New Mexico Military Institute - Bronco Yearbook (Roswell, NM)

lVIartini-lVIancini, the kindness of old Gus Lee, the special train to Eddy for the all-important baseball game, the pitching of Otero, and lVI. Livingston's record pole vault of almost nine feet. In mid-March, 1901, Colonel Meadors re- signed as Superintendent, whereupon the Regents elected Ma-ioi' J. W. Willson, Commandant of Cadets since 1898, as his successor. The next twenty-one years of growth and solid achievement bear witness to the masterful guiding hand of Colonel Willson. Likewise fortunate for the school in its formative and middle years was the almost continuous presence on the Board of Regents of E. A. Cahoon, a man of sound character, vision, and business judgment. The first Bronco, cadet yearbook, made its appearance in 1902. The first graduates, three in number, received their diplomas in May. And the ensuing fall brought Captain John Fletcher, bandmaster, who speedily organized the first Institute band. Baseball remained king of sports, although the Institute ventured into inter-col- legiate football in the fall of 1907, dropping a hard-fought game 28 to 0, to New Mexico Aggies, Territorial champions. Gradually, football got under way and with the arrival of Mr. R. R. Brown and professional, precision coaching in l9l0, interest in the sport boomed and regional success followed. Par- ticularly note-worthy in earlier years were the Brown-coached teams of l9lU, 1916, and 1917, and the Rabenhorst team of l924. The plant, like Topsy, grew in a more or less haphazard fashion until 1908, when with the construction of two sections of Hagerman Bar- racks the present style of Scottish castle or modi- fied Gothic architecture was adopted. The main building, Lea Hall I, burned to the ground Aug. 3 l, l909, the day before school reconvened. Thereupon a new Lea Hall was designed and built in the style of Hagerman Barracks. Nineteen hundred nine was a momentous year for the Institute in that it first brought nation-wide military distinction. N. M. IVI. I. was named as one of the ten honor or distinguished military schools of the nation. It was the young- est and smallest school so named. Here was an earned recognition of the soldierly spirit and the esprit de corps of cadets, faculty and regents. On Labor Day, Sept. 6, 1915, the Institute added a Junior College department by a one- year's extension of the curriculum. Major' D. C. Pearson Cnow superintendentb engineered this change, which placed the Institute among the pioneer Junior Colleges of the nation. The col- lege, at first a minor appendage, has developed in a quarter century until well over half the cadets are members of the First and Second classes. The Institute was formally designated a member of the Reserve Officers' Training Corps on Dec. l3, l9l6-six months after Congress had authorized such a system of training. It has remained a Senior Unit of that Corps until the present. Cadets of the immediate pre-World War I era have many memories of Institute days: the Albuquerque Irrigation Congress, the mutinies of 1906 and 1911, Capt. Hester's capable pitch- ing, Sergeant Leonard's motorcycle machine gun squad, and Dempster lVIaclVIurphy's too realistic impersonation of the Senator's daughter. Entrance of the United States into World War I brought changes to Institute life and de- manded sacrifice from cadets and alumni. The Student Army Training Corps unit was organized on the Hill to streamline preparation for war. The 1919 Bronco displays a service flag carrying 710 stars. Every graduate of the Class of 1914, save one who was rejected for physical disability,