Burn Scars

Produced by KSQD 90.7, 89.5 & 89.7FM

“Be Bold America!” Sunday, October 6, 2024 at 5:00pm (PT)

How do historic documents show that fire suppression was driven by explicit racist and colonial beliefs? Is there nothing in American history that isn’t based in racism in some way? Well, fire suppress in California is and learn how in this "BurnScars", KSQD podcast during interviews with Dr. Char Miller and Dr. Peter Hess. 

There have been efforts to suppress fire in California since the 18th century Spanish invasion continuing through the US Forest Service’s relentless nationwide campaign in the 20th century. The Forest Service argues that suppression is critical for good forest management especially, but not exclusively, in the American West. Yet, in recent years, suppression has come under increasing scrutiny as a contributing factor to our current climate crisis exacerbated era of mega-wildfires.

Interview Guest:

Dr. Char Miller is an award-winning teacher and writer. Dr. Miller is the W. M. Keck Professor of Environmental Analysis and History at Pomona College. His new book is “Burn Scars: A Documentary History of Fire Suppression, from Colonial Origins to the Resurgence of Cultural Burning.” Dr. Miller’s previous book was Natural Consequences: Intimate Essays for a Planet and Peril, and he also authored: West Side Rising: How San Antonio’s 1921 Flood Devastated a City and Sparked a Latino Environmental Justice Movement, and Theodore Roosevelt: Naturalist in the Arena. Dr. Miller is a senior fellow at the Pinchot Institute for Conservation, Corresponding Member of the Society of American Foresters and a Fellow of the Forest History Society.

Guest CoHost:

Dr. Peter M. J. Hess earned his M.A. in Oxford and his Ph.D. in History in Berkeley, and writes and lectures on the relationship between religion, culture and sciences.  A former Director of Outreach of the National Center for Science Education, Peter is the author of Catholicism and Science and of numerous articles and book chapters on religious and ethical aspects of climate disruption.  Dr. Hess is qualified as a Firefighter Type Two (FFT2) and is co-founder of the Lake County Prescribed Burn Association, a consortium of trained fire practitioners. Dr. Hess is currently writing a paper for the Sierra Club on the similarities and differences between ancient cultural burning practiced by indigenous tribes in California, and the prescribed burning increasingly practiced by forest agencies, municipalities, and private groups. Dr. Hess is also a contributing chapter author in “Climate Abandoned: We’re on the Endangered Species List.”