Where
have all the towers gone? Long time passing! Today’s travelers have a better
chance of locating lighthouses than fire towers. Nearly all the former Michigan
DNR forest towers have been dismantled; however, many fine examples still stand
within the boundaries of the national forest system.
If you are fortunate enough to spot
one of these former watch towers, be sure to capture its image on film, for the
few remaining represent the last of a former era… one in which fire towers
served as a connecting link toward the fighting of wildfires.
Forest fire prevention became a
major concern by the turn of the century. Michigan’s first steel fire tower was
erected at Houghton Lake in 1913. A dedicated towerman was commissioned to sit
atop the tower to scan the landscape for wisps of smoke. If fire was spotted,
crews were notified. It was a solitary position.
Remember those steel sentinels of
the forest? Not too many years past, fire towers were common landmarks
throughout northern Michigan; today, few remain. One can still view a classic
tower at the western limits of the Upper Peninsula, where the U.S. forest
Service’s Tee Pee Tower stands at Kenton, Near Strongs, in the eastern Upper
Peninsula, folks will notice the Raco and McNearney Lake Towers. Yet, another
tower remains standing at Goetzville.
At first, fire lookouts were little
more than spiked trees with platforms mounted on top. One such tall pine stood
near Raco until highway M-28 was widened in 1928. The former lookout tree was
later replaced with a steel tower.
The use of such vantage points led
to the erection of small windmill-type towers with open platforms located along
high points of fire patrol routes. The first actual wooden look-out tower int
eh state sstood on a hill near Lewiston in 1912. The first steel tower was
assembled near Grayling in 1915. Each year more towers were added until by 1924
over 100 towers were in use in the Upper and Lower Peninsulas.
By 1925 towers with enclosed cabins
appeared replacing old open platform types; stairways were added instead of
ladders, making towers user-friendlier. The tower system was virtually complete
by 1928 and contained 107 cabin-type primary towers, 16 open platform lookouts positioned
in state forests or game refuges. By 1949, Michigan had 140 primary towers and five
secondary towers in operation.
The standard modern tower was a
specially designed 100-150 foot steel tower with a glass enclosed
eight-foot-square platform, from which the average effective vision range was
10 miles on a clear day.
Each lookout station was equipped
with detailed surface maps; an alidade for accurate determination of direction
from the tower to a discovered fire, and a telephone or radio, or both, by
which fires could be reported to the nearest fire headquarters or conservation
officer. A rule of thumb was to equate fire breakouts in relation to local
landmarks. Distant fires were cross shots from adjoining towers. When
visibility was poor, secondary towers were manned and during emergencies, aerial
patrols we provided by either a state plane or by hired aircraft.
During the early years,
qualification of a towerman was good eyesight and knowledge of the immediate
area. Lacking even a map, these first lookouts had to judge a fire by
positioning with local landmarks and section corners. As tower numbers
increased, fires were located by triangulation and accurate base maps were
standard regulation.
Modern-day towermen also had to have
good eyesight, be familiar with their territory, operate a radio, make meteorological
observations. Distinguish between unauthorized and legitimate burns, judge a
fire’s behavior, and serve as a good will ambassador to the general public.
Communication became the tool of the modern towerman.
In 1933, the Department installed a
number of two-way, medium-low frequency radio sets with a lab set up at
Roscommon. Between 1938-40, over 120 battery operated radio sets were in place
in fire towers, providing direct contact between towers and district
headquarters.
Experiments with plan to ground
radio communications began at Lansing in 1934 weith the Michigan State Board of
Aeronautics furnishing plane and pilot.
Between 1933 and 1942, the Civilian
Conservation Corps (CCC) constructed 95 lookout fire towers, eight lookout
cabins, and 1,371 miles of fire breaks for fire control purposes. Their
services also provided 1,958 miles of telephone line installation that brought
phone usage into remotely located fire towers.
Historically, before the advent of
fire towers and a communications system, it was easy to understand why fire
wardens were able to accomplish so little in the way of forest fire suppression.
Locating fires strictly by patrol proved akin to looking for a needle in a haystack.
Certainly, Michigan’s advanced fire tower system achieved the work for which it
was intended.
Prior to retirement, Jim Pudelko was
assigned to the DeTour DNR field office, but when he hired on in 1965,he served
as a Class-B Towerman. Pudelko relates his experience as a fire tower spotter:
From the time I was a young boy living a quarter-mile from the Goetzville
Tower, I longed to be a towerman; just sitting up in the 110-foot tall tower
was strongly appealing.
I worked about a year as a towerman
before being called into military service and upon my return, fire towers were
being phased out, replaced by aerial patrols. I was transferred to the Michigan DNR Forestry Division, under title
of ‘Fire Officer.’
As a towerman, we wore no specific
uniform. We worked the tower only on high fire danger days and even then, we
did not man the tow until mid-day when morning dew had left the forest floor.
However, if a fire was in progress, we stayed at our post from dawn ‘til dusk.
Serving as one of the later day
spotter, equipment consisted of a pair of binoculars, an alidade, radio and
telephone. We also kept in and an adjoining shed, 50 shovels and 50 axes along
with a number of five-gallon pump cans. All were marked with a CCC label. Each
fall, towermen were responsible for removing large cumbersome radio sets from
towers to prevent theft. This involved strapping a 20-25 pound radio unit to
one’s back and carrying it down the tower ladder. Some towers had stairs;
Goetzville Tower had a ladder. It was a difficult job.
We were issued a ‘tower key,’ which
was master key of sorts that fit any
Michigan fire tower. If we were needed in any district, the key was readily
available. I managed to keep one as a souvenir. Actually, our District alone
held five towers including two located at Drummond Island. We performed
maintenance chores such as painting stairways and making repairs to the cabin,
and the keys provided easy entry.
I came across an old newspaper clipping
from ‘The Republican-News and St. Ignace Enterprise’ dated may 21, 1926: “A
100-foot steel fire tower of latest design, towerman’s cabin, five miles of
telephone line, a mile of truck trail and a shelter cabin will be constructed
on Drummond Island this summer by enrollees of CCC Camp Moran for the Field
Administration Division of the Department of Conservation, if plans for an
establishment of a side-camp materialize.”
We had an amusing incident regarding
one of the purchased towers that was to used as an observation tower by a
couple from the western Upper Peninsula. They bought a 110-foot tower and
somehow a mistake was made and DNR personnel tore down the purchased tower. The
couple demanded a replacement. When the tower was purchased, it was up to the buyer
to have it dismantled and rebuilt; but in this instance the Department had to
locate a tower exactly like the one they paid for. A crew was sent out from
Manistique and Naubinway comprised of Joe Anthony, Pat Clark, John Moon and myself
to disassemble the Gould City Tower.
It proved to a harrowing experience.
The roof was raised first. Everything had to be lowered by rope and pulley
system. The four tower walls were dismantled which left us standing on the cabin
floor 100 feet up in the air with absolutely nothing to hold on to whatsoever!
Talk about being scared!
Flooring was removed next, and then
every step of stairway had to be taken apart and sent downward. Not even a
wrench was dropped in error. But at one point, a cable slipped and I made a
grab for it, but at the last second I pulled back. Had I not, I would have been
pulled right down to the ground. As it was, the attached rod fell with such
speed it buried itself in the ground just missing the man standing below
handling the ropes. Crosspieces were the last to come down, and then the
supports… it proved to be an immense undertaking.
When spotter planes replaced towers,
they became obsolete. An aerial survey took in so much more territory and a
pilot could easily radio a ground crew advising them the easiest route into the
blaze. If the fire was an arson fire, there usually was a two-track trail
leading right up to its source.
Today, few towers remain across the
state. The MDNR put htem up for public sale during the 1980s. The adjacent
property owner purchased Goetzville Tower. If I am speaking correctly, I
believe towers sold around $250 a piece. Many were purchased merely for scrap
metal sales, not preservation.
Jim Pudelko added; Today when you
have an opportunity to view one of these old fire towers, stop and remember how
important they once were to the State of Michigan. They were our first line of
defense against constant threat of forest fires. I am proud that I had the
opportunity to be a part of history in the making.
Source: The Sault News, July 2016. Our Story: A Look Back at the Eastern Upper Peninsula. Where Have All the Towers Gone? Article written by: Betty Sodders.
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