Plattsburg Training Camp - Plattsburger Yearbook (Plattsburgh, NY)

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THE PLATTSBURGER PAUL A WOLF COLONEL INFANTRY, U. S. A., COMMANDANT H31

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O Colonel Paul A. Wolf, Inf., U. S. A., Commandant of the Plattsburg Training Camp, oflicer and maker of officers, this book, a record of the Second Camp, is respectfully dedicated by its members. l5l

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THE PLATTSBURGER COL. WOLF-MAKER OF OFFICERS A Glimpse at a Man Who Hates a Quitter, and His Methods O his alumni, he refers proudly as his boys, this man who has made and is making ofiicers at Platts- burg for the United States army-Colonel Paul A. Wolf-and his boys are making good for America. On April 29, 1917, Colonel Wolf was ordered to the post as commandant by the War Department, and, about two weeks later, 5,800 men stampeded into Plattsburg, the majority of them not knowing the difference between a rifle and a broom. They constituted Wolf's mob. Many of the mob are now serving in France, and doing their jobs to the admiration of all our Allies, and the satisfaction of the regular army ofiicers. Colonel Wolf, one of the best rifie shots in the world, a tennis player of the first rank, and an all-round athlete, is constantly in condition. He never has drank or smoked. Early last May he took off his coat and went to work. He still has it off. The War Department laid out a schedule of study for the camps-a skeleton on which to build-and Colonel Wolf, ably assisted by his officers, builded so well that many of his recommendations have been adopted for the other similar camps, and Plattsburg has now become the model, rating next to West Point. Colonel Wolf works on two principles. If there is a way to accomplish a thing he finds it, and, if there is not a way he hews one. The other is simplicity itself. It is summed up in the phrase God hates a quitterf' So does Colonel Wolf. His theory is to turn out prac- tical ofiicers who can handle the job to be done. Of the Plattsburger, he says: If I were a captain, I would want an officer from this camp in my company, because I would believe he could do whatever job came Up, and would not be tied down by regulations. Colonel Wolf has fought his way up all the way. Through a competitive examination in the little town of Kewanee, Ill., where he was born December 23, 1868, he won his appointment to West Point, and he received his commission from the Military Academy in 1890-the A, youngest man in his class in the infantry. He 'was ordered to the 3d Infantry, Company F, at Fort Meade, South Dakota, and went immediately into the field, his company having been sent out against hos- tile Indians. The campaign was a trying one, lasting from October to February, through a cold Dakota winter. His next move was to Fort Snelling, Minn., where he served as second lieutenant in the 3d U. S. Infantry for four years. From 1895 to 1897 he attended the Infantry and Cavalry School at 'Fort Leavenworth, and was rated a distinguished graduate. ' Colonel Wolf was in charge of the public works in Vera Cruz when our forces landed there in 1915, and did a tremendous job in cleaning up that town, and main- taining and protecting the water supply. . always been one of the famous rifie and once made a trip to the Philip- ordered back upon his arrival in shoot in the national matches. In Colonel Wolf has shots of the world, pines, only to be Manila Harbor, to 1913, he was again ordered into the national and inter- national matches at Camp Perry, Ohio. He hadn't had a rifie in his hand for five years before he began to prac- tice for these matches, but he came within one point of being the champion long distance. shot of the world. His partner and he were the only regular army men to repre- sent America on the champion Palma team fit is still champion teamj, and he made the highest score of any American in the classic Palma individual match for the long distance championship of the world. To-day Colonel Wolf is shaping soldiers for the great new army as a business, and he is attending strictly to business, as the Plattsburg products show. MAJOR BAER--EFFICIENCY EXPERT The Soldier Professor W ho Exeels the Prussians at Their Own Game HEN, out of the confusion and rush following the break with Germany on Good Friday dur- ing those stormy days of debate last April, plans for Uncle Samls new army to take part in the Big Effort and final Big Push were being developed, the eyes of the general staff looked toward a little town near the northern boundary of New York State, just shaking off its blanket of snow. The officers form the skeleton of an army, and the training of men to lead those to make up the vast forces to be flung out abroad for Democracy was one of the first problems. The little town was Plattsburg, a name that will probably go down in American history alongside West Point for generations to come. As Washington looked toward this post and then con- sulted the records, it found that the then Captain Baer, of the Second United States Cavalry, was in charge. Major Baer briefly and graphically accounts for his pres- ence in Plattsburg in April, 1917. , You see, he explains modestly, I had been at the two previous camps held at Plattsburg in 1915 and 1916 as cavalry instructor-the short camps before the war. I was left here with my troop to hold down Plattsburg during the winter of 1916 and 1917 and keep the snow shovelled. However, when the order came through providing for the first camp to take civilians and make them fit their I 7 uniforms and their commissions in three months, Major Baer had to set the stage for one of the biggest jobs Uncle Sam ever undertook. More than five thousand men were to be assigned to the post for training, and cantonments had to be built and all the other preparations made for the reception of the first five thousand. The job had to be done in about three weeks. Plattsburg is a small, cramped town for big building operations of a sudden sort. Major Baer was setting the stage for the first act of Uncle Sam's Big Show. Lieutenant Colonel Wolf had not yet taken charge at the post as commandant. . Major Baer did the job without frills, without fuss, without lost motion, and with more than the boasted Prussian efficiency, for, when the five thousand actors began to detrain, the work was practically done and well done, and done after the fashion of the Service. The Service works silently. A big job had been com- pleted without the tooting of a single trumpet. Major Baer's first thought is the Service, with which word he expresses his politics, his creed, and his religion. All the way through he is a soldier-an American soldier with the ideals of one, a soldier to command and be obeyed, stripped of any frills or autocracy, a strange con- trast to the efficient Prussian these American soldiers are going to fight. l