Rensselaer Semi-Weekly Republican, Volume 39, Number 102, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 30 August 1907 — FIRES DESTROY FORESTS. [ARTICLE]

FIRES DESTROY FORESTS.

About 7,500 Acres of Timber Destroyed In New England. Unusually dry conditions in the forests throughout Massachusetts, caused by the absence of rain during the last month, have been responsible to a large extent for the great damage by forest fires, which have swept through southeastern Worcester county, across the Cape Cod district and over Bristol and Plymouth counties. About 7,500 acres have been destroyed, and in several cases the flames have not been checked. despite the fact that 2,000 men are engaged in fighting them. The extensive fires which have devastated the Cape Coo forests had their origin in small blazes caused by sparks from locomotives, while various causes have been responsible for the others. Blackened trunks and smoldering embers are all that remain in many places where formerly were forests of marketable timber and heavy underbrush. The most extensive fire is that raging in the Douglas woods, one of the richest areas of timberland in the State. The flames there have devastated 5,000 acres in Massachusetts and have spread into Connecticut, where the damage is believed to be about one-fifth as great. Beginning in Douglas, the fire has eaten its way through the forest land in the towns of Sutton, East Douglas, Webster, Millbury, Oxford and Bridge, and is still spreading.