Navy Carpenter Shop

A MOST USEFUL ACTIVITY FLOURISHESFOR NAVY AND UNDERGRADUATES

THE ONE THOUSAND Navy officers who came to Hanover in the summer of 1942 had, for the most part, never heard of the Student Workshop. However, their need for a workshop brought them almost immediately to Bissell Hall and in a few weeks men in uniform used the shop almost as much as students. The use of the shop by the Navy men was not started by orders from the Navy Department, nor even by announcements or invitations from the director. The need for the shop brought them there, and it has been their own interest and desire to do shop work that has kept them there.

The teaching staff of the Dartmouth Naval Indoctrination School needed models to illustrate their lectures. A Navy ordnance man designed a gun model that would demonstrate the working parts of a large Navy gun. He was able to get permission from the Navy Department to purchase materials and to build the gun and a range finder synchronized with it. Many more men on the staff started making models which they found most useful for demonstration purposes. The final result has been that the Dartmouth Naval Training staff has considered it important enough to supply materials and a few men who do nothing but make models for teaching purposes. This is all a part of a Visual Aid program which has been organized at Dartmouth and I believe I am correct when I say that this is the first Naval Training group to organize such a program. Photographs and drawings of the models made here are being sent to Boston and Washington, where they are examined and sent on to other Naval Training Schools.

Besides the big gun and range finder mentioned above, officers have made innumerable boat models, signal models, small gun models, deck gear, blinker models, a fairly good sized model of a life boat, a turntable tripod for a camera designed to take pictures at all angles for identification purposes, etc. And not least, a great deal of furniture has been turned out by officers and their wives in their spare time.

Virgil Poling, director of the workshop, is exactly the right man for the job. He has infinite patience, and infinite skill. He can make a new tool, or figure out the subtlest problem in wood or metal. Further he is generous with his time and advice almost to a fault. I know that he has been delighted to extend the facilities of the workshop to the Navy, and I know that he is proud of the fact that the shop has been flexible enough to meet the needs of the community and the College under the war program.

The use which the Navy men have made of the shop has been as much recreational as technical. It has been a common experience to have the Visual Aid men work all day on models and then, at their official quitting time, turn to their own work of making cabinets, repairing skis, or making various kinds of furniture. Often ten or twelve Navy men may be seen working in the shop until after six o'clock and then reappear again for work with a group that meets at night. One Navy staff lieutenant made most of the furniture for his apartment. Many of them have unquestionably started hobbies which will last the remainder of their lives. They are planning shops, building tool chests, buying tools, and have plans for projects which will keep them busy a great many weeks. One Naval officer and his wife are planning building a house after the war. They have planned a shop, complete with tools for all types of wood work. The value of the Student Workshop is perhaps, not in immediate accomplishment but in the future development of interests and background started while working in the workshop.

Finally there is the therapeutic value of the workshop. Hand work relaxes the nerves as all psychologists know. The Navy man, under a real strain here in training and later in more active duty, needs practice in relaxing. The Student Workshop activities offer an opportunity for recreation and many Naval men are profiting by this, as Dartmouth undergraduates have done for several years.

The Student Workshop is playing a real part in Dartmouth-At-War and all concerned may well be proud of its accomplishment.

STAFF OFFICERS USE STUDENT WORKSHOP Mr. Virgil Poling, Director of Student Workshop, helps Naval Officers solve trickyproblem in the construction of Naval Signal Boat Models.