Teddy Roosevelt wasn&rsquo;t always as tough as nails. Sickly as a boy, frightened by life, the son of wealthy East Coast blue bloods was determined to build himself into a man of strength. When he fell from his horse, Teddy always climbed back on, ready to ride rough yet again. In the face of defeat, he battled back. </p><p>Could one use the life of Teddy Roosevelt as a metaphor for America itself: sometimes whipped, never beaten? </p><p>If that sounds patriotic and jingoistic, Timothy Egan&rsquo;s writing can have that effect on readers. It&rsquo;s difficult for hearts on any side of the political divide not to swell with pride upon reading the stories of bravery contained within &ldquo;The Big Burn,&rdquo; a book chronicling the history of the conservation movement in America before alighting upon its chosen subject: the men who battled the horrific northwestern forest fire of 1910. </p><p>Before he became president, Teddy experienced the kind of devastation from which few could recover. In one day &mdash; Valentine&rsquo;s Day, no less &mdash; he lost both his mother and his beloved first wife. Setting off for the Badlands of the West for a change of scenery, the heartsick Teddy &ldquo;became another man, with cattle to run and horses to keep, with water to haul and fences to mend, a bespectacled cowboy from Harvard who punched a drunk in a bar who&rsquo;d taunted him as &lsquo;four-eyes,&rsquo; chased an outlaw through the canyons, suffered frostbite on a winter outing.&rdquo;</p><p>Slowly, his heart healed. The West had saved his life. </p><p>Teddy wanted to repay the favor. </p><p>Once president, he installed Gifford Pinchot, a disciple of naturalist John Muir, as his chief forester. Together they moved quickly to pass legislation safeguarding land and forests being eaten alive by greedy mining companies and logging concerns, something that didn&rsquo;t win the duo friends in high places. Still, Teddy persisted in his vision of conserving pristine lands for posterity, making the words &ldquo;leave it as it is&rdquo; his battle cry. </p><p>After hard work creating a national team of forest and park rangers, Teddy eventually gave over the reins of presidency to William Howard Taft, his successor. Soon, the wishy-washy 27th president was pressured by corrupt congressional leaders to repeal much of Roosevelt&rsquo;s painstakingly drafted work, and the Forest Service &mdash; deeply unpopular with the rich and powerful &mdash; bore the brunt of the attack. </p><p>&ldquo;Low salaries forced good people out, and the budget was squeezed so tight that by the time the fire tore through the Rockies, a single ranger was responsible for more than 300,000 acres. &hellip;To the enemies of the Forest Service, the fire was a chance to kill the crusade of conservation.&rdquo;</p><p>Ultimately, the horrific fire managed to do just the opposite.</p><p>The first third of the book may be a bit slow-going for some, as the Pulitzer Prize-winning author assembles details of personal histories and political intrigue as a backdrop to the big show itself. If readers can stumble through the underbrush to the real story, they will be richly rewarded. </p><p>&ldquo;The Big Burn&rdquo; is hard to put down, and Egan describes the action in white-heat prose through first-hand accounts from rangers who lived through the horror. &ldquo;They told of trees swelling, sweating hot sap, and then exploding; of horses dying in seconds; of small creeks boiling, full of dead trout, their white bellies up; of bear cubs clinging to flaming trees, wailing like children.&rdquo;</p><p>The devastation was as widespread as it was heartbreaking, and Egan tells the story with great humanity. </p><p>As the nation&rsquo;s eyes recently turned west to watch brave men and women battle 21st-century fires, never before has it been so evident how important it is to safeguard national treasures and keep funding alive for those on the front lines. In prose so sizzling it crackles, &ldquo;The Big Burn&rdquo; keeps alive the conservation dreams of Teddy Roosevelt by allowing this story to rise from the ashes, once again. </p><p><hr class="infobox-hr-separator" /> <div class="infobox"> <strong>The Big Burn: Teddy Roosevelt and the Fire that Saved America</strong>, by Timothy Egan (324 pages; Houghton Mifflin Harcourt; $27)</p><p></div>