His dad would peel scorched visages back and then patiently reconstruct them.
All of it was etched into his personal history.
Despite that past, or maybe because of it, Hertz bought his current combustible property in 2017.
Architect and volunteer firefighter David Hertz, 64, is lifelong Los Angeles resident.Laura Doss
In 1993, the Green Meadow Fire quickly scorched 44,000 acres.
While other nearby properties were saved, much of Duquettes place burned to the ground.
And then they were gone.
Hertz began restoring the remnants of Duquettes village that had survived Green Meadow.
He built a lodge-like residence that looked up to Duquette-inspired spires.
It didnt take long for the danger to come to his front door.
In 2018, the Woolsey Fire surrounded Xanabu, leaving stallions at an adjacent ranch shrieking in terror.
Power and communication failed.
Hertz and his caretakers held off the flames as the fire licked the edge of his property.
Eventually, some surfer friends arrived and tamped down embers and watered down Xanabu.
Still, Hertz fled the land, driving his truck through fire after three days of fighting the flames.
Exhausted, he called his wife.
The wind changed, and Xanabu was spared.
Hertz vowed to do better.
(The invention won him an XPrize for innovation.)
Climate change had already moved in, causing schizophrenic changes in the weather.
Los Angeles experienced wet winters in 2022 and 2023 that left brush the height of corn stalks before harvest.
A biblical drought came in 2024, and now the brush kindled waiting for a spark.
On the night of Jan. 6, the U.S. Forest Service issued extreme red-flag warnings, indicating imminent danger.
Hertz walked through Xanabu in the dark, checking his sprinklers, his fire equipment, and his truck.
He knew the fire was coming he just didnt know from where.
IN ALTADENA, 77-YEAR-OLD John Joyce greeted the high-wind warning with excitement.
The residences were happy places, with a playhouse for kids on the porch.
The front yard was often filled with stretched canvases of the paintings they were working on.
Inside, art was everywhere, from abstract works to giant papier-mache puppet heads.
There were Bernie Sanders signs and a giant Thelonious Monk poster.
He wandered the country, battling depression, until he landed in Altadena in the 1990s.
Unincorporated and wild, the town on the edge of L.A. suited him.
Two decades ago, Joyce had fallen in love with Susie Stroll, a photographer and professor.
In 2022, Stroll found Joyces address and wrote him a letter.
She said turning her back on him 16 years ago had been her biggest regret.
They began seeing each other again in January 2024.
Almost immediately, Stroll started having problems with her balance and speaking.
In November, she was diagnosed with ALS and was moved into an assisted-living facility in nearby Pasadena.
Strolls throat constricted, which made eating solid foods impossible.
Joyce had a solution.
Every day, he would buy a pumpkin pie and then ride his Triumph motorcycle to see her.
There hed mash the pie and feed her tiny fragments.
Her condition worsened, and she was transferred into hospice, just a few blocks from Joyces home.
She died on Nov. 24.
Still grieving, Joyce felt guilty about the chores and projects he had ignored on Ricks properties.
The high-wind warning gave him a chance to catch up.
UNINCORPORATED AND WILD, THE TOWN ON THE EDGE OF L.A.
I can be the hero, thought Joyce.
Joyce got himself a cup of coffee in the shared kitchen.
A writer was grumbling that Donald Trumps imminent return to office had left him unmotivated.
Joyce suggested he look at it a different way.
Let history just go and it will turn into total fraud, and itll turn into a monopoly.
We can do the same with Trump.
Joyce and his friend agreed the world could use a little destruction.
He went outside to start on his chores.
The whipping debris drove him back inside.
He put on a bike helmet for protection.
A few minutes later, he returned and switched to his motorcycle helmet.
He flipped the visor down and began moving the cars.
Friends joked that she still lived her life like she had a stick in her hand.
Tierney decided to squat on the property, a decision Joyce supported.
She lived in a makeshift shack for the first five months without running water.
She went further and waited a decade.
Tierney scored legal possession of the home during the pandemic.
It still didnt feel quite real.
The artist had not slept much the past two nights.
The Santa Ana winds kept her awake.
Reassured, Tierney cleaned up her home and brought in some outside furniture.
The friend was an admirer of her art, and they had been corresponding for months.
Her friends plane was due to arrive at 8 p.m. She didnt want to be late.
Kincey also ran the schools after-care program, so his days could stretch 10 hours.
His friends marveled at the 46-year-olds endless energy and patience.
Kids get me, Kincey told them with a smile.
I just talk to them like little human beings, and it works.
Kincey was born and raised in Altadena.
Kinceys family traced their California roots to his grandparents fleeing Oklahoma after the 1921 Tulsa race massacre.
They found a home here, with jobs as mechanics and postal workers.
Kincey was both in and out of the community as a kid.
It was the urban-rural mix of Altadena that he loved the most.
Kincey swam and played soccer in the supposedly more-affluent Pasadena, but Altadena was his home.
It had been about 100 days since my last meal at the Reel Inn.
Since then, I had crisscrossed the country covering the presidential campaign.
I watched Trump get elected and then traveled to London and Stockholm.
He beamed in front of the flames.
Los Angeles received just a trace of rain in all that time.
It has become so prevalent that writers declaring The Death of the California Dream has become its own ecosystem.
(I have a folder on an old laptop, collecting the best of the genre.)
What is forgotten is that there are 10 million people trying to live that dream.
And it might not be the dream you suspect.
An Armenian couple scraping together money for a bungalow in Glendale.
A mom raising a son alone in Westwood after the suicide of his father.
An East L.A. family afraid of ICE moving in the shadows near MacArthur Park.
The people I talked to after Januarys wildfires had dreams.
In 24 hours, they ignited, flashed, and then vanished into the toxic darkness.
New dreams can be conjured, but first the nightmares have to fade.
IT WAS AROUND 4 P.M.
WHEN EVERYTHING WENT TO HELL.
The Palisades looked down on the Pacific Ocean from posh homes, a few that Hertz had designed.
They found a surreal scene.
The consensus was that the fire was still 10 miles away; theyd wait and see what happened.
It was around 4 p.m. when everything went to hell.
There was a black swirl of smoke as Hertz hit the PCH, reducing visibility to near zero.
Hertz had to tailgate the vehicle in front of him the three miles to the beach.
They pulled into the Topanga Beach parking lot.
Thats when they spotted a vast pyro cumulus cloud spinning down the cliffs behind the Getty Villa.
Private firefighters and staff protected the museum, but the fire tornado devoured everything else.
Hertz and his firefighters started banging on the door of an RV parked on the PCH.
The confused driver cracked the door.
Hertz screamed at him.
Youve got to move!
A few moments later, one of the Reel Inns windows blew out and the checkerboard tablecloths ignited.
There were no hydrants nearby, so the brigade was left pumping out water from their meager supply.
Hertz felt his face flush as the heat moved toward them.
He spotted the fire advancing toward a propane tank and ordered his crew to retreat.
From there, they watched the Reel Inn explode and disintegrate.
It had all taken less than 30 minutes.
The radio barked out that the fire was now sweeping through the Palisades.
The brigade dispatch reported that the flames were threatening the home of one of its members, Tyler Hauptman.
He pointed the truck through the flames, and down the PCH.
They climbed to the roofs in Hauptmans neighborhood and looked out at a world that was ceasing to exist.
A member of the crew swore and stated what was now obvious.
This has gotta be the worst fire in L.A. history.
The brigade went to work.
There was no fire department presence except for a lone emergency vehicle.
But the petrified driver was just looking for a way out of the Palisades.
Hey, over there.
A car was on fire.
They put it out.
A crew member moved in and beat the flames back.
Around 6:30 p.m., the men heard what sounded like a machine gun firing up the street.
It was a neighbors ammo stash catching fire.
Water pressure was dropping, but it didnt really matter.
Around 7:30 p.m., Hertz realized the wind, smoke, and flames had left him disoriented.
For a minute, he didnt know exactly where he was.
It was a horrifying and frightening feeling.
He reoriented himself and told his men that it was time to get the hell out.
His truck was low on fuel, and water pressure was anemic.
Besides, the wind had shifted.
Miraculously, Hauptmans house was out of danger.
The men packed up and drove back down to the PCH.
He gave his worried wife a hug.
We saved Tylers house, Hertz told her.
I guess thats something.
He then passed out on the couch.
But he was wrong.
The winds changed again.
The Palisades ran out of water.
He woke up at dawn.
Thats when he learned Tyler Hauptmans house had burned to the ground.
THIS HAS GOTTA BE THE WORST FIRE IN L.A. HISTORY.
She texted John Joyce, who fought the wind as he made the five-minute walk to her house.
He urged her to head to LAX.
Reluctantly, Tierney agreed and got in her car.
It was now 7 p.m., and she left for the airport.
Two hours later, they hugged in the arrivals terminal at LAX.
Then Tierney told her new friend something important.
Im not sure I have a house anymore.
Im 11 blocks from the mountains, Kincey told worried friends.
The whole neighborhood would have to burn up before my house got hit.
(His parents spent several days a week in Bakersfield helping take care of his niece.)
He brought in furniture and secured doors and windows.
By midnight, he was exhausted.
He texted his sister that everything was OK but she would have to buy some new shingles.
Kincey watered the yard and driveway outside his sisters home.
He then took a shower and got ready for bed.
The fire still seemed distant, and he had to be at school in eight hours.
But something made him set an alarm that would go off every 15 minutes.
He woke up around 1:30, and the night glow had changed to a more-intense bright red.
Its still coming,thought Kincey.
For a moment, Kincey considered getting some of his artwork out of the garage behind the house.
Hed been working on a giant acrylic work of Kobe Bryant being swarmed by Boston Celtics defenders.
But then there was a crackle that sounded like gunfire.
A palm tree above the house had caught an ember.
It burned quickly, shooting out flames that looked like tracer fire.
A nearby house caught fire.
Kincey picked up a garden hose and started wetting his sisters property again.
The torrent of water quickly became a trickle and then nothing.
He ran into the house and turned on a faucet.
Altadena had run out of water.
Now was the time to get his art.
He headed down a narrow path on the side of the house and toward his garage studio.
The wind knocked him down, and the heat stopped him after a few steps.
It was too late.
Kincey jumped into his truck.
He headed to his parents house and grabbed some of his fathers artwork.
Suddenly, he felt a burning feeling: His hair had been scorched by an ember chunk.
He put it out, got into his truck, and raced out of Altadena toward Pasadena.
A few hours later, the sun tried to rise through a haze of fire and smoke.
Thats when Kincey learned that both his sisters and his parents homes were gone.
More and more reports filtered in: Friends and relatives had lost their homes too.
And thats when Kincey realized his whole life his history, his past, his future no longer existed.
MULTIMILLION-DOLLAR PROPERTIES CRACKLED LIKE TWIGS IN A SUMMER CAMPFIRE.
JOYCE DIDNT LIE to Tierney.
He thought everything was going to be fine.
But he didnt know all of the facts.
A resident tried to put out the small flame and then watched it spread exponentially.
In just minutes, embers were spotted a mile away from the initial spark.
Embers could now be seen on Santa Anita Avenue.
She then returned to 2656 to grab some belongings and keepsakes.
The wind nearly ripped the door off her car.
She fled back down Santa Anita Avenue dodging downed trees and residents fleeing on foot.
Terrified, she spied an old man trudging slowly away from the fire, a suitcase rolling behind him.
As Jan. 7 became the 8th, Joyce shuttled between the two houses.
The 2656 house had a loft tower with giant glass windows that blew out in the early morning hours.
Breathing through a respirator, Joyce sweated and groaned as he lugged the plywood up the stairs.
Then, he got an idea.
There was a thick old fire hose in the loft that Joyce had installed for Ricks.
Joyce returned the hose to its designed purpose.
He hooked it up to the sink and ran it out the window.
He began watering the grounds and returning back to 2656 where he did the same with some garden hoses.
Joyce ran between the properties for another two hours.
A friend who was monitoring an L.A. fire app called him.
She told him houses were ablaze just a few streets away.
Joyce looked down at the gravel in the driveway.
It was simultaneously blackening and smoldering.
Everything he loved was burning away.
He called Ricks and told him that it didnt look good.
Ricks reminded him of a favorite anecdote.
Joyce always laughed and egged her on.
Now, as the world melted, Ricks told him to get the hell out of there.
Its all replaceable, except for my porn.
Joyce laughed through his respirator.
He gave himself two minutes to pack up his truck.
He grabbed a white shirt and a tie for Susies funeral the following week.
But in the darkness, he grabbed the wrong box he didnt have his tie.
A house up the avenue exploded.
He closed the trucks door, did a U-turn, and sped away.
Three blocks down the road, he slammed on the brakes.
Joyce had forgotten something: his teeth.
He turned around and charged back up the hill.
He thought for a moment that this is how it ends.
But then the wind blew the flames clear.
He could see smoke shooting out of Ricks loft.
Reoriented, Joyce realized he was going the wrong way.
Forgetting about the teeth, he dodged flaming wreckage for a half mile until he hit Woodberry Avenue.
A pile of abandoned stretchers and wheelchairs lined the ground.
Joyce pointed his truck south, uncertain where to go.
Eventually, he jumped on CA 210 East and drove until the smoke cleared.
For a moment, Joyce thought he had failed.
He had not been able to protect Ricks homes or the countless pieces of art created by his friends.
He had told Tierney everything was going to be fine, and that turned out to be untrue.
But then he had a moment of clarity.
Everything was gone, but as far as he could tell, everyone he loved was still alive.
And that was something.
DONALD KINCEYS PASTOR was persistent.
She wanted him to speak to her flock at Sunday services, five days after the fire.
Kincey is a quiet and thoughtful man, not prone to self-promotion, and at first told her no.
But then at the service, an 88-year-old woman named Fay spoke to the congregation.
She had lost everything, but one thing remained: her faith in God.
After that, Kincey felt obligated to say something.
He spoke of the rich history of artists and athletes in the Altadena Black community.
There were no tears until he began talking about himself and his family.
Kincey said he had always wished he had more of that kind of courage for himself.
My pride died in the fire, so did my fear, he said through tears.
Now, anything that comes my way, Im going to say, Why not?
I FIRST DROVE UP to 2656 with Chris Pack, the houses constant gardener.
Packs cottage was nothing but ashes.
He openly wept until he noticed something in the pile.
They were intact pieces of his grandmothers nativity scene: the shepherds, Mary, and the baby Jesus.
Later on, we came across a haggard old man.
He wore a hazmat suit but had only a surgical mask protecting his lungs.
He was furiously digging up piles of debris at what used to be the homes front door.
It was John Joyce.
I cant talk now, shouted Joyce with a gasp.
I have to find it it has the deed, everything.
She had a better mask and other gear for Joyce.
We drove with her boyfriend a few blocks to the Altadena Community Church where she worked.
But there wasnt much left.
A sign reading Sanctuary hung on a surviving pillar, but now pointed to nowhere.
The office where she worked no longer existed.
A chain-link fence remained with a gate holding a sign that read, kindly dont slam the gate.
Mills picked it up.
I put that sign up there.
It doesnt need to be there anymore.
I could hear her sobbing through her mask.
I circled back to the properties and caught a startling sight.
At the front of the 2656 house, Molly Tierney stood and tried to get Joyces attention.
He was still digging for something.
Tierney shouted his name.
Tierney promptly dropped her pants and mooned him.
Joyce stopped digging for a second and stood perfectly still.
Then, he mooned her back.
And the guy Tierney picked up at the airport?
Tierney gave me a shy, devilish smile and said, He has been such a comfort.
He told me of his life before Altadena.
He wasnt seen as a drifter weirdo, but embraced as a friend and a brother.
He smiled as he remembered the conversation with the writer the morning of the fire.
I guess I caught more of that Marxist destruction than I thought, joked Joyce.
Eventually, we talked about why he worked so hard to save the homes.
It was all hubris, said Joyce.
He paused for a long time.
But everything goes away, people go away, art goes away.
But I still have them, and they still have me.
Theres talk of rebuilding their community and fiercely defending their Altadena.
Some priorities have changed.
But the Triumph was now just another pile of twisted metal.
He had a new bike in mind.
He showed me a photograph of a different motorcycle, one his gearhead friends were prepping for him.
Its a real off-road bike.
It can tow things and ride over logs and stumps.
Its got a real Steve McQueen thing going on.
Its going to be great for rebuilding.
Im on a new journey now.
THE TOWN WAS LIT BY AN APOCALYPTIC ORANGE TINTED BY THE RED LIGHTS OF FIRE ENGINES.
I SPENT TWO DAYS with David Hertz.
First, we retraced his day in the fire in his brigade truck.
Always the architect, Hertz talked about Malibus future as he drove us through checkpoints.
He pointed at the burned remnants of houses on the ocean side.
How do you rebuild there?
The beach behind it was completely worn away.
Where are you going to put a septic tank?
He pointed down to the horizon toward a faraway beach.
Unless you owned one of these homes, you could never see it from here before.
At my request, we pulled into the Reel Inn parking lot.
All that remained was black wood and the restaurants neon sign.
Now, it was dark.
There had been harsh criticisms of L.A.s response to the fires.
The mayor was out of the country.
A Palisades reservoir was empty due to delayed repairs.
It would not have mattered, according to Hertz.
This is where I knew this wasnt like any other fire, he said.
It just moved so fast.
You could have had 5,000 firemen and endless water and you could not have stopped it.
Burned-out cars with Xs on them, meaning cadaver-sniffing dogs had checked them.
He looked for the house of his sons girlfriend.
We had to circle the block twice, slowly creeping by at a crawl.
It simply wasnt there anymore.
He called his son.
Yeah, its all gone.
Ill try and get you up here soon for a look, but theres nothing here.
Hertz opened the gate and greeted me warmly, clad in Blundstones and black wind-resistant gear.
The Indigenous tribes did natural burns for centuries, said Hertz.
Its not the answer to everything climate change is causing, but it can help.
Look, that wasnt the plan, said Hertz.
But that was the situation.
People helped me when I was in danger, and I wanted to repay that.
But, yeah, I do look back on it, and there are some things I learned.
Keep an eye on your exit route.
Regarding preserving Xanabu, he used one word repeatedly.
Its the definition of folly, said Hertz.
If its not here, there will be other beautiful things in our lives.
Enjoy it all while youre here.
I shook his hand and then went for a drive.
I made a trip up to Agoura Hills and pulled into the driveway of the old Paramount Ranch.
It was all gone.
Id forgotten that Hertz told me it had burned to the ground during the Woolsey Fire.
I looked out at the ocean and realized Hertz was right views were now even more spectacular.
And I thought the architect was right about something else: It was all folly.
The beach shacks slipping into the sea.
But it was a beautiful folly.
A few hours later, a light rain began to fall over Los Angeles.
