Firestorm at Peshtigo

On October 8, 1871 - the same night as the Great Chicago Fire - the lumber town of Peshtigo, Wisconsin, was struck with a five-mile-wide wall of flames, borne on tonado-force winds of one hundred mile an hour that tore across more than 2,400 square miles of land, obliterating the town in less than one hour and killing more than two thousand people.