ReThink History: The Fire This Time
One terrifying night in Spokane — the Old Trails Fire of August 1, 2026, under Washington's first-ever Particularly Dangerous Situation red flag warning — becomes the whole history of American wildland fire. The fire triangle of fuel, air, and heat, with a human hand now on all three corners. The people who tended the land with gentle fire for millennia, until we made it a crime. Peshtigo, the deadliest fire in the nation's history; the Big Burn of 1910 and the war to suppress every spark; the century of putting fires out that quietly buried the forests in fuel; and the hard turn back toward good fire. Hosted by a former wildland firefighter. Eight episodes, measured and sourced. AI-narrated from a fully cited research dossier for every episode.
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Episodes
Ep 1 — The Night a Wildfire Jumped the River Into Spokane
On August 1, 2026, the National Weather Service issued its first-ever "Particularly Dangerous Situation" red flag warning for eastern Washington — and hours later the Old Trails Fire jumped the Spokane River and burned into the city.
Ep 2 — Why Modern Wildfires Aren't Natural Anymore: Fuel, Air, Heat
Every fire needs three things — fuel, air, and heat — and a century of human choices now rests on all three.
Ep 3 — How America Made Indigenous Fire a Crime, and Its Return
For thousands of years, Native nations across North America tended the land with deliberate, low-intensity fire — until settler law made that fire a crime.
Ep 4 — Peshtigo, 1871: The Deadliest Wildfire in U.S. History
On the same night the Great Chicago Fire began, a firestorm erased Peshtigo, Wisconsin — killing more people than any wildfire in American history.
Ep 5 — The Big Burn of 1910 and the War on All Wildfire
In 1910, three million acres burned across Idaho and Montana in two days.
Ep 6 — The Fire Deficit: How a Century of Suppression Built Megafires
For a century America won the war on wildfire — and every year it won, the fuel got deeper.
Ep 7 — Good Fire: The Hard Return to Prescribed and Managed Burning
The only way out of a century of stored-up fuel is to put fire back on the land — on purpose.
Ep 8 — Will Wildfire Change the Minds of Climate Skeptics?
The places that burn the hardest are often the most skeptical that the climate is changing.