JACKSON, Wyo. (AP) — Four convection columns of smoke rose more than 20,000 feet into the air as high winds whipped across eerily empty walkways around Old Faithful Inn.

"In all directions that we looked, it looked like the world was coming to an end," Joan Anzelmo recalled.

It was "Black Saturday," the name given to Aug. 20, 1988, when wildfires burned about 150,000 acres of Yellowstone National Park in a day.

Thirty years later, Anzelmo stood in nearly the same spot at Old Faithful where she watched the smoke columns in 1988. Anzelmo served as Yellowstone's spokesperson throughout the histor...