City College of New York - Microcosm Yearbook (New York, NY)

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With the opening of the College in October. 1918. the War Department made arrangements for the conduct of units of the Student Army Training Corps. All men over eighteen at the time had been required to register with the Draft Hoards. Those who were qualified for College had the privilage of immediate enlistment for the purpose of assignment to the Student Army Training Corps. At our College the enlistment was very large. All the students under eighteen and those rejected as physically unfit were sent to the old Twenty-Third Street Building for civilian instruction. Fortunately that huilding had been renovated as a College of Commerce and was in condition to he used for the teaching of over seven hundred civilian students. All the buildings on the heights were devoted to the Student Army Training Corns. This corps was divided into two great sections. The Signal Corps School, which had formally been conducted by the College in direct contact with the Signal Cor| s. now became a part of the Vocational Division of the Student Army Training Corps. It was known as the “B” section of the Student Army training Corps. The “A” section was made up of our own students who were to receive general training to fit them for officer service in the infantry or for service in certain special branches, such as ordnance, engineering, artillery and chemical warfare. The College authorities were faced with the problem of not only instructing but of housing and feeding all the men of the Student Army Training Corps. The general arrangements and responsibility of this work rested with the Vocational Division of the College which had already made similar arrangements for the Signal Corps group. At this | oint the Trustees of the College provided funds on their own personal guarantee to enable the Di- rector of the Division to finance ojierations connected with housing and feeding. The Trustees authorized a loan of $50,OCX) from the Corn Exchange Bank, and Messrs. Baiuch. Kohns, Lydccker, and MeAneny personally endorsed the note. The Loth Building at 150th Street and Amsterdam Avenue was quickly leased and within three weeks con- verted into a very thorough- equipped barracks which cared for over seven hundred and fifty students. The Great Hall was cleared of its chairs and turned into a barracks as were many of the classrooms and corridors of the College. The Students Concourse was strip| ed of its moveable equipment and turned into a great mess hall. The gymnasium became Military Headquarters. In a surprisingly short time the college group on St. Nich- olas Heights were turned into an Army |K»st and no civilian students were cared for during the day with th e only exception of the preparatory students who continued their recitations in Townsend Harris Hall. Of course the Evening Session and Vocational Division of the College continued work as usual, and even grew during the jieriod of the war. The division of the student body according to the courses of study taken was as follows: The Army sec- tion was made up of 834 men pursuing courses prescribed for candidates looking forward to commissions in the Infantry and Artillery: 149 in the Air Service; 79 in the Chemical Service; 44 in the Engineering Corps, and 25 14

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impossible lo get an accurate record of each case. Thirty-seven members of the Faculty entered military service, ten obtained leave of absence in order to take up cx|)erts’ work required by the war activities of the country or sen-ice with the Y. M. C. A. and Red Cross, while a great many who remained on duty at the College did war work besides. In September, 1917. the State Military Law (Slater Law) made military training compulsory for all students between the ages of sixteen and nineteen. This included many students of Townsend Harris Hall and some of the lower classmen of the College. The drills began on September 27 in the armory of the Twenty-Sec- ond Engineers with an initial attendance of about twelve hundred. At this time organizations all over the country were raising funds to send ambulances to France. Our Alumni raised such a fund and sent a College of the City of New York Ambulance to France with the Metropol- itan Unit which was being assembled by the City Club. Malcolm I». Schloss. a sophomore, was sent with it as driver. The unit was twice decorated for gallantry in action, awarded the eroix dc guerre with palms and permitted the honor of wearing the fez. Schloss also was individually cited and received the eroix dc guerre. Other students were cited in like manner as soldiers. At this writing the complete roll of honor has not been made up and it would; therefore, be best to refrain from giving a partial list. Our College was especially honored when, in the summer of 1917. the Signal Corps. Department of the East, selected it as the place in which to conduct the first Signal Corps School established in the Country. The technical work was under the immediate care of Professor Alfred N. Cold smith and the school was part of the Division of Vocational Subjects and Civic Administration. Beginning with a group of about fifty men. it grew rapidly, until, at the time of demobilization, it had over five hundred men. These soldier students were well selected and of a high grade of intelligence. The course of study was for seventeen weeks, new groups being taken in each month—a hundred at a time. Responding to an emergency call from overseas the College equip- ped an entire multiplex telegraphy laboratory in less than a week. This necessitated the complete demolition of the forge and founderv room, refinishing, and the installation of elaborate electrical equipment with all neces- sary wiring. In less than two months the first contingent of multiplex ojicrators was on its way from the Col- lege to France. The Navy Intelligence Bureau established one of its wireless stations in the North or Bell Tower of the Main Building, utilizing our radio plant for the detection of submarines and for other secret work of the Navy. The Navy Department also established at our College, as part of the Division of Vocational Subjects and Civic Administration, the only Radio Compass School in the country. Petty officers who had completed the radio course at Harvard received post-graduate instruction with us before l cing assigned to duty at sea. The importance of the-work of this school in a new field of naval warfare i.an hardly be measured. After the Armistice, the school was transferred to Pelham Bay to be continued as part of the Navy's system of officer training. 13

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in the Medical Service, or a total of 1,127 men. This A section of the army was organized in the military manner as live companies. The Naval section of the Student Army Training Corps, in which were included men looking forward to commissions in the Navy, comprised 225 students organized as a single company. The B section, or Signal Corps, had 556 students at the time of demobilization. Adding to these the commanding officers. Major Harold H. Flower. Captain Harry J. Fee and thirty-nine second lieutenants for the A section. Captain John H. Cunt and six lieutenants for the Signal Corps, as well as the non-commissioned officers and the medical staff of the Army, it can be seen that the College had a military personal of nearly two thousand. The organizing of the military instruction in harmony with the academic requirements of the College had just progressed to the point where excellent results were becoming evident when the Armistice was signed and the Students' Army Training Corps were ordered to be demobilized. Very promptly the college established a short winter term of eight weeks, beginning Decemlier 10. Students were allowed to carry one-half as many credits as those usually contemplated for a full length term, and the Faculty arranged to give some credit for work done under the S. A. T. C. plan of study. With the o| ening of the February term the College of the City of New York was back to its pre-war basis, and with very little academic loss because of the interrupted Fall term. Very rapidjy were the mess halls dismantled and sleeping-quarters changed back to their pre-war con- dition. construction of the new barracks adjoining Compton Hall wtis stopped, and the Ixrtli Building was sublet to the United States Motor Transport Corps. The rapidity with which the college mobilized for war was equal- led by the celerity with which it returned to its jieacc organization. Besides these direct activities which were common to all colleges, our College had certain other war ex- periences which may be of interest. It is always pleasant to reflect upon what might have been. In Scptcmlicr of 1918 the U. S. A. Medical Corps at the Port of New York, working with the College authorities, planned to utilize the entire College plant as a hospital. After some negotiation an arrangement was worked out whereby the Army might have the large Main Building for hospital purposes, while the College would confine its activ- ities to the other buildings and leased space. It was thought that .the use of our building, for this purpose might relieve the Army at a time of serious distress in the matter of caring for wounded men, and that future students might look back with pride at the real sacrifice which their institution had made. Although the College was willing to make this sacrifice, the medical department of the Army found-the pressure less than if had supposed so that it was unnecessary to act upon the patriotic suggestion of the College. During the month of October. 1918, the Signal Corps requested the Director of the Vocational Division to care for a body of two thousand men. At the same time the War Department Committee on Education and Special Training asked him to care for the instruction of a large body of tojiographical draughtsmen, surveyors, airplane mechanics, and gas engine men. The Trustees approved plans which would have involved the leasing of a complete hotel in the neighborhood of Van Cortland Park, and of acquiring property of enormous size near the College. However, lieforc the War Depart- 15