---
title: Fire! Keep it away from our National Parks
url: https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/fire-keep-it-away-from-our-national-parks-1941/
description: An octagonal sheet with 'FIRE!' in flame-tipped red letters above a charred, burnt-out tree standing before a red sun.
section: Collection
---

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3. Fire! Keep it away from our National Parks

[![Fire! Keep it away from our National Parks, 1941 US poster: An octagonal sheet with 'FIRE!' in flame-tipped red letters above](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/images/fire-keep-it-away-from-our-national-parks-1941.jpg)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/images/fire-keep-it-away-from-our-national-parks-1941.jpg)

# Fire! Keep it away from our National Parks

An octagonal sheet with 'FIRE!' in flame-tipped red letters above a charred, burnt-out tree standing before a red sun, with the line 'Keep it away from our National Parks'. The fear-appeal is the scorched tree with arm-like branches and the flaming headline, presenting fire as a looming threat to the parks.

## Propaganda techniques used in this poster

[Fear appeal](https://propagandaarchive.org/techniques/fear-appeal/)

## Text on the object

Original (English) · read from the image, not independently checked

```
FIRE!
Keep it away
FROM OUR
NATIONAL PARKS
DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR
NATIONAL PARK SERVICE
[signature:] Charles J. Thorndike N.P.S.
[imprint:] ENGRAVED AND PRINTED BY THE U.S. GEOLOGICAL SURVEY
THE NATIONAL PARK SERVICE (on both pine-cone emblems)
```

[← Fire is a 5th-columnist](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/fire-is-a-5th-columnist-1941/) [Fire Slogan Contest: 1st Week's Winner →](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/fire-slogan-contest-1st-week-1941/)

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- [Miniature of Pope Urban II at the Council of Clermont, Les Passages d'outremer (BnF Fr. 5594, fol. 19r)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/passages-doutremer-council-of-clermont-colombe-1474/) (France · 1474 · Testimonial, Fear appeal). Content note: Medieval religious imagery and a French text describing alleged killings and captivity of eastern Christians, as used to argue for the First Crusade; the text is shown as written.
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- [Der Warner (broadsheet lampoon on the Jesuits after Breitenfeld and Rain)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/der-warner-anti-jesuit-broadsheet-1632/) (Holy Roman Empire · 1632 · Scapegoating, Fear appeal)
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- [Gazette of the United States, "The Jeffersoniad" no. VIII, 14 August 1800](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/gazette-us-jeffersoniad-1800/) (United States · Aug 14, 1800 · Name-calling, Fear appeal)
- [Tyrants Prostrate, Liberty Triumphant (pro-Polk cartoon on Dorr), 1844](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/tyrants-prostrate-liberty-triumphant-polk-1844/) (United States · 1844 · Name-calling, Fear appeal). Content note: Speech balloons contain anti-Catholic and nativist wording ('the ruins of Popery') in the mouths of the Whig figures, written by a Democratic cartoonist and shown unaltered.
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