra E. Cranr ((\ 7ES, I was entirely alone, but I was which cover 177,642,000 acres. This means \/ n"u.. lonely . - No, I was never that our national. forest land almost equals I afraid." in area the whole of France plus the State of How many times I have given these replies Washington or Missouri. Yet we, the peo- since September, L943, at the end of my flrst ple, through State and municipal ownership summer in a lookout station of the United as well as Federal, own less than a third of States Forest Servicel That season I had been all the forest land in the United States. The Iocated on a mountain road and could drive balance is privately owned. to my cabin door. After my second summer, But Iest these figures make us complacent though I had lived an hour's climb from a and we continue to deplete what was once road, I could still make the same answers thought to be an inexhaustible resource, let truthfully. us remember these Forest Service statements When the same questions were asked at the concerning all the forests of the country: end of the season of 1945, I had to reply, "I First, only about 100,000,000 of our origi- was never lonely, but I was afraid-or at least nal 850,000,000 acres of saw timber remain. very nervous." Second, "It is estimated that the drain on In fact, some of the paragraphs which fol- forests of the United States in 1944 amounted low were written partly to free myself from to nearly 16 billion cubic feet, and exceeded nervousness, by turning my attention from total growth by 50 percent. fn timber of "the mighty space of air" displayed below saw timber size, drain was almost twice the at annual growth." my windows to the mountains and ravines ((To greater distances. Third, meet the requirements of our people for forest products . growth should Wartime Service in the Wilderness be nearly doubled." You may wonder, as others have, why I, For administrative purposes, the national a woman, should choose to spend three sum- forests are grouped in ten regions, with a mers "roughing it" alone in the wilderness. regional forester in charge of each. Region 6, When I learned in the autumn of. 1942 lhat with headquarters in Portland, includes 19 the United States Forest Service planned to national forests in Washington and Oregon. employ women the following year. I knew Each national forest is administered by a that I had found my wartime service for forest supervisor and his assistants. For summer vacations: I should be a lookout, closer supervision, each forest is subdivided or forest guard, on some mountain peak. into ranger districts, with a forest ranger as I was sure I could adapt myself to the iso- administrator. Thus the Columbia National Iated life and to the outdoor environment Forest, which is about the size of the State with which I had become acquainted through of Delaware and the eighth largest forest in essays of students who had introduced me to Region 6, has five ranger districts. the beauty of the virgin forests of the North- Prevention Paramount Duty west's Cascades, Bitterroots, and Olympics. Fire So in the spring of L943 I wrote letters of A district ranger has supervision over timber application to eleven district rangers, accepted sales in his district; over grazing and other my first offer, and in June drove to the Mount uses of the forest; over building and main- Adams District of the Columbia National tenance of roads, trails, bridges, telephone Forest, in my home State of Washington lines, recreation camps; and over the protec- (Plates I, IV, VII, and pages 75, 91). tion of his part of the forest from fire. In September I returned to my college com- The most important of these duties is the munity and, to my surprise, to a barrage last one, for upon it depend all the others. of questions which are repeated every time Consider these figures: a new acquaintance discovers my experiences. "During 1935-1939 cooperative Federal, But before I begin to answer those ques- State, and private fire control was in effect tions in writing, I want to present, as back- on 260 million acres of State and private land. ground, some facts which I have gleaned from The area burned was held to I percent. One Forest Service publications found in my look- hundred and sixty-three million acres of pri- out stations, facts about the great property vate forest land were without protection, and which you and I and other Americans own- fires burned over 17.8 percent of this area.)' our national forests. To assist the district rangers in their work We, the people, own 152 national forests, of protection, nearly 6,000 forest guards are IJ /o The National Geographic Magazine Student Guards Learn to Operate a Firefinder On its surface is a circuiar map of the area, 'with the lookout station in the center. The rim is calibrated in degrees of the azimuth circle. Spotting smoke, the guard revolves the ring and adjusts the sights until the base of the smoke appears in the cross hairs of the front sight (at elbow). A tape spanning the map measures distances. Fire data are telephoned to the dispatcher a few minutes after spotting. The person on duty in a lookout station is to clear the windows enclosing the station. considered "the eye of the entire fire-fighting The steel rim around the map is engraved organization" of his area. He is expected to to show the 360 degrees of the circle-the discover a fire as soon as possible after it azimuth circle. On a movable steel ring be- originates, to Iocate it accurately and quickly, tween the map and the azimuth circle are to record the data concerning it, and to re- screwed, opposite each other, perpendicular port these data by telephone to the office of pieces known as the front sight and the rear the ranger station. sight. The front sight is equipped with a The lookout, therefore, is directed to have vertical hair and two horizontal hairs, to be his area under general observation all the day- used in determining the horizontal angle and light hours during possibly dangerous fire the vertical angle of a given spot. weather. By so doing he can detect a fire Across the map, between the front sight and when it is small. the rear sight, runs a measuring tape, by He is also directed to give his area a "check which the lookout determines distances. At look" every twenty or thirty minutes; by a the center of my map is my particular lookout check look is meant an intensive scrutiny of station. the observed area, one small sector at a time. The map shows the topography and names Usuaily the schedules for check looks on ad- the principal landmarks (peaks, rivers, creeks, jacent stations are so arranged that a given Forest Service stations) in a radius of twenty sector is under scrutiny most of the daylight miles from my station. It is also a section hours. When a lookout detects a smoke, he frap, and therefore shows the townships, locates it by means of a fireflnder. ranges, and sections of the area covered. When, therefore, f see a smoke, I revolve the How Fires Are Located sight-bearing ring and I adjust the front This instrument has a circular map of a sight until, as I look through the peephole given area screwed to a steel frame. The of the rear sight, the point of intersection of whole equipment rides on a pair, or two pairs, two hairs in the front sight appears to cut of tracks fastened to a rigid stand tall enough through the center of the base of the smoke. Forest Lookout .to Now f am ready read the horizontal The lookout is directed to keep his house, angle on the azimuth circle and the vertical tool shed, and adjacent groundj tidy. We angle the on vertical scale of the rear sight. women have not been expected to d-o some I locate the spot on the map, record these of the tasks usually,done by men lookouts, data and others on a blank prepared for the such as and repairing the stations, purpose, -painting and reach for the telephone. All or working on trails on foggy days, but at this is supposed to be done within three to least one woman unaccustomed to hammer, five minutes after the fire has been spotted! saw, and pliers has found it fun to discovei My report to the fire dispatcher includes what she can do when necessitv arises. the following data: location by local land- And of course housekeeping takes some marks (for ixample, the junction of Agnes time, even for one person, when it includes Creek and Trapper Creek) ; the azimuth, or splitting. kindling, cooking on a wood stove, horizontal, angle; the vertical angle; the dis- baking bread, _ and doing the taundry with tance in miles; the township, range, section, tub and washboard. and subdivision; the direction from which the One learns to be economical with water smoke is drifting; the volume, color, and char- carried up from a spring. With the same acter of the smoke; the approximate size of water f have, in turn, shampooed my hair, the base of the smoke; the time the smoke washed my clothes, scrubbed the woodwork was first sighted. and mopped the floor.