Library hosting 'Living Through the Fire'
<p>JAKE PARRISH/Press Cody Bray wields an axe while Jenny Twitchell plays piano to accompany his singing while rehearsing a scene from the musical "Living Through the Fire," on Monday at Coeur d'Alene Summer Theater in Coeur d'Alene.</p>
COEUR d’ALENE — The Coeur d’Alene Public Library will host a Jan. 15 performance of the musical, “Living Through the Fire” — based on incidents from the Big Burn of 1910 — featuring players from the Coeur d’Alene Summer Theatre and preceded by a lecture about the historic blaze.
The doors will open at 6 p.m. for the benefit performance with proceeds going to the Friends of the Library, the CST, and the Museum of North Idaho.
Regional historian Robert Singletary, programming and marketing director for the museum, will discuss the Fire of 1910 beginning at 6:30 p.m. in the Community Room on the lower level at the library, 702 E. Front Ave.
Tickets are $15 per person and can be purchased at Second Story Books, the Friends’ bookstore in the lobby at the library. Reservations can be made by email at dtownsend@cdalibrary.org. Reserved tickets must be picked up at the bookstore before 4 p.m. the day of the performance.
Singletary has been a frequent speaker at the library, recently completing the series, “Idaho 125: Wilderness to Statehood.” He wrote a weekly history column for the Coeur d’Alene Press for 10 years and taught history at North Idaho College and Lewis-Clark State College. He is active in the Kootenai County Historical Society and has served as a trustee for the Museum of North Idaho and the Idaho State Historical Society.
“Living Through the Fire” was co-written by Christian Duhamel, a North Idaho native who is now a New York-based playwright and composer, and Jadd Davis, CST Artistic Director.
It is based on the events of Aug. 20, 1910, when forest ranger Edward Pulaski saved the lives of his firefighting crew by leading them, along with two horses, into a mine tunnel.
Over the years, Pulaski has become a household name in the Northwest and around the nation with firefighters, but the story doesn’t stop with Pulaski and his famous tool.
Davis told The Press, in an October interview, that the play sheds some creative light on the families of the men who battled the blaze more than 100 years ago.
The play follows the story of a young girl named McKenzie in present-day Wallace.
McKenzie is given a school project to read and write about the diary of Elsie Pulaski, the daughter of Ed.
Davis said the play was commissioned because, “I’ve wanted to do a story about the Big Burn since last year. It’s an iconic piece of the Inland Northwest’s natural history, and there are a lot of interesting characters, including Edward Pulaski.”
“Living Through the Fire” is the inaugural production through CST’s new “On The Road” program, which brings educational theatre, performed by professional actors, to schools throughout the Inland Northwest. In its first season, CST On The Road was able to reach nearly 4,000 students with this piece.
Based on this success, the show will be remounted in 2016 with a new commission planned for 2017.