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The U.S. Geological Survey Report on the Preface to the 1907 report by Joseph A. Holmes (excerpts) Immediately afterwards there was a decision to investigate the effects of earthquake and fire on buildings and materials of construction. Accordingly, on April 19 Richard L. Humphrey was sent to San Francisco for this purpose, as secretary of the National Advisory Board on Fuels and Structural Materials and representing the structural materials division of the United States Geological Survey. At the request of the President, Capt. John Stephen Sewell, Corps of Engineers, United States Army, was sent to San Francisco on a similar errand by the War Department under order of April 23, 1906. Frank Soulé, dean of the college of civil engineering of the University of California, was asked in the fall of 1906 to prepare a report on the general earthquake and fire conditions. G. K. Gilbert, of the United States Geological Survey, also a member of the California earthquake investigation commission, who was near San Francisco at the time of the disaster was asked to prepare a brief special report on the phenomena of the earthquake. The authors also are responsible for the excellent photographs. Each has the name of the photographer. |