570 HISTORY OF TH1 COMM ON SCIENC1 VND TECHNOLOGY 



mission report and recommendations. A telegram along the same lines 

 was sent to Davis. Davis immediately wrote a friendly note to the 

 Chairman of the Fire Commission, Richard E. Bland, stating: 



Let me assure you tli.it I have no intention to rush through a fire bill before the 

 Fire Commission has been heard from. I think you know that I have had a long 

 standing interest in lire research and education. As a principal sponsor of the Fire 

 Research and Safety Ait ol 1968 I helped establish the Commission which you chair. 

 I have followed the work of the Commission through our former chairman, Congress- 

 man George P. Miller, and I was pleased when the Speaker saw tit to appoint me to 

 the Commission last February 5th. * * * I share with you and the other members of 

 the Commission the conviction that there is an urgent need lor additional effort in the 

 fire research and education held. I hope we can work together toward the achievement 

 of that common objective. 



At the same time, Davis wrote a note to all committee members 

 and cosponsors of his bill, affirming that he did not intend to rush the 

 fire hearings until publication of the Commission's report. He added: 



[ expect that the Commission Chairman and other officials will appear before the 

 subcommittee and that the Commission's proposals will be given careful consideration 

 along with the other proposals before the subcommittee. 



At the end of April, when the Commission's report and specific 

 legislative recommendations were ready, Howard D. Tipton, Com- 

 mission executive director, delivered a copy to the subcommittee 

 and asked Davis to join in a televised press conference and luncheon 

 which would provide a glittering launching pad for the report and the 

 bill based on it. Further to attract Davis to get on board was the fact 

 that Senator Warren G. Magnuson (Democrat of Washington) had 

 accepted an invitation to be a costar at the proceedings. Tipton slipped 

 the word that Peter Hackes of NBC was helping with the arrangements 

 and that national press coverage was expected, drawing the attention 

 of firefighters and the general public throughout the country. Despite 

 all the attractions, Davis declined to be drawn into the net. The Com- 

 mission instead enlisted Representative Wright Patman (Democrat 

 of Texas), chairman of the House Banking and Currency Committee, 

 which would probably get jurisdiction over the new agency if it were 

 established within HUD. Nevertheless, Davis had no fight with the 

 Commission and asked Bland and Tipton to testify on the opening day 

 of his subcommittee hearings at the end of July and early August 

 1973. 



The July-August hearings of the Davis subcommittee drew huge 

 crowds which jammed the main committee room. When the final 

 version of the bill was developed and brought to the House floor on 

 April 29, 1974, it included authorization for a U.S. Fire Academy and 

 a Fire Safety Bureau in the Department of Commerce, a Fire Research 

 Center in the National Bureau of Standards, and expanded efforts in 



