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

Page 30 text:

N.Y.M.A.lS 25th ANNIVERSARY Alumni Group at the 1914 Commencement Exercises at Cornwall. Association. Cord Meyer, '98, one of the founders of the Association and its first president, was returned to the presidency in this year, and it was under his guidance that the alumni program was carried out. A Twenty-Fifth Anniversary Dinner, held at Murray's restaurant in New York, was attended by several hundred old boys . Plans for participation in the commencement exercises were made at this time, with the result that the alumni delegation occupied a special train to Cornwall in June. The group was so large that the entire Grand View Hotel was reserved as alumni headquarters during the com- mencement week-end. In the fall of 1914 the corps departed from the Acad- emy for the first time, except for furloughs, in its history. The date was October 17 and the occasion was the football game with Manual Training High School at Brooklyn, N. Y. The steamer Homer Ramsdell was chartered for the trip and the whole school, including a chef and his as- sistants, set sail down the Hudson. Luncheon was served just before landing at the foot of Fulton Street, Brook- lyn, and the corps then entrained for the field on a string of trolley cars. The score: N.Y.M.A.-20, Manual Training-0. Territorial expansion on a large scale took place at the Academy in September, 1915, when the 375-acre Tall- man farm was purchased by the school. This large tract lies directly west of the campus. Its acquisition insured more than enough property for future expansion of almost any sort. Football continued to dominate Cornwall sports activi- ties. The record of the 1914 team, seven victories and one defeat, was bettered by the 1915 eleven, Captain Hoxie An- derson, '16, leading his eleven through the season with only one tie to mar an otherwise perfect record. N.Y.M.A. scored 278 points to 19 for its opponents. The tie was a 6-6 struggle with Cullum Hall of West Point. s.--.-...m.-ff .. ,nf Y .-.-.-,Y-Hex.-.. aww., - .fzmf afar i:........., ..-H..-..X.......- an-... Y, . ......-. ..--.af-f Q-, . Y . ,-..,..-.-...s-s1.,:?fwff:: , - .. - .. ...-fs-,Y Y ..--- ---- - . -1 --.fm-J-.e..-......-..-rs., ' ' ' W' 'H WTY' 'WW ' ' ' Y' Yi N . - ' H .--. - ,,1 '-,1-', '.- '. . -a .. , ' ,. . ,'. Page Twenty-six

Page 29 text:

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

Page 31 text:

iw The fencing team was by this time faced with the para- doxical situation of being too good. An almost unbroken string of victories in scholastic competition has the effect of discouraging entries of other schools in any of the ma- jor events, and the National Amateur Fencers' League, tak- ing cognizance of this fact, proceeded to place the Acad- emy's four best swordsmen-Rigobert McFarlane, '16, Al- cides Betancourt, '16, Francisco Horcasitas, '16, and Bar- tolomae Ducassi, '17-in the junior classification, where they would have to meet more experienced fencers. Captain Vauthier, sword master, thereupon developed a new novice team and Mario Betancourt, '16, immediately ran away with the Novice Championship of the United States. A few weeks later another novice combination of Humberto Giquel, Louis Deschappelles and john Lliteras, all of the class of '16, finished 1-2-3 in the Novice Foils competition at the Crescent Athletic Club in Brooklyn. Once again the League stepped in to put the crusher on the squad with word that Mario Betancourt, Giquel and Deschappelles were now juniors also. With seven of its best swordsmen therefore ineligible, the Academy then lost the classic Clemens Medal for the first time in three years, although Lloyd Miller did manage to come through to second place. Outstanding in the memories of all the boys in at- tendance that year is The Big Snow of December 13 and 14, 1915. Beginning with a light fall that Monday morn- ing, the storm increased in severity to blizzard proportions and continued for more than thirty-six hours. At the end of that time there was no less than thirty-eight inches of snow--a fall exceeded only by the blizzard of 1888. The weight of snow caused the collapse of several old buildings and made all roads impassable to ordinary traf- fic. Troop D was mustered into service, however, and forty horsemen, in column of two, broke roads to the station and to Orr's Mills in order that a much needed milk supply might be brought to the Academy. Cold and more snow continued through the winter until the total fall was more than ten feet. Old grads still recall the use of sleighs of all descriptions for the exodus at the time of the Christmas vacation. The going was still so bad that many sleighs overturned, depositing cadets and baggage in small mountains of snow along the roadside. High point of the social season was the Midwinter Hop in February. The Midwinter not only attracted the largest crowd ever to attend a social function at Cornwall but was the scene of some extemporaneous excitement, when a photographer's flash-light powder set fire to the decora- tions in the gymnasium and kept a group of cadets busy for several minutes in the role of volunteer firemen. The fall of 1916 witnessed the arrival of the first of- ficial N.Y.M.A. mascot-Mike. Mike was a white English bulldog who wandered in from no one knew where and made himself at home. He was taken to the heart of the corps as an omen of good luck, and equipped with a lux- urious blanket which he wore proudly at all athletic en- counters. An unfortunate incident with a railroad train at the Cornwall station during the summer of 1917 cost Mike what little remained of his already stubby tail, but ap- parently it had no effect upon his mascoting activities dur- ing the rest of the year. He was forced to share the latter part of his reign with another, however. Bill, the rambunctious goat, not only superseded Mike in short order but remained in all his glory until 1928, when he was retired from active duty after a term of al- most a decade as official luck-bringer for all cadet activi- ties. Mascot No. 3, the present incumbent, is Skippy. Skippy is a donkey who came to the Academy from the Pine Tree Riding Academy in Central Valley, N. Y., in 1928 and has lived a life of ease and plenty ever since. His most arduous task is leading the parade around the football field in the fall, and his sleek and glossy hide never feels the weight of harness. He is the only drone at N.Y.M.A. The school year of 1916-17 was a mixed one for sports at the Academy. The football team, almost entirely lacking in experienced material, lost its first scholastic game in four years Qto Yonkers High School by 6-Oj and won only two games through the season. Basketball was discontinued as an interscholastic sport and was played on an intramural basis only. The rifle team won the National Rifle Associa- tion Trophy for the first time, however, and when cold weather brought ice on the Hudson, hockey was revived after a three-year lapse. The puck-chasers won one match, lost one, and tied one. America's entry into the World War in April, 1917, unleashed a wave of patriotism, but it was not until the following fall that the war hysteria which gripped the nation communicated itself thoroughly to the N.Y.M.A. corps of cadets. By September of that year it seemed likely that some of the older cadets might be called into service, and all other activities and thoughts were subordinated to the great condict. Extremely active in the somewhat limited scope within which the cadets might demonstrate their patriotism were the Academy musical organizations which gave their ser- vices on many occasions for Red Cross and other benefits, in one case returning to the Chester KN. YJ Red Cross a fifty-dollar fee proffered for appearance of the band in a parade. I i Page Twenty-seven