The 1947 Fryeburg-Brownfield Forest Fire

Modern firefighting

by Charles Francis

It was another “yellow day” in southern Oxford County. The pall of smoke that hung over Fryeburg and Brownfield was so dense that cars had to use their headlights, even at midday. Most of these cars were filled with people fleeing before the racing walls of flame that at times reached a height of three hundred feet. At one point the choking haze became so unbearable that the watchman at the Pleasant Mountain lookout tower abandoned his post for two days.

It is 1947, the year that Maine burned, the year that countless small fires and four major ones caused the greatest damage the state had experienced to date. Two of the big ones began on October 17th — the York County fire and the Mt. Desert Island fire, and two on October 23rd — the Washington County fire and the Fryeburg-Brownfield fire. All told, two hundred and fifteen thousand acres of the state were consumed by fire. Property losses approached thirty million dollars. Nine towns were completely destroyed, and twenty-five hundred people lost their homes. Yet the destruction could have been worse were it not for

Paid Off

the foresight and preparedness of the Maine Forest Service, which had been closely monitoring conditions across the state since early summer.

The summer and early fall of 1947 were the driest in the history of Maine. For a one hundred and eight-day period, starting in mid-July, no appreciable rain fell. As the water table dropped, wells gave out, streams dried up, and the shorelines of rivers and lakes widened as water levels receded. Maine became a tinderbox. Hardwoods dropped their leaves early, leaves crumbled at the slightest touch, and the ground was so dry that it sifted like beach sand. As the danger of forest fire rose from low in early summer through medium and high to extreme, the Maine Forest Service went on high alert status and made sure that newspapers and radio stations informed the public of the increased chances for major conflagrations.

The Maine Forest Service had its origins in a bill passed by the legislature in 1909. The bill established the Maine Forestry District, which was charged with providing fire protection in the unorganized townships in the eight northern counties of the state — an area of almost ten million acres. Overall supervision of the District fell under the jurisdiction of the Forest Commissioner headquartered in the State House in Augusta. The man who did the most to organize and modernize forest fire fighting in Maine was Neil Violette, who became Forest Commissioner in 1924.

Prior to Violette becoming commissioner, fires had been fought with the lumberjack’s double-bit ax, gunny sacks, shovels, and water buckets. Commissioner Violette saw to it that the Maine Forest Service was amply supplied with lightweight shovels specially designed for fire fighting, fire rakes, grub hoes, Pulaski fire axes, and Indian backpack pumps. Each chief warden and deputy warden was provided with a motor-driven pump and hose. In addition, by 1927 there were sixty-eight tall, green fire towers strategically placed throughout the north woods, all connected to the outside world by phone lines.

The next major step Commissioner Violette made was to expand the responsibilities and jurisdiction of the Maine Forest Service to organized towns. To do this Violette secured federal matching funds through the United States Forest Service. The state was now able to provide fire wardens, trucks, and firefighting equipment from regional headquarters throughout the state. In addition, more fire towers were built and the position of Supervisor of Forest Fire Protection in Organized Towns was created. The first supervisor, who was still in the position in 1947, was Austin Wilkins. Wilkins went on to serve as Forest Commissioner from 1958 to 1972.

Prior to October 17th, when the first of the major fires began, the Forest Service and local fire departments had successfully contained the nearly two hundred small outbreaks that occurred across the state. The Fryeburg-Brown(cont. on page 62)

(cont. from page 61) field was a different story, however, due to its behavior.

The first report of the Fryeburg-Brownfield fire came from the lookout tower on Pleasant Mountain at 2:30 on October 21st. Local fire departments and firefighters from the Maine Forest Service were quick to respond. They used two techniques to fight the fire. Backfires were started along old logging roads, and where there were no roads, bulldozers dug wide fire lines. For a time it seemed that the fire would simply burn itself out. Then on October 23rd disaster struck.

October 23 was to be later called the day of the big wind. The winds started before dawn and grew in intensity. Suddenly, walls of fire came roaring up out of the valleys and over the mountains. As the velocity of the wind continued to rise, jump fires reached out ahead of the main conflagration. As soon as a new fire line was bulldozed to stop the advance, a jump fire would crown further on. At times firefighters were in danger of being surrounded by competing walls of flame seemingly shooting to the sky.

As the fire neared Brownfield it found new fuel and picked up speed. Numerous areas had been cut over and were filled with piles of bone-dry slash. There were hayfields around farmhouses and barns that were filled with dry stubble. When the latter caught fire so did the foundation timbers of nearby buildings. As the flames approached the town, the evacuation began. Roads became crowded with cars carrying frightened families, and trucks filled with livestock. Altogether the fire traveled a distance of thirteen miles, pushed by the big wind of October 23rd.

By the time the Fryeburg-Brownfield was over more than seventeen thousand acres of timberland had burned and about three thousand acres of farmland. Denmark, Hiram, and Cornish, in York County, were devastated. Supervisor of Forest Fire Protection Austin Wilkins called “The loss of the two communities of Brownfield and East Brownfield… tragic.”

Amazingly enough, there was no loss of life while the fires raged. In addition, one hundred and twenty million board feet of timber was salvaged. Modern firefighting training and techniques had paid off.

Today the Fryeburg-Brownfield forest fire is but a memory. The summer tourists drawn to the region’s lakes and mountains and the leaf-peepers of the fall are unaware that they are visiting the location of one of Maine’s worst disasters. The terrors of the Brownfield fire are largely forgotten. Perhaps time indeed heals all wounds, whether they be to nature or to the mind.