ETATION
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me articles
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(697)
significant numbers in the journals of the several interested professional socie-
ties. At first the articles were general in nature, such as Willis T. Lee's classic:
The Face of the Earth as Seen from the Air‘). By 1939, however, literally
hundreds of articles concerned with photo interpretation in specialized fields
had been published in the professional journals of archaeology, ecology, engi-
neering, forestry, geography, geology and pedology in the English, French and
German languages. For example, in 1944 the U. S. Forest Service prepared a
chronological listing of 286 works, published between 1887 and 1943, relative
to the use of aerial photographs in forest surveys. ?)
During this period there were no professional periodicals devoted exclusive-
ly or even chiefly to photo interpretation. Near the close of the period, how-
ever, several scientific journals commenced frequent publication of articles con-
cerned with airphoto analysis. Among these were Photogrammetric Engineering,
of the American Society of Photogrammetry, published since 1935; Luftbild und
Luftbildmessung, about 30 issues of which were published during the last portion
of the interwar period and the first few years of World War II; and Zeitschrift
der Gesellschaft für Erdkunde zu Berlin, which, although largely devoted to
other matters, carried articles on photo interpretation in the volumes published
since 1938.
Although photogrammetry and certain aspects of scientific and engineer-
ing photo interpretation received a great impetus from World War I, military
photo interpretation for intelligence purposes came to a complete standstill dur-
ing the era of peace that followed the war. Unlike other arts and specialties of
modern warfare, no training curricula were provided to insure a military photo
intelligence capability. In Germany, however, several works were published
before the outbreak of World War II, on the military aspects of photo reading,
the volume of General Fischer being typical. ?)
Among the German geographers who labored for the cause of photo inter-
pretation during the latter portion of the interwar period, the name of Professor
Carl Troll is outstanding. Troll, associated with the Geographical Institute of
the University of Bonn, led the movement for the establishment of the Wissen-
schaftliche Luftbildstelle at the Gesellschaft für Erdkunde zu Berlin. He also
published several papers on the subject and had Russian books and articles con-
cerning photo interpretation translated into German. These translations were
mineographed and distributed to geographers and other scientists interested in
photo interpretation.
No consideration of this period would be complete without mentioning
some of the many Federal government agencies that were making extensive use
of aerial photography during the 1930's. The Agricultural Adjustment Admin-
istration was systematically photographing the nation's crop and grazing lands
1) New York, American Geographical Society, Special Publication No. 4, 1922, 122 pp., 82
maps and photos. More recent Special Publications of the American Geographical Society
which are based primarily on aerial photos include: No. 12, George R. Johnson, Peru from
the air. 1930, 171 pp., 141 photos. No. 26, John L. Rich, The face of South Ame-
rica. 1942. 301 pp. No. 25, Richard U. Light, Focus on Africa. 1944, 228 pp. 323
photos.
2) See the Bibliography of Photo Interpretation Bibliographies appended to this dissertation
for complete reference to similar bibliographies.
3) Oberstleutnant Eberhard Fischer. Das Luftbiilwesen. Verlag Bernard & Graefe,
Berlin, 1938, 267 pp., 150 illus.
