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Disaster Twice: Raging Wildfires In Caligornia Cause Disaster Declaration As US Forest Service Continues War On Women Firefigters
by Monica Davis
Forest fires are dangerous. Firefighting is a dangerous business, which has been male-dominated for hundreds of years. Yet, though they have not been always lauded, women have been fighting fires in the United States for more than two centuries. To paraphrase an old saying, “This ain’t our first rodeo.”
The first known female firefighter was a black woman, a slave in New York City. In fact, women have been fighting fires in the US for 10 generations.
Women have been firefighters for longer than most people realize: in fact, for almost 200 years. The first woman firefighter we know of was Molly Williams, who was a slave in New York City and became a member of Oceanus Engine Company #11 in about 1815.
One woman whose name is sometimes mentioned as an early female firefighter is the San Francisco heiress, Lillie Hitchcock Coit. She became an honorary member of Knickerbocker Engine Company #5 as a teenager in 1859, after helping them drag the engine to a fire on Telegraph Hill. READ MORE HERE
Women have been fighting forest fires professionally in California for more than four generations.
The first all-woman forest firefighting crew in California was assembled in 1942. Employed by the California Department of Forestry, the crew consisted of a foreman, a truck driver, an assistant driver, firefighters, and a cook.
The first women in the postwar period known to have been paid for fire suppression work were wildland firefighting crews working for the U.S. Forest Service (USFS) and the Bureau of Land Management (BLM). An all-women BLM crew worked on fires in Alaska during the summer of 1971, and a crew of USFS women worked that year and the following year in Montana. READMOREHERE
Firefighting remains a male bastion, despite the thousands of women firefighters in the US Forest and in volunteer and paid fire departments nationwide. Recent droughts have turned parts of the Southwest into tinder boxes, as wild fires rage through the California and Southwestern countryside, destroying thousands of acres of forest, and homes and businesses. In California, its a major disaster, as fires roar through towns and suburbs, destroying hundreds of businesses and homes. Given the nature of the fire disaster in California, and the long history of women in the fire service–city and forest fire fighting units, one would think that women would be welcome in the US Forest Service, and in other departments, particularly because of the intensity of the current drought and firedisaster.
California Governor Jerry Brown declared a state of emergency in three Northern California counties on Wednesday after raging wildfires destroyed 50 buildings and threatened more than 200 others.
Some 3,000 people have been evacuated as the so-called Ponderosa fire burns through more than 24,000 acres (9,700 hectares) of steep, rugged terrain in the rural California counties of Tehama and Shasta, about 125 miles (200 km) north of state capital Sacramento. READMOREHERE
Yet, despite their history of fighting fires, both in the US Forest Service and in other agencies, more than 6,000 women firefighters continue to battle bias via class action lawsuits and civil complaints. Several lawsuits against the US Forest Service allege that women firefighters are the unwilling victims of a long-term campaign of intimidation, violence, threats, retaliation and illegal firings. Across the nation, women have filed gender bias suits, claiming they have been harassed on the job, or have been illegally passed over for promotions.
In the federal government and in local communities, women firefighters are prevented from doing the jobs they were hired to do– fight fires.
Speaking of the good ole boys club that was once, and still is, the US Forest Service, retired firefighter Bob Gates told a reporter in 1998 that the Forest Service culture was male-oriented and simply did not accept women as firefighters. In 1995, California-based Lesa Donnelley and Ginelle O’Connor filed a class action lawsuit against the Forest Service. That lawsuite generated a massive backlash against women firefighters–which continues to this day, as do additional civil rights complaints and lawsuits.
Despite the lawsuits, the ongoing male-oriented culture in the Forest Service and many other fire service departments is that women simply do not belong in the forests, or on the streets, fighting fires with men. Women firefighters, in and out of the Forest Service, contnue to have problems gaining promotion or being accepted as firefighters, despite the long history of women in firefighting. And they are also paying the ultimate price, dying, in service to their departments, as their sisters around the nation battle gender bias and retaliation.
Redlands’ (California) only female firefighter has sued the city, its fire chief and two battalion chiefs, alleging they engaged in gender discrimination in denying her a promotion to captain.
Eva Toppo said she applied twice to be a captain, completed written and oral exams at the top of the field but was not promoted.
She alleges the fire chief told her she wouldn’t be respected as a captain because she is female, and claims she was passed over in favor of firefighters with less experience. READMOREHERE
In some communities, the number of female firefighters is actually shrinking. But that still hasn’t affected the moral of those women in fire service who remain committed to their professions
…women firefighters remain passionate and committed to their work despite their dwindling ranks nationwide. “During the job interview in San Jose, they ask how you think you’re going to measure up to these total kick-ass women there,” says Amy McClure, who was among the city’s last female firefighters hired in 2009 READMOREHERE
In the course of such a dangerous profession, women have paid the ultimate price–death, in service to their communities.
Twenty year old Ann Veseth was killed by a falling tree as she fought a wildfire in Idaho. A college student from a long line of firefighters, Vesseth was in her second season as a firefighter. According to newswires, “Her older brother also is a wild-land firefighter in Idaho, where 12 blazes are burning.”
The bottom line is that firefighting is a dangerous, still male-oriented profession. Women continue to fight fires in the Forest Service, in municipalities and in the military. And they also continue to battle biased fire departments and agencies in the courts, as well.
Despite the death threats, abuse, even rape, women firefighters remain in service to their communities.Many, including women firefighters who have sued because of a hostile work environment, have faced massive and open hostility on the job. From draining air tanks, to death threats, to sexually explicit and terrorist phone messages, and vandalism, today’s femal firefighter often works in a hostile work environment, with co-workers who often don’t want her there.
Women first responders died on 9/11. They continue to fight fires, and yes, pay the ultimate price, death, in service to their communities. They have been doing so for more than two centuries
About the author: Monica Davis is an author ,editor, columnist, activist and non-profit executive.
Her author website: http://www.lulu.com/spotlight/davis4000_2000
Her books include: Land, Legacy And Lynching–Building The Future For Black America
She is Lead Investigator and Land Rights Activist, Imani Advocates
website: http://40acresandamule.bravehost.com/index.html
