Gene Miller

Listen here for interivew 1- February 4, 2021

Listen here for interview 2- Febraury 26, 2021

Listen here for interview 3- March 4, 2021

Interview 1 Summary:

Gene describes growing up in Montana’s Swan Valley and how that helped him decide to become a U.S. Forest Service lookout. Miller talks about his 38-year tenure as a lookout, including Priscilla Peak, three lookout towers as a relief staffer, and 37 years on Blue Mountain. He tells about several fire incidents, including the inside phone melting after a lightning strike and igniting a fire under the lookout. He recalls a diverse range of visitors to the tower including Russian and Chinese delegations, pot smokers, an arsonist who was starting fires along the road, and the Hells Angels.

Interview 2 Summary:

In this second interview, Gene Miller provides more information about growing up in the Swan Valley in the late 1930s and early 1940s. He describes the wildlife that lived in the area including bears and a young coyote who found Gene companionable. Miller tells more stories about his time as a U.S. Forest Service fire lookout, focusing on the wildlife there. He talks about visits from mountain goats and blue grouse, listening to elk bugling, and watching his dog chase pikas. Other wildlife incidents include finding evidence that a mule deer got its antlers caught in the ground wire for the lookout phone, feeding peanuts to Golden Mantled ground squirrels, picking huckleberries alongside a bear, and seeing wolf tracks. He also tells about a time when his dog refused to go home with a packer after Gene was helicoptered to the hospital with appendicitis.

Interview 3 Summary:

Gene Miller’s third interview follows his many years of fire experiences, from harrowing lightening strikes around and beneath his lookout that sparked fires to winds rocking the lookout, to large hail storms. He watched first from several lookouts during several years with many large fires, including a powerline fire that hit Patty Canyon, and a smokejumper whose joke to a firefighter resulted in an arson fire that burned Hellgate. He also experienced snowstorms and being evacuated from Diablo Lookout with a truck whose battery had died. He begins with stories from his childhood in the Swan Valley and 40 degree below zero weather.