Historical society’s Cedar Fire collection on display at library
By Chris Mac Kenzie
The Alpine Sun
ALPINE — Those terrifying black clouds, shot through with streaks of fiery red, billowing up across the zenith, the thick acrid smoke everywhere, and the ever increasing sense of disaster spreading through the town, is all there, displayed in two huge binders.
The books are packed with photos of the Cedar Fire taken by homeowners who lost everything, by fire fighters, and by reporters covering the story. They chronicle the events of that disastrous week so vividly that the reader may find himself reliving his own fire experiences.
The loose leaf binders were created by Carol Walker for the Alpine Historical Society, which had been displaying the photos mounted on cardboard posters at the museum. “But not enough people could see them, “ said Carol Morrison, president of the society, “as the museum is only open on weekends, and by request. We asked Carol to put them into the binders that we have now loaned to the library where anyone can ask to view them.”
The white ring binders, each one almost four inches thick, are kept on a shelf behind the checkout desk, The photographs are captioned with the locations they show, creating a vivid image of that blazing inferno as it raced across East County towns and on into the Back County.
Book 1 displays huge mountains of flames and smoke racing toward homes and businesses, followed by photos of the aftermath and destruction left in its wake.
The California Department of Forestry provided a section showing its heroic efforts to fight this many headed monster. Another section honors all those who came to help. The final section is in memorium to Christy-Anne Seiler-Davis of Peutz Valley, who died in the fire.
Book 2 is even more fascinating, containing fire stories and photos by families describing what they experienced. “I downloaded pictures from the Internet,” Walker said, as she flipped through the section of full page photos of the fire in other parts of the county. “I wanted people to remember that it wasn’t just Alpine that suffered. Places like Julian, Descanso, Poway and San Bernardo were caught in a disaster too,”
She also included the whole report produced by the California Department of Forestry and Protection called Fire Siege 2003, The Story, Oct. 21 to Nov. 4, which described its efforts to battle three monster fires within four days, A special section by the San Diego Union-Tribune and the little November news letter from Crown Hills are there.
She admits that the job took a bit of time, “I worked on it in the evenings,” she said, “but I enjoyed doing them very much. It was such a rewarding thing to do.”
Walker also produced the much-needed index for Beatrice La Force’s book, History of a Mountain Settlement when the book was reprinted by the Society in the spring of 2005. The index, a separate small volume, is sold by the society for $5.
“I enjoyed doing that job too,” she said, admitting that it did take her almost six months. “I used Excel, which works fine for a job like that. I started on page one and typed out every name I came across and the page number it was on. If it was a photograph, I noted that too.”
She went through those 500 plus pages three times so as not to miss
anything.
Walker enjoys this kind of detail work. An accountant by profession, she was a senior vice president of California Coast Credit Union until she retired six years ago.
Now she uses her skills as a volunteer for the Alpine Historical Society, the Alpine Woman’s Club and the Alpine Community Center.
Her husband, Paul, who retired about the same time from his work with Navy sonar systems, is also busy volunteering, He repairs and renovates talking book players and computers for the Braille Institute and chairs the senior activities committee for the community center The couple has been married 31 years with each of them bringing young children, five in all, to their combined family. Their children are all grown now, ranging from 34 to 42 years old.
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