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Fort Mandan, Upper Missouri River, present day McLean County North Dakota

6th March, 1805

a Cloudy morning & Smokey all Day from the burning of the plains, which was Set on fire by the Minetarries for an early crop of Grass as an endusement for Buffalow to feed on– the horses which was Stolen Some time ago by Assinniboins from the minetarries were returned yesterday– visited by Oh-harh or the Little fox 2nd Chief of the lower Village of the Menetarries– one man Shannon Cut his foot with the ads in working at the perogue, George & Graviline go to the Village, the river rise a little to day–

The Journals of the Lewis and Clark Expedition. 2005. U of Nebraska Press / U of Nebraska-Lincoln Libraries-Electronic Text Center. 3 March 2019 <http://lewisandclarkjournals.unl.edu>.

In one of young George Shannon’s minor mishaps while engaged by the Corps of Discovery he swung an adze into his foot. He was excavating a dugout canoe or shaping planks for manufacture of a “perogue” in a long bout of strenuous effort that no doubt threw off his practiced swing due to fatigue.

Chopping related injuries were common in the days of manual wood reductions and continue common today. These are examples of an injury principle called Line of Fire. Line of Fire injuries are obviously preventable by removing body parts from consequent directions of force, in this case the arc of swing of the adze. Carelessness and fatigue increase likelihood of these injuries.

Shannon became lost at least twice during his service. On one occasion he was missing for 16 days and he had used his last rifle ball his third day lost. He was the youngest member of the expedition signed on at age eighteen. What an adventure for a young man, a school of hard knocks!

Many Contact Period journals observe the prevalence of anthropogenic fire. Some ecologists today believe prairie plant communities owe their existence to deliberate fire management by First Peoples for thousands of years. Certainly broadcast fire pushed prairie plant communities eastward into Indiana and Ohio and beyond.

The Great Plains ecoregions pre-dated the human discovery of herbivore abundance therein and the pyro-culture that followed. Soils formed of wind blown glacial silt known as loess accumulated throughout the northern prairies ecoregions have favored rich grass communities since continental ice sheets melted at the end of the Pleistocene. Mid-continent climate patterns have supported abundant grass communities throughout the present Holocene Epoch. Grazing by large herbivores, millions of bison among them, worked in no small measure to sustain the same. Lightning fire raged through prairies for millennia. Today, plows and livestock culture have replaced abundant native herbivores and the plant communities that sustained them for tens of thousands of years.

Stephen J. Pyne is a contemporary authority and prolific writer offering authority of resource for understanding fire and our human relationship with fire. Begin with Pyne’s Fire: A Brief History.