with better tools to perform their vital services. Both groups, I know,
will do better jobs with them. I am pleased, also, to observe the close
cooperation that exists between those who are engaged in training
for fire prevention and fire protection and those engaged in training
for civil defense. You are, as I have suggested, engaged in common
pursuits — the protection of the people against disasters — and it is
proper that you should share, as you are doing here, facilities in
common.

The State of Maryland has achieved a most enviable reputation
nationally and internationally for the quality of the fire protection
it offers its citizens. And as one who has been associated intimately
with our program for a great many years, I can assert with some
authority that this achievement is due in no small part to the caliber
of the training that has been carried on in this Fire Service Extension
Department of our University of Maryland, where so many persons
have been trained in the skills and techniques of fire fighting and
fire prevention....

For quite a few years, the Maryland Civil Defense Agency, working
with the civil defense organizations of the counties of Maryland and
Baltimore City, has conducted extensive training programs on a
variety of civil defense problems. Just a few days ago, General Van
Brunt, the Director who is with us here today, reported to the Mary-
land County Commissioners Association that more than 11, 000 Mary-
landers have received civil defense instruction during the past year,
and that many thousands of others had received such training in
prior years. We are extremely proud of the fact that our State
Troopers, our forestry personnel, our game wardens, our tidewaters
fisheries inspectors — all have received extensive instruction in
radiological monitoring. Key employees in other State departments
have been given similar training. On the local level, hundreds of fire
fighters and police officers have been given instruction. Along with
continued instruction of State employees, these people, both paid
and volunteer, will continue to be offered the opportunity to acquire
skill in civil defense protective techniques. Just within the past two
weeks, I am told, a sizable group from many sections of the State
completed an advanced course in heavy duty rescue.

I have been pleased to learn that the civil defense program of locat-
ing, marking and stocking of fallout shelters has been preceeding quite
well in recent months. Up to the present time, I am advised, shelter
space for more than 600, 000 persons has been provided, and survival
stocks such as food, water and medical supplies for nearly 300, 000

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