RICHLAND, Wash. – Dramatic photos of wildfires in Eastern Washington will punctuate a free, public presentation about the philosophy of fire management by U.S. Forest Service (USFS) photographer John Marshall at Washington State University Tri-Cities. “Fire and Forests: East of the Cascade Divide” is especially timely with five major fires in Eastern Washington during the past few months. The talk begins at 7 p.m. Thursday, Nov. 15, in the East Building Auditorium, 2710 Crimson Way, Richland.
Marshall will cover opposing views of fire management – those of Native Americans and European settlers – that influenced federal policy. For 50 years, the USFS battled all fires, but today’s fires are larger and hotter since forests have grown into living tinderboxes.
Marshall will talk about his 18-year career as a USFS photographer. He has shot extensive landscape photos of what happens to forests following fires. The son of a wildlife biologist, he came to understand the importance of wildfires to the region’s wildlife in the same era that Smokey the Bear was telling the public that fires were bad. Marshall began his career as a photographer with the eruption of Mount St. Helens, which he photographed for National Geographic magazine.
The lecture is part of the 2012-2013 WSU Tri-Cities College of Arts and Sciences Season of Events and is co-sponsored by Humanities Washington, a flagship nonprofit that provides free educational and cultural programs based in the humanities – with a special commitment to serving the cities and rural communities of Eastern Washington. For more information, visit http://www.humanities.org.
Established in 1989 with upper division and graduate programs, WSU Tri-Cities expanded in 2007 to a four-year undergraduate campus offering 18 bachelor’s, 10 master’s and six doctoral degrees. Learn about the most diverse campus in the WSU system at http://www.tricity.wsu.edu.