MISSOULA – Forestry students at the University of Montana are working hard this week to set up the 106th Foresters’ Ball, a beloved campus tradition and fundraiser for students in the W.A. Franke College of Forestry and Conservation.

Students and alumni have turned UM’s Schreiber Gym into an old logging town featuring wooden false fronts of a saloon, chapel, jail and other buildings. The Western atmosphere will draw hundreds of flannel-clad visitors to gather and dance to live music. 

This year’s ball is open to the public and will be held at 7 p.m. Friday and Saturday, Jan. 31-Feb. 1. Tickets are available online. The public also is invited to a Community Forestry Day which will be held from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. Saturday in Schreiber Gym before the ball. 

This year’s theme for the ball is “Tankers Dumpin’ & Crews a Jumpin’,” a nod to the brave firefighting crews across the state. 

The work to create this year’s ball was inspired by fire crews past and present, said Koson Verkler, a senior forestry student and “chief push” of the Foresters’ Ball Committee. A replica of the Miss Montana plane and parachutes will be displayed at the ball. 

On the second-story of the gymnasium, a room will have interpretive signs to honor the 12 smokejumpers and one ground-based firefighter who died in the 1949 Mann Gulch Fire. The fire is considered one of the most tragic in U.S. Forest Service history and led to several changes in the safety and tactics of wildfire suppression. 

Verkler, who served last year on the Mann Gulch 75th anniversary committee, said it was important to him and the other forestry students to recognize those lost in the historic fire. 

“People will be able to walk up there and understand more about who they were,” Verkler said. “We will honor them all and share the fact that six of them went to UM and sat in the same chairs that we sit in. They had similar classes and likely also put on Foresters’ Balls just like we are doing.” 

Mike Ryan, a third-generation UM alumnus and Forest Service firefighter, was glad to hear the Foresters’ Ball will commemorate the Mann Gulch Fire. Ryan is deeply familiar with Mann Gulch, having hiked through it each year to help clear the trails and having led a helicopter crew over the area. Additionally, his grandfather, John Milodragovich, was on a Forest Service crew that responded in the days after the deadly fire. Ryan’s grandfather graduated with a bachelor's degree in forest management from UM in 1940 and worked as an assistant ranger in Philipsburg during the Mann Gulch Fire. 

“When you stand at the top of Mann Gulch, you are immediately carried to what it must have been like for those men in those moments,” Ryan said. “Even if they are not directly remembered by name, the lessons that came out of Mann Gulch will stay with the firefighting community forever.” 

The history of Mann Gulch is a motivation for Verkler as he leads the ball and studies to join the next generation of land managers and stewards. This summer, Verkler will enter his third season working on a Missoula-based Montana Department of Natural Resources and Conservation helitack crew. He works closely with other UM forestry college alumni on the crew. 

“A lot of alumni work out there. It’s a blast,” Verkler said. “Not many people can say they fly around in a helicopter for their college job.” 

In the classroom, Verkler has seen support grow for the UM forestry college and its mission to be a leader in conservation and sustainability efforts across Montana and the West. This past year, the college partnered with the UM Foundation to launch the “Treasure Montana: Cultivating Our Tomorrow” fundraising campaign. The UM Foundation seeks to raise $20 million in private support for a new state-of-the-art, 60,000-square foot hub for environment and conservation research and instruction on campus. The campaign will match $25 million committed to the project by the Montana Legislature in 2021.   

As Verkler enters this weekend’s Foresters’ Ball, it will be his last as a student. But he knows he’s leaving it in good hands. Three years ago, he helped bring back the ball after a COVID-related hiatus and kept the momentum going each year since. 

The first meeting of this spring semester to plan the ball drew 66 students, mostly freshman and sophomores, who are eager to continue the time-honored tradition. 

“I think the ball is in a really good spot right now, and I hope that continues into the future,” Verkler said. “I’m just lucky to be able to do what I do and be a part of this history.”