US Naval Reserve Midshipmens School - Capstan Yearbook (Notre Dame, IN)

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Ulze ,Dramatic anal OMI' Thirteen days before graduation the entire regiment filed into the drill hall-not to train to be communications officers , but to take a good-natured crack at everything on the station with half-an-inch of 990-TZ, around sleeve, and quite a number who had two half-inches. That was the evening when all scores were evened, the one time in four months when midshipmen were bossg when ensigns didn't say a thing about Get shahp, mistah! Yes, that was a night that will be long remembered by no-longer-embryonic officers-a night of fun and frolic and good-natured jest. The Third Battalion led off with its Battle of the Brandywine , featuring its hazy quartette and professional blind-dates. The Fourthis From Badin to Worse paged Admiral Halsey between card games in the Ward Room. The Second Batt topped the night with a series of impersonations as Midshipman E. Colman took the audience on a tour of Morrissey Daze , featuring well- known persons like The Damage Control Department's gift to the Double-Bottoms , 4'All I want to know about my men is :How many of you played football'?,' and others. S. Siegel, emcee, kept things running smoothly all evening. Main contributors to the evening's entertainment, aside from the skits, were the Choir and the Dance Bandg the former rendering When Day is Donel' and 4'The Navy Hymni' and the latter giving out with plenty of hot swing. Bob Trotter tickled the ivories well enough to get two en- cores from the crowd, and Bob St. Mary pulled excellent tricks from among his embroidered handkerchiefs. The evening was closed by the cast and audience singing the National Anthem, led by the Choir and Dance Band. Other entertainment planned by the Dramatic Club was sacrificed to study-the concentrated program being too solid to permit hours of rehearsal necessary for presentation of any plays.

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K 1 poria Although the men in the Fourth Midshipman Class didnit exactly ask for it, they caught the Spirit of Notre Dame on the athletic fields and in the gymnasiums. Ath- letics occupied a most prominent position in the lives of the middies. Organized sports and outside competition were meager, but the future ensigns found that the tradition at Notre Dame still lives-every apprentice seaman and every mid- shipman participated in some form of athletics. From that first morning intearly October when the 0555 bell knocked the seaiman straight from his bunk into calis- thenics on the hard, cold, cement sidewalk-otherwise known as an exterior passageway-until the fag end of the four months here, there was little let-up in that business of hardening muscles. Directed by Lt. A. P. Brown, athletics officer, the sports program showed the Navy method- of preparing young men for combat under tough conditions. The program ranged from the rugged obstacle course to volley ball. Between these came football, baseball, track, basketball, tumbling, soccer, swimming and the worst nightmare of all, calis- thenics. . Q The early morning ghost patrolu garbed in gray sweat suits lasted about a month until the Indiana weather caught up with the yawning stoop and squatters. Although the 0555 bends went the way of so many good,' things, afternoon calisthenics remained to plague every middie for the entire four months. But, as each day went by, sore muscles became more and more a thing of the past. Fellows who had shown no inclination to touch their toes were soon laying their palms on the deck without any semblance of bent knees. Sit-ups and push-ups no longer brought the quantity of grunts and groans that were so much in evidence during the first week. ' The puffs and pants that came with double-timing during the early stages of indoctrinationturned to easier breathing after a few jaunts, and after two weeks of coaching in the art of running by Chief Specialist Quinn, a noted Mid- western runner, the boys began to take shape. Competition reached its highest peak in the aerial-minded tag football games which added much to the variety of injuries reported at evening sick call. Swimming paced the field for indoor sports. The two lengths seemed mighty long to many the first afternoon in the pool at Rockne Memorial Gymnasium. Speed swim- ming also had its pitfalls. But the sub-squad remedied most of the faults and soon there was more resembling fish than Friday dinner. 52381