According to A.B. 'Bert' Curtis a Hispano Standard airplane was probably the first airplane used for wildland fire detection in the Clearwater Region. In 1923, Clyde Pangborn and Captain N.B. 'Nick' Mamer, both expert pilots contracted with Potlatch Timber Protective Association to experiment with an 'eye in the sky' for $600 per year. The success continued.

With no electronic communication between the plane and the ground. They devised a way to drop little Bull Durham sacks with hand written notes and a rock inside. There was a paper or cloth streamer tied on the outside so that it could be seen. The sacks were dropped at cruiser camps, lookout stations and etc.

The plane could only go as fast as 65 miles per hour and landing strips were limited. The only suitable one on either Association at the time was a Hog Meadows near Bovill. That airstrip was still a good emergency landing strip when A.B. Curtis wrote his book White Pines and Fires: Cooperative Forestry in Idaho which was published in 1983.

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