Sundance Fire memories burn bright for residents

(The Sundance Fire started with a lightning strike on Sundance Mountain in Bonner County on Aug. 23, 1967. The mountain is 6,298 feet high and is located four miles east north east of Coolin on Priest Lake. By Sept. 1, the fire was burning the surrounding timberland at the rate of one square mile every six minutes — the fire was six miles wide and 25 miles long.

More than 2,000 firefighters fought to control the blaze and on, Sept. 2, the fire did slow but not before taking the life of Luther P. Rodarte of Santa Maria, Calif., and Lee Collins of Thompson Falls, Mont. They were killed while taking shelter beneath a bulldozer. The fire burned nearly 56,000 acres of land and caused a terrific loss of cattle and wildlife.

Today, Bernice and Art Webb share, in their own words with some editing, their personal experience during the great fire of 1967 — the Sundance Fire. )

Art Webb:

“In August 1967, the Sundance fire that started at Coolin was quite a spectacle. The night the fire made its run I was at Coolin driving a pickup and hauling crews up and down the mountain. It was two in the morning and you didn’t even need headlights because the fire was so bright.

“My wife and baby boy could see the glow behind Baldy Mountain from Sandpoint and she feared the fire would come over Baldy if the wind shifted. Instead, the flames jumped from tree to tree as the high winds drove the fire towards Roman Nose Mountain and Bonners Ferry. For several years after the fire, my dad, brother, and

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I logged salvage in the Ruby Creek area.

“Pack River lost a lot of timber in that fire. Pack River Lumber at one time had 13 mills in three states: Washington, Idaho and Montana. Jim and Larry Brown were the owners and they employed a lot of people, loggers, foresters, and mill workers. Pack River was a big part of the economy back then.

“I went to work for them in 1973 hauling mostly private logs and driving the first self-loading log truck they bought. There were three other self-loaders in the area at the time — Stub Verewolf, Truman Bennett and Mel Martin — and there was plenty of work for all of us. Stub and Mel have passed on but as far as I know Truman is still hauling.

“Logging is nothing like it used to be. I retired in 2002 and have probably seen the best of the logging as well as enjoying the best of the fishing. I guess with all the changes it was just not meant to stay as good as it was back then.”

Bernice Webb:

“Art was up there fighting that fire along with every other able-bodied man around here who was able to go. I went to the Pastime Cafe and helped pack sandwiches to take to the crews working on the fire. One night my baby son and I watched the flames shooting up behind Baldy and I was scared to death the fire would come over the mountain to Sandpoint.

“Art rode on a ‘cat’ and helped transport crews back and forth. Then he worked with his dad and brother logging Roman Nose Mountain to salvage any timber that was still good for lumber. It was still hot and dangerous in some of the places and he would come home all black from the ash left behind in the wake of the fire.

“Roman Nose is still recovering from that fire but it opened up the area for lots of huckleberry bushes. There was one good thing that came from clear cutting, which was a terrible, devastating, practice in the ’70s — the huckleberries flourished. Now I find they are getting choked out again.”