Men to Match the Mountains

by Colleen Morton Busch (Author)

A San Francisco Chronicle Best Book of the Year • A Publishers Weekly Best Book of the Year “Vivid prose as electrifying as any beach novel you're likely to find this summer.” —San Francisco Chronicle In June 2008 more than two thousand wildfires, all started by a single lightning storm, blazed across the state of California. Tassajara, the oldest Zen Buddhist monastery in the United States, was at particular risk. Set deep in the Ventana wilderness north of Big Sur, the center is connected to the outside world by a single unpaved road. If fire entered the canyon, there would be no way out. Disaster struck during the summer months, when Tassajara opens its doors to visitors, and the grounds fill with guests expecting a restful respite. Instead, the mountain air filled with smoke, and monks broke from regular meditation to conduct fire drills. All visitors were evacuated, and many Zen students followed. A small crew of residents and firefighters remained, preparing to defend Tassajara. But nothing could have prepared them for what came next. When a treacherous shift in weather conditions brought danger nearer still, firefighters made the flash decision to completely evacuate the monastery. As the firefighters and remaining residents caravanned out the long road to Tassajara, five monks turned back, risking their lives to save the monastery. Fire Monks is their story. A gripping narrative as well as an insider’s portrait of the Zen path, Fire Monks reveals what it means to meet an emergency with presence of mind. In tracking the four men and one woman who returned—all novices in fire but experts in readiness—we witness them take their unique experiences facing the fires in their own lives and apply that wisdom to the crisis at hand. Relying on their Zen training, the monks accomplished the seemingly impossible—greeting the fire not as an enemy to defeat, but as a friend to guide. Fire Monks pivots on the kind of moment some seek and some run from, when life and death hang in simultaneous view. Drawing on the strength of community, the practice of paying attention, and the power of an open, flexible mind, the Tassajara monks were able to remain in the moment and act with startling speed and clarity. In studying an event marked by great danger and uncertainty, Fire Monks reveals the bravery that lives within every heart.

by Joyce Butler (Author)

by Robert W. Cermak (Author)

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 2005-06-30 Excerpt: ...that were constructed by the CCC in the mid-thirties. The master plan and fire replanning described a Region 5 fire control organization that consisted of lookouts, tank truck suppression crews, a few guards and fire prevention men. The tank truck crew became the backbone of a fire pre-suppression organization that remains essentially unchanged today. The improvements that have occurred since 1940 have largely been in quality of equipment, improved tactics and better communication. Telephone lines were the most important form of communications in the region through World War II, but radio communications made giant strides during the thirties. Radio had a checkered history in the Forest Service. Early experiments in the Apache National Forest (Region 3) in 1916 were followed by wireless transmissions during the Army air patrols of 1919-1921. Because tight budgets were the rule during the twenties, Roy Headley took a dim view of most efforts to improve radio communications. Throughout the early development of radio by the Forest Service, Headley had to be conscious of an agreement with American Telephone Telegraph Company, whereby the Forest Service received lowered telephone rates so long as it did not foster a communication system that competed with the telephone company.38 Headley's opposition changed to strong support after he and Chief Forester Greeley witnessed the demonstration in August 1927 of a crude little contraption built by Dwight L. Beatty of Region 1. Beatty had been a mule skinner, ranger and forest supervisor. While working in the Region 1 office, he educated himself in radio technology and built the contraption to prove that a portable radio could be built. After the demonstration, he was assigned the responsibility for radio developm...