Between Two Fires: A Fire History of Contemporary America

by Stephen J. Pyne

From a fire policy of prevention at all costs to today's restored burning, Between Two Fires is America's history channeled through the story of wildland fire management. Stephen J. Pyne tells of a fire revolution that began in the 1960s as a reaction to simple suppression and single-agency hegemony, and then matured into more enlightened programs of fire management. It describes the counterrevolution of the 1980s that stalled the movement, the revival of reform after 1994, and the fire scene that has evolved since then.Pyne is uniquely qualified to tell America’s fire story. The author of more than a score of books, he has told fire’s history in the United States, Australia, Canada, Europe, and the Earth overall. In his earlier life, he spent fifteen seasons with the North Rim Longshots at Grand Canyon National Park.In Between Two Fires, Pyne recounts how, after the Great Fires of 1910, a policy of fire suppression spread from America’s founding corps of foresters into a national policy that manifested itself as a costly all-out war on fire. After fifty years of attempted fire suppression, a revolution in thinking led to a more pluralistic strategy for fire’s restoration. The revolution succeeded in displacing suppression as a sole strategy, but it has failed to fully integrate fire and land management and has fallen short of its goals.Today, the nation’s backcountry and increasingly its exurban fringe are threatened by larger and more damaging burns, fire agencies are scrambling for funds, firefighters continue to die, and the country seems unable to come to grips with the fundamentals behind a rising tide of megafires. Pyne has once again constructed a history of record that will shape our next century of fire management. Between Two Fires is a story of ideas, institutions, and fires. It’s America’s story told through the nation’s flames. 

Genres: Environment, History, Nonfiction, Ecology, American History

544 pages, Kindle Edition

First published October 15, 2015

Reviews

[Brown Robin · Rating 4 out of 5]

More appropriate for the fire professional, an aspirant to the forestry service, or an historian of US government in the 20th century, this is a terrific book.
Pyne clearly knows his material, but doesn't know when to move on, spending so many pages saying the same thing in various ways. I could not finish, but feel I learned a lot about the US and its fire policy and about fire and woodland science.

[Mark Symons · Rating 4 out of 5]

Dense and sometimes dry, this book is nonetheless very much worth reading for one looking to understand the last century's fire management policy and where it has taken us.

[M · Rating 4 out of 5]

A lot. How should we define progress?