Castle Heights Military Academy - Yearbook (Lebanon, TN)

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-..,, XE ,, COMPANY A5 SKIRMISHERS SHELTER TENT ENCAMPMENT

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and finds a physician and a trained nurse waiting at the infirmary to see all cadets in need of their ministrations, and then from 8:15 until l o'clock come the class periods. Dinner is at I :IO P. M. Your son has by this time probably had to meet nine or ten formations, and has nine or ten times answered to his name. Had he failed at any formation to answer to his name, he would have been checked up at once. Had his name then not appeared on the official absentee list, a guard would be looking for him in two minutes more. Your clock at home is still keeping time for your boy at school. At 2 P. M. come drill for the companies and practice for the band. The band is one of the features of Castle Heights life. It is directed by a competent faculty officer, and liberal allowances are made cadets who are proficient on the various band instruments fsee page 935. The companies march to the drill Held, and there are instructed in close order or extended order drill, or in the ceremonies. The entire Battalion may go through Butts Manual, with music, a remarkable and beautiful set of exercises executed with the rifie. One company may go to the target range, another on a practice march, a third to do bayonet work, a fourth to study methods of attack and defense in trench warfare. Sometimes signalling or grenade throwing is the order of the day: or perhaps there is a field problem, in which the Corps works out over hill and valley certain practical points arising in battle. In fact, on every Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, and Friday afternoon, from 2 to 3:l5, you may know that your boy is building up brain and body in the open air, inclement weather alone interfering. On such rare afternoons this time is devoted to lectures by members of the military staff on such subjects as hygiene, minor tactics' ma-I9 reading. and military history. FTOTTI 3230 until 4:30 comes afternoon study hall, a delinquency school for those cadets whose recitations of the morning have fallen below requirements. Parade and formal guard mount are scheduled at 5:l5, four aftemoofls Yveelfly- Again your boy falls in with his company on the plaza' this tlme m gray uniform, smart garrison cap, and shining black leather PUUCCS- The band strikes up a stirring march, and the Corps, escorting the Colors, moves to the parade grounds for the crowning 9'-Wemomes of the day- It is a wonderful picture-a wonderful memory fm' Your boy as he stands there in the midst of it. The sun 75

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is setting over the blue foothills of the Cumberlands: the long gray- clad lines stretch silent and immovable: there is the blare of a bugle from up the field, and then the strains of the national anthem as the Colors slowly sink from the top of the gleaming white Hag-staff in the distance. ls there any wonder that the red-blooded boy loves the real military school? The program is changed, however, on Wednesday and Saturday afternoons. These are the recreation days. ln the afternoons all are free for outdoor games, for hikes and expeditions, for strolls to town and perhaps a visit to the motion picture house-all, that is, except those who have demerits. These spend the afternoon in walking extra duty, one hour for each demerit. On Saturday morning comes the most rigid inspection of the week, Hrst of quarters and then personally of the cadet under arms. The mother may well glance at the clock and think of her son at 10:30 A. Nl. Saturdays, but she will scarcely be able to dream of the incredible neatness of which her boy is now proving capable, or to conceive it possible that he should ever clean up a room to such an unbelievable degree of perfection. But he does, and he is proud of his accomplishment. lmagine yourself without a servant, and your son, having done all his own work, inviting you to enter, and challenging you to Hnd one handkerchief folded the wrong way, one messy spot in the soap-dish. one particle of trash on the floor, one book out of place, one drawer in disorder, one odd or end shoved out of sight, or one atom of dust any- where! Bu! me boy goes through this every week at Castle Heights. On Slfndays the cadets attend service in the Lebanon churches- Eiesbyterlan, Cumberland Presbyterian, Methodist, Baptist, or nstlan' Those Wh0 prove themselves faithful attendants on Sunday School leave the Hilltop earlier, and join the formation on the Squaff beffffe Chl1fCl1. Sunday afternoons are free, and for many yea-ff If has been the custom to encourage in the evening a Y. M. C. A. Servlce Conducted by the cadets themselves, a faculty officer assisting. Supper is Served at 6130 P. M., after which reports are answered 'to the Commandant or his assistant. At 7:20 another bugle sounds 77