Paying to Burn the Prairie > Comments > "The Parable of Fire"
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Commenter Profile
- James Reiss
- Username: jamesreiss
- Location: Wilmette, Illinois
- Joined PRX: Dec 28, 2006
Piece Information
- "Paying to Burn the Prairie"
- Summary: A Kansas rancher invites tourists to help out with his annual prairie burn.
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The Parable of Fire
James Reiss
Posted on June 24, 2009 at 09:47 PM
I’ve never been fond of fires. Ever since I took my eye off a fidgety barbecue and nearly burned down a summer vacation house, I’ve preferred water to flame.
Many people don’t share my preference. Arsonists, gothic novelists, and backwoods types cuddling up to Franklin stoves would light firecrackers and cherry bombs 24/7 if they could. It turns out that Jan Jantzen, a retired college administrator, charges visitors a hundred and twenty bucks a person to participate in torching his ranchland in western Kansas.
Seasonal prairie-grass burn-offs are legendary. If native Americans and their North American conquistadors weren’t replenishing the soil by charring it, lightning has been causing wildfires for eons. Without such conflagrations and without grazing, in Rancher Jan’s words, the prairie “would become primarily a scrub forest, mainly with eastern red cedars that wouldn’t have much value for anything.”
Although this piece glows too tepidly and could have used a reverse bellows to make it at least a minute shorter toward the middle, it’s mainly fun. While Jan jokes his visitors about being careful not to singe their eyebrows, his 50 paying guests are netting him a serious six thousand bucks. As well as indulging in pyrotechnics, they’ll get to chow down local cheese curd plus peach-glazed buffalo and barley meatballs out of a chuck wagon—yum!
They’ll also get to hear The Millbrook Boys light a bluegrass fire in Rancher Jan’s barn. During the last couple of minutes here, the band ends up sounding a bit sour to my ears. But far be it from me to rain on this blaze!