Fire Fighting Exhibit at the Exposition 



DOX CARLOS ELLIS is in charge of the Forest 

 Service exhibits at the Panama-Pacific Exposi- 

 tion which are attracting so much attention from 

 tile thousands of visitors, who are curious to learn what 

 the Government is doing with the great forest areas 

 under its control. The larger exhibit is at San Fran- 

 cisco and the feature about which most of the inquiries 

 are made is the forest fire protection and fire fighting 

 exhibit. This is complete in every detail. 



In the center of the space is a large model, measuring 

 12 by 15 feet, showing a ranger district on a national 

 forest. A lookout house and a lookout tower occupy 

 the two highest peaks. These are connected by telephone 

 with a ranger station, which 

 in turn is connected with vari- 

 ous users of the forest at a 

 ranchhouse, a hotel, and a pow- 

 erhouse. The model shows 

 Government roads, trails and 

 bridges, constructed primarily 

 for the purpose of making 

 every part of the forest ac- 

 cessible to fire fighters. Fire- 

 fighting equipment boxes are 

 placed at strategic points along 

 trails and roads, and a fire line 

 kept clear of inflammable ma- 

 terial runs along one of the 

 mountain ridges. 



To one side of the large cen- 

 ter model a full-size fire look- 

 out house, fully equipped for 

 discovering and locating forest 

 fires, is built on an imitation of 

 a great boulder on a mountaili 

 top. The house is painted 

 white to serve as a conspicuous 

 target for heliograph messages 

 directed toward it by patrol- 

 men. The building contains 



binoculars through which a distant forest fire is seen ; a 

 fire finder, by the aid of which the supervisor's oiifice 

 can be informed definitely of the location of a fire; and 

 p special tyjje of telephone in communication with the 

 supervisor's office. There are also on display in this 

 tower a portable telephone and a portable heliograph out- 

 fit for use by patrolmen. A pair of stereopticon ma- 

 chines are concealed within the imitation rock on which 



DON CARLOS ELLIS 



In charge of the Forest Service Forestry Exhihits at the San 

 Diego Exposition and at the Panama-Pacific Exposition 



standing at the Entrance to 

 Exhibit at San Diego. 



the house rests and throw pictures and descriptions on 

 screens built into the rock, which tell the entire story 

 of the fire protection work. 



On a redwood tree trunk in another part of the exhibit 

 is displayed a weather-proof iron box telephone, such as 

 is placed along patrol routes on the forests. This tele- 

 phone is connected with the telephone in the lookout 

 and with a supervisor's telephone at the desk of the 

 demonstrator by slack lines attached to tree trunks on 

 swinging insulators, just as the line is installed on a 

 national forest. This manner of construction enables 

 the line to stand the stress of the elements through the 

 winter and prevents the wire being broken when a 



tree falls. 



The latest type of fire-fight- 

 ing toolbox, equipped with 

 shovels, rakes, hoes, axes, can- 

 vas waterbags and buckets, 

 canteens, lanterns for fighting 

 fires at night, torches for set- 

 ting back fires, nesting cooking 

 utensils, and emergency ra- 

 tions, occupies a place near the 

 lookout house. 



lieside the desk of the dem- 

 onstrator, who plays the part 

 of the national forest super- 

 visor, is hung a master fire 

 map of the forest similar 

 to the one in the lookout 

 house. On this map is shown 

 the location of every trail, 

 bridge, road, telephone line, 

 telephone station, ranger sta- 

 tion, fire-fighting toolbox and 

 lookout station. At the loca- 

 tions of the lookout points are 

 protractions oriented to corre- 

 spond with the protractors of 

 those stations. This map enables the supervisor to 

 locate a fire directly from the reports of the lookouts 

 without any mathematical calculations, and to place to 

 the best possible advantage the force of men available. 

 Fire warning posters and rules concerning care with 

 fire in the forests are posted upon tree trunks and in 

 other conspicuous places through the exhibit as they are 

 in the forests. 



the Building Containing tlie 



852 



