Dartmouth Joins the Navy
One Thousand Student Officers Report to Hanover July 15 For Start of Naval Training School Assigned to College
NAVY SONGS RINGING from the tower of Baker Library seem natural, almost, to everyone in Hanover these days and symbolize a new wartime role which Dartmouth has wholeheartedly taken up.
Since July 15, when marching files of men in summer-khaki brought the war closer to students and faculty, the College and town have been sharing their best with one thousand Naval Reserve student officers who have assembled from all over the country to undergo a two-months indoctrination course at the new U. S. Naval Training School established here.
Dartmouth's long-standing offer to the Navy to provide facilities for a training unit of up to a thousand men was accepted early in June, and since that time the College has gone through the throes of quick readjustments and changes necessary to house, feed, and train a group of Navy officers almost half as large as the normal undergraduate body. All was in readiness, however, when the first student officers reported on July 14, about a week after the school staff had assembled to prepare for them; and succeeding units of one thousand men each, reporting at two-month intervals, will find a compact portion of the College set aside for their training.
Five dormitories—New Hampshire, Topliff, Ripley, Woodward and Smith—have been turned over to the Naval school, their normal capacities more than doubled by the addition of extra cots and doubledeckers. College Hall, now used entirely by the Navy, provides offices for the commanding officer, Captain Henry M. Briggs, and his staff of forty officers of administration and instruction. Freshman Commons and the former basement grill beneath it have been converted into mess halls, cafeteria style, and the upper floors of College Hall provide living quarters for the enlisted men assigned to the school as clerks and assistants.
Other plant changes necessitated by the establishment of the Dartmouth school include the transformation of Rollins Chapel into a study hall for approximately 800 men. Daily chapel services have been conducted outdoors, at the Old Pine, this summer, and arrangements have been made to hold indoor chapel in the White Church, where regular Sunday services are also being held. Additional study-hall space for the Navy officers has been provided in Z Webster, which also serves as a classroom during the day, and the main auditorium in Webster gives ample space for any occasional assembly of the entire school. Thirteen classrooms are being used by the Navy, including the entire first floor of Dartmouth Hall, three rooms on the first floor of McNutt, and three basement rooms in Webster.
Drill grounds, particularly Chase Field, and general athletic facilities have been made available to the Naval Training School, and the Trophy Room of the gymnasium has been made into a lounge where student officers can entertain their families and guests, visitors being forbidden in the Navy dormitories. Since freshmen at Dartmouth are now eligible for varsity teams and are using varsity facilities, the freshman training and locker rooms in the gymnasium are free for use as a dispensary and sick bay for the school; and if additional bunk space should be needed, the top floor of Davis Field House is ready for use.
No insurmountable difficulty was encountered in making all these College facilities available to the Navy by July 15, since the College was in summer session, under the speeded war program, and the 1300 undergraduates and the thousand student officers together equalled a little less than the normal Dartmouth enrollment. Nearly two hundred undergraduates were asked to give up their summer rooms in the Navy dormitories, and this was done with admirable cooperation. The College accommodated these students in other dormitory rooms of the same price range or, if the men wished, released them from contracts so they could move to off-campus rooms or fraternity houses. Considerable juggling of room assignments for the fall is still going on, and with an additional five to seven hundred undergraduates expected then, a tight rooming situation is in prospect from September until the present senior class graduates in December. Adequate space is available, however, and if September enrollment makes it necessary, the number of men permitted to live in fraternity houses can be increased by Trustee vote.
Living space in the town itself has betion come something of a premium, with Hanover experiencing a rental boom as the result of the influx of staff officers, their families, and of some number of wives of student officers. Faculty members and townspeople have matched the coopera- of the undergraduates by coming forward with furnished rooms which can be rented for week-ends or transient periods. A central rooming agency has been set up at the Hanover Inn, and this is expected to be especially helpful to wives and others who might visit the student officers during the corps' period of liberty from Saturday noon until Monday morning.
The loss of Freshman Commons has been met by transferring the two hundred summer freshmen to the upstairs dining rooms of Thayer Hall, where upperclassmen continue to eat. In the fall the entire freshman class will be accommodated in Thayer Hall, probably through some special cafeteria arrangement. The Dartmouth Dining Association, under the direction of Mrs. Elizabeth W. Hayward, is continuing to operate Commons as well as Thayer Hall, and in the fall it will have the biggest feeding job in its history.
These changes, although startling enough, have been taken creditably in stride by a College which has just barely become accustomed to the idea of fullscale operation throughout the summer. The ever-present columns of Navy men marching to class and to meals, or drilling briskly to the accompaniment of "hep, hep," still draw all eyes, however, and still create the only major topic of Hanover conversation. Curbstone spectators still look, mentally rub their eyes, and experience along with the strangeness a feeling of satisfaction that Dartmouth and Hanover are making a greater contribution than before to the war.
The men who have brought this new feeling to the College are all Naval Reserve officers who have been commissioned directly from civilian life. Ranging in rank from Ensign to Lieutenant Commander, they have been sent to the Naval Training School at Dartmouth "to learn the Navy way of doing things," as one officer puts it. Their two months' indoctrination course includes military drills, lectures, and inspections; physical training; practical ordnance drills; seamanship; and historical and medical lectures. Upon successful completion of the course the student officers have their commissions finally approved and are assigned to active duty as Reserve volunteer specialists in the deck, aviation, intelligence, ordnance, engineering, or communications branches of the service.
The course is intensive and exacting, and from reveille at 6:15 in the morning to taps at 10:15 at night, the student officer is subject to a continuous program of discipline and hard work. The typical daily schedule from Monday through Friday is reveille at 6:15, setting-up exercises at 6:30, breakfast at 7, first class at 8, study hour at 9, second class at 10, third class at 11, lunch at 12, class or drill at 12:45, class at 1:30, drill at 2:30, recreation at 4, supper at 6, study hall at 8, release from study hall at 9:45, tattoo at 10:10, taps at 10:15. The Saturday morning program has some variation with drill instead of study hall at 9, Captain's inspection at 10, infantry at n, and liberty at noon. Student officers are on their own from Saturday noon until Monday morning at 8, but special leave is necessary to be absent from the dormitory overnight during this week-end period.
This is a rigorous new life for nearly every man in the student corps, which is made up entirely of college graduates from a single month up to perhaps twenty years out of college. Twenty-three Dartmouth graduates (listed in an accompanying item) are included among the student officers, and a total of 293 different colleges and universities are represented. The largest delegations come from Harvard, 123; Yale, 35; California, 33; Michigan, 26; Northwestern, 26; Princeton, 25; Dartmouth, 23; Wisconsin, 23; Columbia, 21; Florida, 20; Stanford, 20; Illinois, 19; Pennsylvania, 19; Cornell, 18; Southern California, 18; Virginia, 18; M. I. T., 17; Purdue, 17; Minnesota, 16; North Carolina, 16; Ohio State, 15; N. Y. U., 13; Penn State, 13; Boston College, 12; Duke, 12; Chicago, 11; Washington, 11; Brown, 10; Texas, 10; and William and Mary, 10.
In national distribution, the student corps of the Naval Training School is as completely representative as the Dartmouth undergraduate body. Only one state, New Mexico, is not represented among the student officers. The largest delegation from any one state—loB men—journeyed all the way from California to report to the school. New York follows with 105 men, and then, in order, come Illinois and Massachusetts with 84 each, Pennsylvania with 54, Virginia with 47, Ohio with 45, Florida with 42, Michigan with 40, Texas with 32, the District of Columbia with 28, New Jersey with 27, Indiana, Maryland and Wisconsin with 23 each, North Carolina with 19, Georgia with 16, Minnesota with 15, Missouri with 14, Oklahoma with 13, Washington with 11, and lowa with 10.
NAVY STRONG IN SOUTH
Except for California at the top, this distribution starts off like Dartmouth's usual geographical report, but the strength of the southern states, from Virginia down through Florida, Texas, North Carolina and Georgia, is a new note for Hanover. The coolness of New Hampshire's summer nights has been a revelation to some of the Southerners, who were half-willing to believe the jocular statement that ice would appear in Occom Pond toward the end of August.
The staff officers, who have had a slightly longer acquaintanceship with Hanover, have already become pretty well settled in the community—after a housing shuffle in which the Treasurer's Office did yeoman service. Captain Briggs, whose family will come to Hanover in the fall, has quickly won a host of Dartmouth friends. A graduate of the Naval Academy in 1913 and a home-town resident of Neosho, Mo., he was formerly a submarine commander and before receiving orders to head the Dartmouth training school was connected with the Navy's bureau of personnel in Washington.
The executive officer of the Naval Training School is Lt. Comdr. Daniel Stubbs, USNR, of Lincoln, Neb., a Naval Academy graduate who was an instructor at the Naval training school at Northwestern before being ordered to Hanover. His three executive assistants are Lt. K. G. Baur Jr., IJSNR, and Lt. A. B. Taylor, USNR, both of Evanston, 111., and Northwestern; and Lt. (jg) R. V. Tate, USN (Ret.) of Philadelphia, a Naval Academy graduate. Dartmouth's official liaison officer in dealing with these members of the staff is Sidney C. Hayward '26, Secretary of the College.
One Dartmouth graduate, Lt. (jg) Alan L. Fink, USNR, a member of the Class of 1930, is among the 35 officers who make up the remainder of the school's staff. One senior lieutenant, ten junior lieutenants, and 24 ensigns are included in this group. Eighteen of the ensigns have just graduated from Annapolis and have been assigned to the Naval Training School as instructors while their ships are being made ready for sea duty. They will probably be replaced after a short period here.
Three medical officers are also connected with the school, along with ten chief petty officers who are in charge of the physical training program. One of the latter "Tunney-men" is assigned to each of the eight companies of student officers, and two others direct the general recreational program. Thirty-five yeomen are also stationed in. Hanover to serve as clerks, typists, and office assistants for the school.
CORDIAL WELCOME BY COLLEGE
The Dartmouth alumnus might at once wonder about the effect on the College of this abrupt addition of more than a thousand uniformed men, subject to a discipline so different from the freedom of the undergraduate college. Editorially TheDartmouth has hailed this new atmosphere as salutary to the whole College and as bringing the war closer to home. Many anticipate that the mingling of students and the older Naval Reserve officers will induce an even more serious approach to college work and war responsibilities. In any event, Dartmouth undergraduates have been as cordial in their welcome as has the official College, which voiced its greeting through President Hopkins at the opening assembly of the school. Green Key was busy both at the White River Junction railroad station and at the College helping the student officers to get acclimated, and Palaeopitus has undertaken a study of the ways in which undergraduates can increase the social opportunities for student officers. Some form of athletic competition, such as softball games, is contemplated, and fraternity brothers from other colleges will be welcomed by the Dartmouth chapters. On the first week-end of the school, the Dartmouth Glee Club presented a free concert for the student officers, and a campus band concert and Hanover Inn movies provided other entertainment. Baker Library has expressed its willingness to reopen on Saturday afternoons if necessary, and the Hanover churches, filled on the first Sunday, have offered to hold special services for the Navy men.
Meanwhile, Hanover is doing its nautical best to keep pace with its new residents, and only a sea breeze from the Connecticut and a few gulls wheeling over Dartmouth Row are needed to complete the picture. Advertisements in the Hanover Gazette read "Ahoy there!" and "Port your helm"; Naval uniforms of summer white and dress blue have crowded out slacks and seersucker jackets from the shop windows; and gradually one knows what time 22:15 is without counting on one's fingers. It will doubtless take a little longer, however, to get used to calling all floors "decks" and all stairways "ladders," and to grow accustomed to "coming aboard" and "going ashore" when moving dry-shod about the town.
Commercial repercussions during the opening days of the school have been stupendous, with Hanover shops cleaned out of certain essential items; and the distribution of the school's laundry to firms in Hanover, Lebanon, Claremont, Rutland, and St. Johnsbury indicates the benefit to the whole nearby region. These are by-products, however, and Hanover's obvious pride in its Naval Training School is based on recognition of the serious job for which the student officers are getting ready and on appreciation of the privilege and opportunity which the College has to help speed that preparation and make it more effective.
If Dartmouth has given much to the Navy, the Navy is certain to contribute much to the College as the months go by. The bells of Baker signal a real and cordial alliance for the national good.
COMMANDING OFFICERS Capt. H. M. Briggs, USN, is head of theNaval Training School at Dartmouth anddirects the eight weeks' indoctrination pro-gram for 1000 commissioned student of-ficers. President Hopkins welcomed theTraining School to Hanover at the open-ing assembly July 16.
Caplan's busses and taxis from New Hampshire and Ver-mont towns transported passengers, strange to the WhiteRiver-Hanover run on July 14-15 when 1000 naval officersdrawn from all parts' of the country, reported for an eight-week period of indoctrination. Left above: the line forms
on the porch of College Hall. After inspection of orders, reg-istration and assignment of rooms in five dormitories, theTraining School got under way with an opening assemblyin Webster Hall. Above right: student officers leaving Web-ster after talks by Captain Briggs and President Hopkins.
Executive Officer of the Naval Training School at Dart-mouth. College is Lt. Comdr. Daniel Stubbs (seated above).He is a Naval Academy graduate, later attended HarvardLaw School, and until called back in the service was cm at-torney in Lincoln, Neb. His principal assistants from the
Staff Officers are, left, to right, Lieutenants K. G. Baur Jr.(Northwestern), A. B. Taylor (Northwestern), and R. V.Tate (Naval Academy). At right are shown some of the ar-riving student officers having their orders inspected by Lt.C. Hall at College Hall.
