on the bark. I guess he was hungry and thirsty. He was such a lonely little cub! I never saw a more implor¬ing look. You could tell that more than anything in the world he wanted his mother. "His hair was singed. His feet were burned to the bone. One of the soldiers grabbed him and gave him first aid. The cub whimpered when put into a truck and taken back to the firefighters' camp." That night, when the tired, smoke-stained crew got back to camp, the cub was there to greet them. He cuddled up contentedly on the shoulder of the young man who had rescued him. It seemed as if they—cub and rescuer—had a bond between them, drawn together by the ordeal of fire. The cub was flown to Santa Fe the next morning. There he was treated by a veterinarian and put on a diet of pabulum mixed with honey and milk. An appealing picture of the veterinarian bandaging the little bear's paw was featured on the front pages of the nation's newspapers. The cub became one of the most famous hotfoots in history. Letters of sympathy and help poured in to Elliott S. Barker, New Mexico state game warden. A state fair manager wanted to put the famous cub on exhibit. A large zoo offered him a permanent home. But Barker insisted that the cub get well before he decided upon a permanent home for him. A week passed, and then Lyle F. Watts, chief forest¬er of the U. S. Forest Service, got in touch with Mr. Barker. "We think your cub could help us in our forest fire prevention campaign," Mr. Watts said. "Would you let him come to Washington?" Mr. Barker agreed. In the nation's capital, the bear would be a symbol in the national campaign against the waste and horrors of forest fires. So Smokey got his name, after the bear that has been on posters for six years. He was a live Smokey helping carry on the work of the poster Smokey, whose picture was already familiar to millions of people who ride streetcars, trains, and subways. Smokey flew to Washington in the luxury of a spe¬cial plane. At Tulsa, St. Louis, Cincinnati, and Balti-more, crowds gathered at the airports to see the cub, and newspaper photographers flashed their bulbs. The real ovation, though, didn't come until Smokey's plane glided down through the rain to land at Na-tional Airport, Washington. Smokey was hustled into the airport's Presidential Room, no less, and he drank happily from a baby bottle while television and news- reel cameras whirred. Smokey was officially presented to the Washington Zoo on June 30. He has since been made an honorary fireman, and an honorary member of the School Safety Patrol with a Sam Browne belt and badge. During a Fire Prevention Council's parade down Washington's Pennsylvania Avenue, Smokey rode on a special float, and acted like a Hollywood star at a premiere. His picture appeared everywhere, and so did his story. All this attention turned Smokey's head. In his early days in the Washington Zoo he played to the crowds that visited his cage. He scampered around, turned somersaults, and climbed up the tree trunk to please his audience. He's a big bear now, not as playful as he was when a cub. Sometimes he's surly. The keepers can't get a leash on him. And so he makes no more trips out of the zoo. Children still flock to him. "That's Smokey," one will say. "Oh, sure, I know," another will answer. "He's the bear they rescued from a forest fire." But Smokey is still a cub in everybody's memory, a cub who has saved lives and forests merely by his ex¬istence, a living symbol in the fight against forest fires. He's done a big job, and he's still doing it. And maybe he's grouchy, not just because he's a bear, but because there are still too many forest fires. That's what the youngsters say, anyway. And they may be right. *A conservationist at heart, Duncan Scott of the United States Forest Service has contributed articles to Holiday, Better Homes and Gardens, and other magazines. Forest fires are an old story to Red Cross. In fact, the first relief operation undertaken by the organization followed the destructive Michigan forest fires in the late summer of 1881. During the past 5 years the Red Cross has con¬ducted 20 such operations in which it assisted a total of 40,000 people at a cost of more than $2,400,000. In addition to relief activities, many chapters engage in a program of forest fire prevention in cooperation with national, state, and local agencies. 24 There she stands, looking at the camera, face demure but forceful, complete with bonnet and basket—Mrs. Lucy Salisbury Doolittle, a "Hospital Visitor" of the United States Sanitary Commission. In Civil War days, before Clara Barton started the American Red Cross, many patriotic women were volunteers with the Sanitary Com¬mission, which went out of existence shortly after the Civil War. Today Mrs. Doolittle would be a Gray Lady. She might sometimes carry a basket, but her bonnet and her costume would be quite different. She wouldn't be so picturesque, and she would have a lot of pro- Not Always Skin Deep fessional skill and a specialized assignment, but her impulse to make illness and suffering a little more bearable would be the same. We can't find out whether the three pretty girls, Civil War nurses, worked in the uniforms they have on in the picture or whether these are the "dress-up" clothes they put on to have their picture taken. The costumes—or uniforms—of Red Cross women have, of course, always reflected the styles of the time. And it's a far cry from Mrs. Doolittle and the nurses and the Red Cross workers of World War I to the uniforms of today. But the spirit is the same. 25