A little licking flame, high up on the wooded slopes of Mount Tamalpais above San Francisco's Golden Gate, one day last week, started eating through timber dried by months of drought. A strong wind whistled to its aid. Soon Mount Tamalpais' long north and east slopes were ablaze.
Down in Mill Valley, rich householders and poor looked upward in common alarm. From across the bay San Franciscans could see the reddened, angry sky, the fire marching down the mountainside. Around the bay went the alarm, brought boats with firemen, U. S. Rangers, soldiers from three forts, small boys, milkmen, millionaires hustling to aid.
Somehow 150 men fought to the top of Mount Tamalpais, saved historic Tamalpais Tavern. Blistering, snapping at every twig and leaf, the flames swept down into Blythedale Canyon and toward fine homes, set on the knees of the mountain.
For three days thousands of men, haggard with weariness, blackened with smoke and cinders, struggled to keep the fire back. Sometimes the wind swung round to aid them, sometimes it veered against them, drove the flames across firebreaks to lick at the nearest roofs. The gas mains burst in Mill Valley. The water supply dribbled out. Two pump engines were hustled to Cascade Canyon to drain an abandoned reservoir. Refugees clogged the roads. Red Cross stations sprang up to treat the injured, house the homeless.
When only smoking embers remained on the hillsides 130 homes were destroyed, more than million-dollar damage was done. The dwellings of wealthy Ralston White, Lucian Marsh, Charles Coles, Mrs. Mary Webber Fisk, German Consul Kurt Zeigler, had been devoured. And as fire in a forest will sometimes lay bare a landmark half-forgotten, one ash-heap in Mill Valley stood out in despatches with historical significance. It was the home of Col. Andrew Summers Rowan, U. S. A. retired, onetime world hero, the man who "carried the message to Garcia."
One April day in 1898, with the U. S. hurrying inevitably toward war with Spain, two soldiers sat lunching in Washington's Army & Navy Club. The older, serious-faced, put a question. The younger made a laughing reply. Serious-Face spoke again. Smiling-Face stopped smiling. In a moment both heads were bent together in low-toned, tense conversation.
Thus did Col. Arthur Wagner, chief of the U. S. Bureau of Military Intelligence, convey to Lieut. Andrew Summers Rowan the wish of President McKinley that he seek, in the jungles of Cuba, Lieut.-Gen. Calixto Garcia, insurgent Cuban leader, carry to him a McKinley message, ascertain the size and strength of Spanish forces.
On April 23, Carrier Rowan landed in Kingston, Jamaica, sailed Cuba-ward that night on a dirty native fishing boat under the eyes of the Spanish patrol which was scouring the Caribbean. Flat on his back against a gunwale, Carrier Rowan heard a Spaniard swagger alongside shouting queries; heard his pilot's lazy answer, the Spaniard's satisfied grunt.