Mark Twain officially honored for setting Lake Tahoe’s ‘first prescribed burn’

INCLINE VILLAGE, Nev. — “The ground was deeply carpeted with dry pine needles, and the fire touched them off as if they were gunpowder. It was wonderful to see what fierce speed the tall sheet of flame traveled.” Those were the words famous American author and humorist Mark Twain penned in his novel “Roughing It” to describe a wildfire he started in the Lake Tahoe Basin in 1861.But it was an account that was embellished, as revealed by Twain impressionist McAvoy Layne during a present