Dollar Mountain Fire

The Dollar Mountain Fire was one of the earliest large scale wildfires in Ferry County, Washington. Starting August 4, 1929 Burning an estimated 98,000-142,000 acre of Colville National Forest land in the Kettle River Range, east of Republic, Washington, the conflagration was contained by mid September, but only finally extinguished due to weather changes in "late fall". Fire crews came from across the region, including Portland, Oregon, Seattle, and Spokane, Washington, and across British Columbia. While news reports of the period occasionally called the blaze the "White Mountain Fire", it should not be confused with the White Mountain Fire of 1988 that burned in much of the same area as the Dollar Mountain Fire 59 years later.

Background
Much of northern Ferry County is dominated by temperate coniferous forests maintained by the Colville National Forest and as private land. The forests at the lower elevation are mixed Douglas fir and ponderosa pine, which intergrade into mixed Douglas fir, lodgepole pine, and western larch at mid-elevation and finally into mixed Engelmann spruce, subalpine fir, and lodgepole pine forests at the highest elevations.

The Kettle River Range had a history of wildfires with fires first reported in the early 1910's. According to Colville National Forest records the turn of the century through 1910 were wet and fires scant or non-existent. This changed with the 1910 fire season were five major fires were seen, including the Lost Creek Fire said to have burned all summer and engulfed more area than the other four fires combined. The fire seasons were smaller for the next few years but flared up in 1914 with five fires, none of which was listed as major. The years between 1915 and 1919 saw one active fire season, 1918, where 50 fires in total were seen, but less than 2,000 acres were burned. The fire season of 1920 saw the largest acreage losses to that point in the Colville National Forest lands, with four large conflagrations, the Coco, Golden Harvest, Indian Creek, and Pierre burniing 3,000 acres, 5,410 acres, 7,680 acres, and 6,465 acres respectively. The four in conjunction with 84 other small to medium fires over the season consumed 34,747 acres. 1921 followed in the footsteps of 1920, with 23,298 acres lost to 93 fires, the largest being the Linderman and Flat Creek Fires. The years 1922-1928 were quieter, though consistently more active then the 1900's and 1910's overall. Fire lookouts in this time period were just transitioning from the pre-1921 tents, transient wooden structures, or primitive fire lookouts to first and second generation wooden Fire lookouts. 1929 saw abnormally dry conditions across the region, the daily high winds blowing from the south exacerbating the 6% to 10% ambient humidity.

Fire
The fire started sometime on August 4th in the Barnaby Creek drainage, and was initially suggested to have been caused by lightning strike. No thunderstorms or lightning had been reported that day in the region and further investigation pinned the start on carless campers who had been in the area at the time, possibly smokers, or a blackberry pickers fire. Due to the hot dry conditions, the fire behavior was unpredictable, with the forest Service noting that single day "runs" of 5-6 mi were not uncommon in areas and reignition of already burned areas happening frequently. As many as 300 Canadian Doukhobor firefighters flowed into the area to assist the official recruits and volunteers. On August 8, one such crew of approximately 65 men was surrounded and trapped by flames in the Barnaby Creek area so the group sought shelter under a rocky ledge outcrop with a creek nearby. The next morning the flames had moved far enough away for the Crew to walk back out of the burn zone over several miles. The full crew had been presumed lost when they hadn't returned the evening prior. To commemorate the event the stream near where they sheltered, which flows into Barnaby Creek from the north was named Doukhobor Creek. A near miss again occurred on August 12 when strong winds drove the fireline rapidly towards two camps with 300 total firefighters. The flames engulfed both camps destroying equipment and belongings, but the men were evacuated only minutes before the firewall arrived. One know fatality has been linked to the Dollar Mountain fire, Vasiliy P. Makeiff, reported on occasion as William Mikaryoff in error. The Doukhobor firefighter was hit by a falling tree on August 15, 1929, causing fracturing of his skull. He was transported east to Mount Carmel Hospital in Colville, Washington, but succumbed to his injury. His body was returned to Ootischenia, British Columbia and was buried in the cemetery

As of August 27th, 450 men had been garrisoned in the Barnaby Creek area, with additional crews out of the ranger stations at Bangs Mountain, Growden, Sherman Creek, and Trout Lake. The ranger station crews were tasked with forming and maintaining fire lines along the southwestern, southeastern, and southern edges of the fire. The northern edge of the fire was unmaintained and being wind-driven in that direction. At the time of reporting the fires extended in a region about 12 mi north of the center of the Colville Reservation north to just south of the Canadian Boarder, and was up to 8 mi at its widest. On September 1st, the number of people on the fire had grown to 650 but efforts to check the northward progression of the fire were failing. The northern fireline was then 18 mi north of original ignition site, and encompassed about 70,000 acre. The fire was reported to be under control as of September 14th, though the outlook was cautious as heavy winds were still possible and could whip it up again. At the time of containment, the fire was estimated 98,000 acrein size. The fire was fully out by October 13 when an estimate of 100,000 acre burned was given.

Aftermath
By the time the fire was fully quelled in the "late fall" of 1929 the blaze had burned an estimated 98,000-142,000 acres along the eastern slopes of the Kettles over a several month span. The fire was the largest fire for the still young Colville National Forest, and also one of the largest fires in the nation over the 1929 fire season. In the years after the fire, efforts were stepped up to assess the fire detection system in the Colville National Forest as a whole, with a full survey being performed and funding allocated to improvement. A number of additional fire lookouts were approved and built along the backbone of the kettles, were they were seasonally or continuously manned until eventual decommission. Stations where wheeled vehicles could not reach had the lumber and building material packed in by men and tandem-horse teams in custom made harnesses.

Originally established in 1927 with 17,000 acres of national forest, the San Poil State Game Reserve was expanded after the Dollar Mountain Fire. The new boundaries increased to encompass the majority of the burn zone northwards to the Deer Creek-Boulder Creek Road. On the expansion the 345,600 acres reserve was renamed the Dollar Mountain Game reserve. The reserve maintained its boundaries for under 10 years, with the northern half being removed from reserve status in 1937, leaving a 188,800 acre area that was fully opened for hunting in 1940.

In 1938 Civilian conservation corps workers living at Camp Growden were tasked with fire hazard mitigation and other cleanup work in the surrounding Dollar Mountain Burn. Major focuses were snag patch cleaning to remove standing dead trees and fire line construction in preparation for controlled burns in service of fire management. Much of the timber cut was put through the small saw mill at Camp Growden and turned into low cost lumber.