The great Peshtigo fire
Many worshipers in the church congregations throughout the small logging town of Peshtigo, Wisconsin were praying for rain on Sunday October 8, 1871. It had been a hot and dry year so far - only two measurable rains had fallen from July through September and drought conditions had been in effect since May. Creeks were dried up and the level of the Peshtigo River, upon which the townsfolk relied upon for water and transportation, was dispiritingly low. The surrounding woods and grasslands were dry and brittle and crews of volunteers from the town had spent many a day battling the sporadic wildfires that flickered across the horizon. The smoke from these fires hung low over the town and often made breathing a chore. Certainly some rain would be welcome in Peshtigo.
Just after 8:30 that evening a dull roar alarmed everyone in town. Flames from the scattered forest fires had been whipped into an inferno by ferocious winds and Peshtigo stood directly in its path. Firefighters started out to meet this new challenge but soon tossed aside their buckets and fled for home to collect their families and head for the Peshtigo River. As the blaze hit the town, the air was aglow with burning embers and walls of hot sand. Within minutes the entire town was burning. By 10:00 that night Peshtigo was gone.
That morning there had been more than 2000 residents in Peshtigo, a boom town on the railroad line. Men found abundant work in the forests and on construction crews. The world's largest wooden-ware factory was in Peshtigo. No more. The Great Peshtigo Fire and its aftermath claimed 1,125 lives. Many died of suffocation in wells where they had sought shelter, others drowned in the rivers, most simply could not escape the onrushing flames.
The fire destroyed every building in Peshtigo, save for a recently erected structure whose wood was still too green to burn. More than 1.25 million acres of forest were scorched before the winds died and the fire burned itself out before dawn. That next day, the rains finally came.
The Great Peshtigo Fire was, and is, the worst fire in the history of the United States, taking more lives than the next two worst fires combined. Yet most people have never heard of the Great Peshtigo Fire because, strangely, it occurred at the exact same time as America's most famous fire - the Great Chicago Fire. The fire in Chicago that may or may not have been started by Mrs. O'Leary's ornery cow destroyed 17,450 structures, caused about $200 million in damage and left one-third of the city homeless. Some 250 people were killed in the Chicago Fire and it grabbed every headline in America.
News of the tragedy in the small town 240 miles north of Chicago took days to reach the public and was quickly forgotten. The Governor of Wisconsin felt compelled to issue a special proclamation begging people to divert gifts from Chicago to Peshtigo. Relief supplies poured into the village and $155,000 was raised within a few months. Villagers rebuilt Peshtigo from the ashes into a new, vibrant town but the conflagration was never forgotten. The Peshtigo Fire Museum opened in 1963 to tell the story to generations who might forget. Adjacent to the museum is the Peshtigo Fire Cemetery containing the remains of several hundred unidentified persons and a monument to those who died.
For some the coincidence of two of America's most devastating fires igniting on the same day is too great. Although the ultra dry drought conditions are the official cause of the Peshtigo Fire, one theory speculates that a comet struck the earth in the area. Such a celestial intruder would be largely composed of ice and would leave no evidence. No one will ever know for certain.
Written by Doug Gelbert