Image ID:  FHS3259
Image Date:   June 30, 1950
Image Title:   [Dedication ceremony of the "real" Smokey Bear to the Washington Zoo, 1950.]
Image Caption:   Caption 1: No. 8 -- Joseph F. Kaylor, President, Association of State Foresters, speaking at the Smokey presentation at the Washington Zoo, on behalf of the State Foresters for the splendid public support being given the nation-wide CFFP [Cooperative Forest Fire Prevention] Campaign. Seated left: William T. Piper, President, Piper Aircraft Corporation, and Lyle F. Watts, Chief, U.S. Forest Service. Seated right: U.S. Senator Dennis Chavez of New Mexico.

Caption 2: [Ceremony in front of bear cage at Washington Zoo. Sign on cage reading "Do not feed this bear." Several Smokey Bear posters in background, and a large banner reading "Welcome, Smokey!"]

[This image is one of many promotional photos taken in 1950 of events surrounding the bear cub (see also FHS image ID# FHS3253-3254, FHS3256-3260, and FHS3262-3263). The cub was cared for by New Mexico Game Warden Ray Bell after being injured in the 1950 Capitan Gap fire in New Mexico's Lincoln National Forest. He was named "Smokey Bear" after the character created in 1944 by the Forest Service and the Advertising Council, and donated by the Forest Service to the National Zoo in Washington, DC where he remained until his death in 1976.]
Photographer:   [Walters, Harold D., for the U.S. Forest Service]
Use Restrictions:   Permission from the Forest History Society required for any use of this image.
Repository Contact Information:   Forest History Society, Inc.; 701 William Vickers Ave., Durham, NC 27701; Tel.: (919) 682-9319; Fax: (919) 682-2349.