Fire
On September 26, 1936 a fire burned several miles of forest east of town. But a sudden shift in the wind drove the flames swiftly westward. Ignited by the forest fire, the town’s abundant gorse became engulfed in flames, Bandon resident D.H. Woomer told The Coos Bay Times. Bandon's entire commercial district was destroyed. The total loss stated at the time was $3 million USD, with 11 fatalities.
Ironically, the gorse was first introduced to the Oregon Coast by the founder of Bandon, Lord George Bennett, from his native Ireland.
Firefighters found that burning gorse reacted to having water squirted on it like a kitchen grease fire—it simply spread burning gobs of gorse everywhere. Stewart Holbrook described this conflagration in his essay "The Gorse of Bandon."
Part of the commercial district had been erected on wooden pilings jutting out over the Coquille River not far from the South Jetty, accommodating river traffic at the merchants' doors. After the 1936 fire, when Bandon began to be rebuilt, the new perimeter of the business district did not extend beyond the available land.
There is still gorse in Bandon today, but municipal codes strictly regulate how high and thick it may be allowed to get.
Read more about this topic: Bandon, Oregon
Famous quotes containing the word fire:
““God’s fire upon the wane,
A diagram hung there instead,
More women born than men.””
—William Butler Yeats (1865–1939)
“It is hard to hate what one has loved, and a half-extinguished fire is soon relit.”
—Pierre Corneille (1606–1684)
“I haven’t much opinion of words.... They’re apt to set fire to a dry tongue, that’s what I say.”
—Ellen Glasgow (1874–1945)