A home belonging to Don and Carol Gerstner near Medicine Lodge that was destroyed by a wildfire is pictured Thursday. The Gerstners are the parents of Lawrence resident Kyle Gerstner. The fire that started Tuesday in Oklahoma has burned 640 square miles of grassland and destroyed six homes as of Saturday.

The biggest wildfire in Kansas’ recorded history has destroyed the boyhood home of a Lawrence resident.

Janet Gerstner said her husband, Kyle, would return Sunday from Medicine Lodge after visiting his parents, 87-year-old Don and 85-year-old Carol Gerstner. The couple lost their home Wednesday to the raging wildfire that has burned through miles of the rugged Gypsum Hills on both sides of the Kansas-Oklahoma line. The Associated Press reported Saturday that the fire had consumed 640 square miles of grassland and destroyed six homes.

She and her husband had been tracking with concern the progress of the wildfire that started Tuesday near Alva, Okla., Gerstner said. They and Kyle’s parents thought the house was safe when the fire moved north past their home two miles southwest of Medicine Lodge. However, a wind shift early Wednesday again put the house in danger.

“Kyle’s father called Wednesday and said the fire was near them,” she said. “I got home that afternoon at 6:30. Looking at the computer to follow the fire, we got concerned. We tried to call, but we got a busy signal.”

Gerstner said that was because phone lines were down from the fire. By the time she and her husband were making that call, a finger of flames driven by sustained winds of 35 to 40 mph with gusts of up to 60 mph had consumed her in-laws’ home on U.S. Highway 281.

“Just minutes after he got off the phone with Kyle, Don saw a 16-foot wall of fire to the west,” Gerstner said. “As he was watching the fire, a cedar tree exploded in flames in the yard. That’s when he knew they had to leave. He and Carol made it to the truck. He tried to get his bird dogs when he realized he needed to go if they were going to survive. He actually drove out through fire with cedar trees burning near the driveway.”

The house had been the home of her husband’s parents for 54 years, Gerstner said. Through the years, her father-in-law, who is a carpenter as well as a bird dog trainer, rebuilt and expanded the house that started as a dugout in the 1800s, using brick salvaged from the old Barber County Courthouse and cedar-shake siding and shingles, she said.

“I remember standing at the kitchen sink at Christmas and telling my mother-in-law, ‘This is one of the most miraculous landscapes and beautiful views in the world,'” she said. “It really was a beautiful house. He (Don Gerstner) did a wonderful job building it.”

Her father-in-law lost a number of bird dogs, including a descendant of a two-time national champion, Gerstner said. Two survived, perhaps through the efforts of responding firefighters, she said.

Everything inside was lost, including her artist mother-in-law’s paintings and the dog training trophies her father-in-law won. It could have been much worse, Gerstner said.

“If this would have happened at night, there would have been nothing left of them to find,” she said. “We have immense gratitude that they survived and the outpouring of support for them.”

The home was insured, and with the success of an Internet fundraising drive for Don and Carol Gerstner, she is asking that contributions be made to the larger community, Gerstner said.

The hundreds of firefighters, local ranchers and other volunteers battling the wildfire appear to have gained the upper hand with the help of snow early Sunday morning and the deployment Saturday of Kansas National Guard UH-60 Black Hawk helicopters, Gerstner said. But she said a lot of recovery work will be needed as the area of large ranches.

Volunteers will be needed to help replace miles of fencing destroyed or cut to allow livestock to escape the blaze and a call has been made for hay donations to feed livestock with the loss of pasture, she said. Those who would donate or help can find links at sccfks.org or at facebook.com/SouthCentralCommunityFoundation.

Don and Carol Gerstner are moving into a Medicine Lodge apartment, but Janet’s father-in-law’s early intention is to rebuild at the 40-acre homestead. Gerstner said it’s a plan that “made sense” for a man who was an active carpenter.

“He’s very rugged,” she said. “Carol loves the outdoors, too. They are the epitome of that rugged county.”