On our way home from San Francisco, we saw smoke coming from a house in Daly City. We drove towards the smoke, which was getting thicker and smelled like burning driftwood. Because we make this kind of trip once a week to take two classes at San Francisco State, I had installed a CB Radio inside my car in case I had a problem — hand held telephones had not been invented yet.

We saw an old unoccupied house with smoke coming out of the top window. We called another CB'er, who called the local fire department. Within several minutes we heard sirens and saw red lights. We then continued our trip home, which was 136 miles from San Francisco.

Because there were two of us in the car, one would drive halfway and the other the rest of the way.

While on the freeway leaving Livermore, California, heading east we saw a bright light that seemed to blink on and off, like a flame from a fire. When we got closer it was a car on fire and people were trying to put it out. Again we used our CB Radio and reported a car on fire out of Livermore going east. Within minutes the fire was put out.

We then drove through Tracy, Manteca, Escalon and had no trouble.

On the road out of Escalon to Oakdale, we smelled smoke that had an odor of hay burning. The closer we got to Oakdale the stronger the smell. We passed a road that crossed a field to a barn that was stacked with hay. In the car's mirror, we could see a red glare coming from a barn. We turned around the car, there was no one on the road at this time of night and drove towards the barn. By the time we got there, the barn was on fire. Again we used the CB Radio and called the sheriff's office. In small counties, the sheriff's office had installed CB Radios. Within twenty minutes a fire truck with a volunteer crew was putting out the fire.

Finally, we made it home without any more incidents.

Today, there are very few CB's Radios in cars — most of them are in trucks that go from state to state. Handheld telephones have replaced the radios.

Every county has a fire crew ready to respond in a matter of minutes to put out fires, which are small like the fires that I described. As soon as the fire department recognized that the fire is too big for them to handle they will call for mutual aid — other fire departments and CalFire help. When CalFire is called it turns out to be a major fire like the fires that California has been having in the last six months.

Just remember when you see a red moon at night there is a fire somewhere close by. At one time we used to call it blood on the moon.