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The Big Burn: Teddy Roosevelt and the Fire That Saved America
Contributor(s): Egan, Timothy (Author)

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ISBN: 0547394608     ISBN-13: 9780547394602
Publisher: Mariner Books
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Binding Type: Paperback - See All Available Formats & Editions
Published: September 2010
Qty:
Additional Information
BISAC Categories:
- History | United States - 20th Century
- Nature | Environmental Conservation & Protection - General
- Nature | Natural Disasters
Dewey: 973.911
Age Level: 14-UP
Grade Level: 9-UP
Physical Information: 1.1" H x 5.3" W x 8.1" L (0.60 lbs) 352 pages
Themes:
- Topical - Ecology
- Chronological Period - 1900-1919
- Chronological Period - 20th Century
Features: Bibliography, Index, Maps, Price on Product, Table of Contents
Awards: Washington State Book Award, Winner, History/Biography, 2010
Review Citations: New York Times Book Review 09/26/2010 pg. 24
 
Descriptions, Reviews, Etc.
Publisher Description:

In THE WORST HARD TIME, Timothy Egan put the environmental disaster of the Dust Bowl at the center of a rich history, told through characters he brought to indelible life. Now he performs the same alchemy with the Big Burn, the largest-ever forest fire in America and the tragedy that cemented Teddy Roosevelt's legacy in the land.

On the afternoon of August 20, 1910, a battering ram of wind moved through the drought-stricken national forests of Washington, Idaho, Montana, whipping the hundreds of small blazes burning across the forest floor into a roaring inferno that jumped from treetop to ridge as it raged, destroying towns and timber in an eyeblink. Forest rangers had assembled nearly ten thousand men -- college boys, day-workers, immigrants from mining camps -- to fight the fires. But no living person had seen anything like those flames, and neither the rangers nor anyone else knew how to subdue them.


Egan narrates the struggles of the overmatched rangers against the implacable fire with unstoppable dramatic force, through the eyes of the people who lived it. Equally dramatic, though, is the larger story he tells of outsized president Teddy Roosevelt and his chief forester Gifford Pinchot. Pioneering the notion of conservation, Roosevelt and Pinchot did nothing less than create the idea of public land as our national treasure, owned by every citizen. The robber barons fought him and the rangers charged with protecting the reserves, but even as TR's national forests were smoldering they were saved: The heroism shown by those same rangers turned public opinion permanently in favor of the forests, though it changed the mission of the forest service with consequences felt in the fires of today.


THE BIG BURN tells an epic story, paints a moving portrait of the people who lived it, and offers a critical cautionary tale for our time.


Contributor Bio(s): Egan, Timothy: - TIMOTHY EGAN is a Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter, a New York Times columnist, winner of the Andrew Carnegie Medal for excellence in nonfiction. His previous books include The Worst Hard Time, which won a National Book Award, and the national bestseller The Big Burn. He lives in Seattle, Washington.
 
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