THE NAUTICAL LIFE
"Naval Organization" Is Required V-12 Basic Course
NAVAL ORGANIZATION 1 AND 2, known officially as N-1 and N-2 and by the trainees throughout the Unit as "Naval Org," is a pocket edition in naval indoctrination. It consists of two one-hour-per-week courses, both of which are operated every term. All trainees are required to take the course during their first two terms in the Navy V-12 Program.
The content of the course is prescribed by the Bureau of Naval Personnel. Among the topics considered are: naval traditions, naval etiquette and customs, naval terminology, naval shore organization, internal construction of ships, exterior equipment of ships, types and characteristics of naval vessels, ranks and ratings, corps devices and insignia, the organization of a naval ship, naval forces of the United States, naval correspondence and official reports, navy regulations, discipline and naval law.
The several topics are treated by one or more lectures as apportionment of the alltoo-scanty course time permits. At various points lantern slides and motion pictures supplement the lectures. Study assignments utilize five different textbooks:— Bluejackets' Manual, Naval Administration Volume 1, Ageton's Naval Officer's Guide, Brodie's A Layman's Guide to Naval Strategy, and Our Navy, a Fighting Team, by Taussig and Cope.
Many trainees enter the Unit directly from high school, preparatory school or college, and for them the course serves as an introduction to the Navy. Every study assignment and every lecture brings to them facts about the Service which are new to them. Not infrequently such boys returning from a week-end visit to the Charlestown Navy Yard speak enthusiastically of how much they saw of what they had read and heard about in the course. In the same sections with these newcomers to the Navy are men with two or three years of duty with the Fleet and a few men wearing a hash mark. Also there are men who have been awarded the Presidential Unit Citation on gallant ships in the hot areas of the southwest Pacific; there are Marines fresh from duty in. Guadalcanal wearing the shoulder insignia of the justly famous First Marine Division.
The course is required for all men in the Unit; veterans of combat duty, seasoned ratings from the Fleet, and newcomers. To make the course informative and interesting to trainees of such radically different backgrounds of experience or the almost complete lack of it, is a challenge.
Trainee opinion indicates that in general the men feel that the subject matter of the course has a more direct bearing upon what they will be required to know and do in the Navy in the immediate future than does anything else they study in their first two terms in Navy V-12. Letters to friends still in the Unit from trainees who have moved onward and upward into midshipman training bear testimony to the value of the course. Comment on letters of this sort spreads rapidly; the Unit thrives on scuttlebutt. A greater willingness to get the material "cold" is noted than was evident earlier when trainees had no one in midshipman training to evaluate the V-13 program from experience.
An accidentally overheard comment last August indicates the feeling among certain trainees regarding Naval Organization at that time. "This is the damnedest course I ever got into; it meets only once a week but we've got to learn more stuff than in any three hour course in my schedule." The content of the course has not been diminished; in fact the reverse is true, and yet during the last term no such "gripes" have been heard.
The course must be presented with careful regard for correct terminology. The newcomers are beginning to absorb a nautical vocabulary; the lectures should further the process. Men from the Fleet think in nautical phrases and naval terms. A careless reference to a battlewagon or a cruiser as a "boat" hurts the ears of these men and causes them to discount all material which follows such a slip. A trainee from submarine duty will object just as violently if one refers to a sub as a "ship." One must talk their language if he wants to get his material to them.
If the topic under discussion can be highlighted by examples from recent naval actions interest is stimulated and so is intake of ideas. The instructor must read a surprising number of news stories, magazine articles and books in the process of gleaning a handful of truly pertinent illustrative material.
One may well wonder why such a course is under civilian direction. Navy V-12 Bulletin Number 200 has this to say regarding the course: "The Commanding Officer will teach the courses in Naval Organization, N-1 and N-2; or supervise the teaching by a junior officer or petty officer; or if necessary and desirable, arrange with college authorities for competent civilian teachers."
A little background at this point will help to clarify the situation. Recent graduates now in the Navy will recall the Wednesday night lectures in 104 McNutt given by Murray Austin, Dartmouth 1915. The informal course was called Naval Orientation. It was so well attended and the information which it imparted was so valuable to our V-7 men of that period that when Murray Austin returned to active duty in the Navy the course was taken over by Professor A. L. Demaree of the History Department, until he too returned to active duty in the Navy.
In the meantime the course had been formalized and added to the schedule as a three-hour-per-week course. The writer, being a friend of long standing of both Murray Austin and Al Demaree, had taken an active interest in the course from its beginning. When Professor Demaree shoved off, Naval Orientation was added to the writer's undertakings and remained so until it was discontinued, and replaced by Naval Organization with the coming of the V-i 2 Program to Dartmouth. In passing, it might be noted that the writer served in the Navy in the first World War, sailed twice into the Arctic with Commander D. B. MacMillan, and has three and a half years' sea time behind him, in fact all of it twenty years behind him.
In setting up Naval Organization a year ago, the College is indebted to Captain H. M. Briggs, USN, for the valuable assistance which he and his staff of the Naval Training School at Dartmouth rendered to the faculty who volunteered for duty in the new course.
A score of professors worked on the subject matter of the course before the opening of the V-12 program. Some found themselves so heavily involved in the work of their own departments or as associates in other courses that it was impossible for them to continue with Naval though they still turn out loyally when their services are required to proctor hour examinations. On such occasions it is not uncommon for every large lecture hall in the College to be in use and in several instances even Webster Hall was used as an examination room.
To provide models of the many types of naval ships for use in the course many volunteers have worked as opportunity permitted under the expert supervision of Virgil Poling in the Student Workshop. Although several ship types are as yet unrepresented in the model fleet, two display cases of models have been completed, including the following: two carriers, a heavy cruiser, two destroyers, two submarines, a C3 cargo ship, an LST, a PC boat, and two PT boats. A list of the model makers indicates how diversified has been the cooperation. Professor W. B. Unger has completed four models; N. E. Persinger A/S USNR, five models; J. C. Eckels A/S USNR, a destroyer; William McCallum, son of Professor J. D. McCallum, a destroyer; and Jonathan Strong, 11-year-old son of Dean R. C. Strong, a PT boat. The group of trainees around the model cases before and after classes amply testifies to the value of the collection as a teaching aid. The cases themselves are in- dicative of further cooperation; they were loaned to the course by Professor W. W. Bowen, Curator of the College Museum.
In fact, it will be difficult to recall all the help that has been rendered. The department of buildings and grounds has been most helpful in providing bulletin boards practically without end in 104 McNutt for the display of Navy instructional posters, as well as a set of signal halliards for use in code flag drills. Dr. Clark Horton has helped in the setting up of special examinations for the course which are graded electrically under his supervision. When enrollment in a course runs in excess of a thousand men term after term such cooperation and help is appreciated. It is a pleasure to have this opportunity to acknowledge it.
During the current term the following members of the faculty are lecturing from time to time at various points in the course: —Professors Bell, Carlson, Cox, Dankert, McCallum, Pressey, Raven, Rice, K. A. Robinson, Waterman, and the writer.
With the ever-present thought in mind that the function of the Navy V-12 Program is to provide officer candidates for our expanding navy, the writer's only regret is that so few hours are allotted to a subject which could absorb, with profit to the Service, much more of the trainees' time. There is so much to learn and so little time in which to learn it.
COURSE DIRECTOR and main lecturer for the required V- 12 course in Naval Organization is Prof. Richard H. Goddard '20, shown here in Shattuck Observatory, which he directs.
COURSE DIRECTOR
The MAGAZINE'S series of articles on the required courses in the basic Navy V-12 Program continues this month with a description of Naval Organization. Preceding articles have dealt with English, Mathematics, and Historical Background of the Present World War.
