New York Military Academy - Shrapnel Yearbook (Cornwall on Hudson, NY)

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I L SVT Yi 'Ll-E MAIN BUILDING OF ACADEMY AT TIME OF THE FIRE- 1910 Hard work and excitement while the fire was at its height had kept the cadets and their ofiicers impervious to the biting cold and wet snow which had begun to fall dur- ing the night, but the reaction attendant upon the final collapse of the building brought realization of chilled bodies, weary muscles and depressed minds. Few of the cadets had saved more than the clothes they wore, and it was necessary to find shelter for them at once. Bard Hall was crowded to the roof and the overflow was taken care of by townspeople of Cornwall, who gen- erously opened their doors to the temporarily homeless youngsters. The corps ate breakfast in shifts in Bard Hall and settled down to await developments. Meanwhile the responsible heads of the Academy sat in grim conclave to decide the fate of the school. Faced by catastrophe beyond their wildest imagining, they knew that it lay in their hands to say whether or not the school should try to survive. It was a hard decision to make but, shortly before noon of that day, they made it. The decision was Yes. Then came work and more work. The Elmer House and Palmer House, both vacant, were leased in their entirety, and a portion of the Grand View House was also taken over. A large force of men was recruited to make the buildings habitable and the corps moved in, three days later, comfortably if not sumptuously domiciled for the remainder of the school year. Having cared for the cadets, school authorities next turned their attention to the problem of permanent re- organization. It was finally decided to incorporate the New York Military Academy Realty Company. This company purchased Colonel Wright's interests in the prop- erty, approved plans for four new buildings, and, in April, 1910, broke ground for the first of these structures. General Davis was in complete charge of the elaborate program of reconstruction. Indeed, the Academy's physi- cal plant, as it stands today, is a memorial to the creative and building ability of this great administrator. The ofiicial cornerstone-laying ceremony took place on june 9 in combination with the commencement exercises, which were held outdoors for the first time in the history of the Academy. Brigadier General William Verbeck, presi- dent of the Manlius School, Major General Franklin Bell and Senator john B. Rose, of the Class of 1892, were among the speakers. It is interesting to note that the name of Sibert was once again in the spotlight at commencement. William Olin Sibert, discoverer of the fire, was valedictorian of his class, while his brother, Harold W., was named Head Boy for the year. Between them they garnered most of the honors in the gift of the Academy. The Academy re-opened in October, 1910, but the buildings were still incomplete, and the cadets were forced to endure considerable discomfort for the greater part of the year. Construction was continued in the spring of 1911, however, and when, at Commencement Exercises in the new gymnasium in june, it was announced that the total registration was 104 cadets, the outlook for the future was bright indeed. Page Twenty-four

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I gif - -C wat- - if THE FOOTBALL TEAM OF 1906 This is one of the best teams that ever represented N.Y.M.A. It went through a hard season with an uncrossed goal-line. and scored 256 points against its opponents. fLeft to Rightj Gerst, Rinehart, Smith, Rhodes, Gradi, Manning, Walker, Bortz CCapt.j, Staples, Day, Sholes. Crooks, Leslie, Beehe, Levy, Bragg CCoachj. There is every reason to believe that two of the three men of the Seventy-First New York were Clifton Beck- with Brown, '96, and Talmadge Brereton, '96, and that it was Brown whom Roosevelt saw shot. The coincidence of this meeting between Davis and these alumni of N.Y.M.A. on the battlefield was not known until many years later. During the Wtxrld War, Davis served as Colonel and lixecutive Officer of the Signal Corps, Chief of Training in the Air Service, and Chief of Staff in the Air Service. And in 1925 he was awarded the Distinguished Service Medal for exceptionally meritorious and distinguished services . And in the hearts of N.Y.M.A. boys General Davis is recalled with honors beyond those that any government can bestow! On the national horizon, as the second decade of the twentieth century opened, there were no signs of the Armageddon that was to come. New York Military Acad- emy was still unaware of the boys who were to be sacri- ficed all too soon. The quiet before the storm reigned in Cornwall as elsewhere. lt was bitterly cold when taps was blown on the night of january 9, 1910, and a dull, overcast sky gave promise of snow before morning. The cadets, burrowing beneath extra blankets, luxuriated in a feeling of security against the elements and dropped off to sleep with dreams of sledding and snow-ball fights for the next day. Later, much later-it was after two o'clock in the mor- ning of january ICJ-William Olin Sibert, a member of the senior class, stirred restlessly in his bed on the second floor of the main building. He turned over and then back again, his hand brushed irritably at his face, and then he began to cough. The coughing brought him wide awake and up- right in bed. Then bewilderment turned to horror as he saw, pouring through a hole which admitted the steam pipes to his room, a steady stream of smoke, and smelled the acrid gases which had caused his coughing. He leaped from his bed and ran, panting, across the hall to the room of Headmas- ter Artemas D. Dimmick. The fire had started in the servants' hall and stairway of the main building, directly beneath Sibert's room, and Dimmick, accompanied by Superintendent Jones and As- sistant-Commandant Frank Fraser, rushed to the scene with fire extinguishers. They made a short attempt to curtail the blaze, but it was evident almost at once that this was a serious fire and orders were given to have fire call blown. Military discipline came immediately to the fore in this emergency and the building was quickly cleared of its more than two hundred occupants. All were out before the flames reached the main stairway, and there was not the slightest sign of panic, nor any injury. Officers and cadets joined in fighting the fire, and were assisted in a short time by the Cornwall fire department. The conflagration had gained too much headway, however, and the fight was hopeless from the beginning. By day- light, there remained only a great hole in the ground, with the main chimney protruding like the grim finger of Fate. Page Twenty-three

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laik W' . w J' rr 1-li L+ All construction work was completed by January 1, 1912, and the entire new plant was placed in service. Offi- cial dedication of the buildings took place in June of that year, and the Academy acknowledged its debt to those who had come to its assistance during the time of its greatest crisis. Chief among these were Fred Booth and Charles Curie, jr. Elected to the board of trustees in 1910, these men gave generous financial aid as well as untiring per- sonal attention to the affairs of the school through the en- suing years. Beginning the school year 1912-13 with a record en- rollment of 186 cadets marked the beginning also of a new way of life at the Academy. Arrangements of the bar- racks in the old building had been such that the corps lived in more or less the atmosphere of a large family existing under one roof. The new barracks made a decided change in this direction. The sectional character of the barracks brought the cadets into smaller units under the constant supervision of one or more members of the faculty. This meant that each group developed a special feeling for its own members and closer ties to the faculty members. The results have been universally beneficial, both from the standpoint of schol- astic and military attainment and from that of the develop- ment of school spirit. It took a disaster as great as the fire of 1910 to effect any major change in the cadet uniform which had been established originally by Colonel Wright. Most of the corps' personal property having been destroyed in the fire, it was found necessary to equip the boys quickly, and for this reason the olive drab of the regular army was adopted. The battalion was outfitted with ready-made uniforms from government stores for the rest of the year and simi- lar uniforms, although tailor-made, were standard equip- ment until the fall of 1912. At that time the uniforms which are still in use were established as regulation. Gray was adopted as the color for service uniforms, and blue for dress. The close-fitting high-collared jacket, long trousers with black stripe, and modern cap made up the most attractive dress ever allotted to the cadets. In 1912, the Academy welcomed back to its halls, as a member of the faculty, one of its first students, Lieutenant Colonel H. A. C. de Rubio, U. S. A., Retired. Following graduation from the Academy, de Rubio spent several years in travel and then returned to this country to enter the army during the war with Spain. He served for some time, retired, and continued to travel. Al- ways interested in horses, he made a study of equitation in many countries and then hit upon the idea of introduc- ing his hobby at N.Y.M.A. The plan was cordially received by school authorities and de Rubio served as director of equitation, without compensation, for two years. De Rubio not only arranged for the necessary mounts and aroused the enthusiasm of a considerable number of the cadets, but actually designed the special uniforms him- self. The colors of the service and dress uniforms were naturally the same as those of the infantry, but he drew his inspiration for the cut from the dress of a famous regiment of German dragoons. Three companies of infantry having already been estab- lished, the cavalry unit was christened Troop D. Michael Daly became its first cadet captain, with Percy Kittle and William Dwyer as his lieutenants. For some mysterious reason, lost in the haze of the Academy's early history, St. Patrick's Day, March 17, had always been the occasion for student pranks of all sorts but this practice was abandoned in 1913 in favor of a flag rush between A and B companies on the athletic field. The climax of this titanic struggle is described in the following fashion in the 1913 Slorapnel, inaugural edition of that publication : Company B won the flag, its usually sleepy but this time very much awake representative and Lieutenant, fjohn CJ Cade, slipping out of the turmoil and running a marathon the length of the field. We would print his photo, taken at this historic moment, but for the fact that when he emerged from the crowd with the flag he was in a condition 'not fit for publication'. This initial issue of The Shrapnel, incidentally, set a standard which subsequent graduating classes have had to work hard to equal. Consisting of 160 pages of text and pictures, exclusive of advertising, it contained not only a complete record of the school year but a fairly compre- hensive history of the Academy up to that time. Douglas Wahl was the first editor-in-chief, Percy Kit- tle, '13, and Larue McCarty, '13, acted as associate editors. The art department was taken care of by George Gies, '13, and Edwin Sibert, '14, Paul Mehlin, '13, was business manager. Mehlin was also a leader in the establishment of a fourth fraternity chapter on the campus. With the assist- ance of john Blackford, '10, he formed a group which was chartered as Alpha Gamma Chapter, Delta Sigma Nu. This was the last fraternity to establish a chapter at the Acad- emy. Further evidence of the public confidence awakened by completion of the Academy's extensive building pro- gram was seen in the next three years as enrollment con- tinued to increase. The registration totaled 200 in 1914, and 230 in the following year. In the spring of 1914, the Academy marked the twenty- fifth anniversary of its founding with numerous special programs. Most active in this observance was the Alumni Page Twenty-fue