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California Burning: Photographs from the Los Angeles Examiner Main Menu Introduction Essays Photo Collection Los Angeles Examiner Photographs Collection, 1920-1961

Brush fire (Rio Hondo fire), 1951

41365 Depicted is a brush fire emerging in Rio Hondo, a tributary of Los Angeles County whose name derives from the 'deep river' - Rio Hondo - that runs parallel to the San Gabriel River. Even as an area of land named after a body of water, fires still manage to ravage the land, and the efforts to mitigate this state of emergency caused no shortage of worry and damage. The fire spread rapidly through the brushes upon it's kindling, burning more than 50 acres of land and damaging two houses within a few hours [1]. The dry climate helped propagate the fire and spread embers to rooftops where the smoldering did most of its damage [5]. While the fire fortunately maintained itself within the riverbed [4], it didn't make the lives of the Los Angeles Fire Department easy. They had to storm together a 10 unit battalion that aggregated teams from Whitter and the State Department of Forestry to contain the flame. Shown in the image is the efforts of the fire department mobilizing to eliminate the flame. To that end they were able to shut down the fire in two hours, even deploying tractors with dozer blades in order to eliminate the immediate presence of fuel. While the nature of the fire was calmed quickly, quantifiable amounts of damage were done to the surroundings, and fire fighters were dispatched throughout the night to ensure embers didn't form again [1]. Fires like these continued to strike the area, and in 2005, volunteers and Angeles Chapter Staff came together to form a campaign called the Emerald Necklace which aims to plant trees and brushes that reinstate the park experience that perhaps once existed in the area [6].

Depicted is a brush fire emerging in Rio Hondo, a tributary of Los Angeles County whose name derives from the 'deep river' - Rio Hondo - that runs parallel to the San Gabriel River. Even as an area of land named after a body of water, fires still manage to ravage the land, and the efforts to mitigate this state of emergency caused no shortage of worry and damage.
The fire spread rapidly through the brushes upon it's kindling, burning more than 50 acres of land and damaging two houses within a few hours [1]. The dry climate helped propagate the fire and spread embers to rooftops where the smoldering did most of its damage [5]. While the fire fortunately maintained itself within the riverbed [4], it didn't make the lives of the Los Angeles Fire Department easy. They had to storm together a 10 unit battalion that aggregated teams from Whitter and the State Department of Forestry to contain the flame. Shown in the image is the efforts of the fire department mobilizing to eliminate the flame. To that end they were able to shut down the fire in two hours, even deploying tractors with dozer blades in order to eliminate the immediate presence of fuel. While the nature of the fire was calmed quickly, quantifiable amounts of damage were done to the surroundings, and fire fighters were dispatched throughout the night to ensure embers didn't form again [1].
Fires like these continued to strike the area, and in 2005, volunteers and Angeles Chapter Staff came together to form a campaign called the Emerald Necklace which aims to plant trees and brushes that reinstate the park experience that perhaps once existed in the area [6].

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