1944 - Environment

Environment

An earthquake registering 7.8 on the Richter scale shatters San Juan, Argentina, January 15, killing at least 5,000 and possibly 8,000; a quake in Turkey February 1 registers 7.4 and kills between 2,800 and 5,000; a quake measuring 8.3 hits Tonankai, Japan, December 7, leaving about 1,000 dead.

Smokey Bear becomes a symbol for forest fire prevention. Created by the National Forest Service and the Advertising Council to enlist public support at a time when lumber is critical to the war effort, the bear appears in a poster by Saturday Evening Post illustrator Albert Staehle showing Smokey with the message, "Only You Can Prevent Forest Fires." National Forest Service illustrator James Hansen develops another likeness of the bear, Forest Service artist Rudolph Wendelin will soften Hansen's bear, and Forest Service illustrator Harry L. Rossoll, now 33, will turn it into a weekly newspaper "Smokey Says" cartoon character (see 1950).

The new Kentucky Dam on the Tennessee River creates the largest reservoir in the Tennessee Watershed—a 160,000-acre body of water with 2,380 miles of shoreline to provide a Land Between the Lakes recreation area for anglers, boaters, campers, hikers, riders, and swimmers. Even more than the other dams on the river, it provides effective flood control, protecting 6 million acres of land in the lower Ohio and Mississippi River valleys from inundation.

Congress establishes Big Bend National Park in a bend of the Rio Grande River of Texas. It occupies 708,221 acres of mountain-land and desert.

The new Shasta Dam in California will help control floods, provide irrigation, and provide recreation (the lake it creates is the state's largest, covering 46 square miles [119 square kilometers]).