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We reconstructed vegetation and fire histories from four sites located on a sandy outwash plain in northwestern Wisconsin (USA) to test whether lakes and wetlands have influenced how vegetation and fire regimes in pine–oak forests responded to late-Holocene climatic changes. Because of positive feedbacks between jack pine (Pinus banksiana Lamb.) and fire, communities with few fire breaks should be more resilient to changing climatic conditions. Pollen and charcoal from lake-sediment cores were used to reconstruct vegetation changes at 50- to 100-year intervals and forest fire history at decadal time scales for the past 2500 years. The presence of fire breaks affected both fire regimes and the response of vegetation to climatic changes. Areas with more fire breaks had smaller charcoal peaks and the vegetation was more responsive to climate changes. The vegetation in areas with few fire breaks was more …