By Buster Barkley, lead reporter
Some birthday parties come with cake. Fort Vancouver National Historic Site’s listing for Smokey Bear’s 82nd birthday celebration came with a more practical party favor: a reminder about fire safety.
The National Park Service listed the free event for Saturday, August 8, at 10 a.m. at the Fort Vancouver Visitor Center in Vancouver, Washington. The planned gathering brought together the U.S. Forest Service, Friends of Fort Vancouver, the National Park Service and the Red Cross for family activities and information on wildfire, campfire and home-fire safety.
That is a remarkably responsible way to mark a birthday. The event page says children could take part in activities, while tables from the participating organizations would offer safety education. Smokey Bear-themed items were also slated for sale through the Friends of Fort Vancouver bookstore.
The listing also revisited the real bear cub whose rescue after a New Mexico wildfire helped turn Smokey Bear into a national wildfire-prevention symbol. The official Smokey Bear history says the cub later lived at the National Zoo, received enough mail to be assigned ZIP Code 20252, and retired in 1975.
Buster’s dry dispatch: a birthday where everyone leaves with a better campfire plan is the kind of party detail worth copying. The dessert remains optional; the water bucket does not.
