Monday,  Aug. 26, 2013 • Vol. 15--No. 42 • 24 of 29

(Continued from page 23)

Firefighters struggle to contain huge wildfire raging in Yosemite National Park area

• TUOLUMNE CITY, Calif. (AP) -- Hundreds of firefighters were digging trenches, clearing brush and starting back blazes to keep a wildfire raging north of Yosemite National Park out of several mountain hamlets.
• Inaccessible terrain, strong winds and bone-dry conditions have hampered their efforts to contain the Rim Fire, which began Aug. 17 and has grown to become one of the biggest in California history.
• Firefighters were hoping to advance on the flames Monday but strong winds were threatening push the blaze closer to Tuolumne City and nearby communities.
• "This fire has continued to pose every challenge that there can be on a fire...," said Daniel Berlant, a spokesman with the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection. "It's a very difficult firefight."
• The fire has consumed nearly 225 square miles of picturesque forests. Officials estimate containment at just 7 percent.
• ___

Civil rights movement and US immigration history connected

• NEW YORK (AP) -- When 250,000 marchers converged on Washington in August 1963, the issues were jobs and freedom.
• Now, as the crowds come together to mark the 50th anniversary of that seminal event in the civil rights movement, those issues have been joined by others, including one, immigration reform, that wasn't nearly on the political radar then like it is today.
• "They were fighting for equality, and that's exactly what we're fighting for," said Mikhel Crichlow, 28, a native of Trinidad and Tobago now living in Brooklyn. Crichlow said he was going to Washington for the commemoration.
• The push for comprehensive immigration reform was heard from the speakers' podium on Saturday, when tens of thousands marched to the Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial and down the National Mall.
• "It doesn't make sense that millions of our people are living in the shadows," said Rep. John Lewis, D-Ga., who was a speaker at the 1963 event. "Bring them out into the light and set them on the path to citizenship."
• ___

(Continued on page 25)

© 2013 Groton Daily Independent • To send correspondence, click here.