Amazing Snapshots of Animals
Bring Fame to Desert Photographer
IN A desert shack that cost less than fifty cents to build, Fred V. Sampson, of Barstow, Calif., has found not only contentment but a curious road to fame. Three years ago, he left his job as a commercial artist in Los Angeles and built the low, one-room hut on the edge of the Mohave Desert. Three wails are made of mud and stones, the fourth is formed of the gold-bearing rock of a steep hillside. Here, Sampson spends his days doing what he wants most to do, making friends with curious creatures of the desert and snapping pictures of the animals in action. These photographs—some of the most remarkable wildlife pictures ever made—are attracting wide attention.
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ELECTROCUTING WHALES
BIRGER HOLM-HANSEN, a Norwegian engineer, has invented a device for the instantaneous electrocution of whales. It consists of a small but powerful generator which is carried in the whaleboat, and a flexible, insulated line conveying a current of high voltage to the harpoon. At the in-slant the harpoon hits the whale the current is thrown on and the electric charge shot into the monster.
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Guinea Pigs Test New Beauty Aids
GUINEA PIGS are partly responsible for the beauty of many of the glamorous faces that flash across the screen of your neighborhood movie theater. Tests with these patient little rodents have even saved the film careers of actors and actresses whose skin reacted unfavorably to ordinary studio make-up. Now applied to the manufacture of cosmetics for the general public, similar tests are guarding the beauty and health of millions.
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This is one of the coolest things I’ve ever seen. Beaver paratroopers!

Airborne Beavers Fight Floods
OUT in Idaho, the Department of Fish and Game is teaching eager beavers to yell “Geronimo!” These busy little creatures are being dropped by parachute to terrain where they can do their bit in the conservation battle.
Idaho state caretakers trap unwanted beavers which may be a nuisance in certain areas, round them up at central points and pack them in pairs in specially constructed wooden crates. After they are dropped, the boxes remain closed as long as there’s some tension on the parachute shrouds but pull open as soon as the chute collapses on the ground. Then, out crawl Mama and Papa beaver, ready to start work.
After they’re settled, the 40-pound, web-footed rodents multiply and become outpost agents of flood control and soil conservation. Fur supervisor John Smith reports that in carefully observed early operations,
the beavers headed straight for water and started building a new dam within a couple of days.
However, one problem still remains to be solved—a question of ethics more than conservation. Are these eager beavers bona fide members of the Caterpillar Club?