US Navy Recruit Training Command - Keel Yearbook (Great Lakes, IL)

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EMi D. A. DEWEY USN COMPANY COMMANDER THE COMPANY COMMANDER . is an outstanding senior petty officer who has been selected as part of the corps of company commanders at Great Lakes. Prior to ttpicking up his first company, he has been trained in techniques of instruction, principles of leadership, and administrative procedures in schools at Great Lakes Naval Training Center, both at Service School Command and at Recruit Training Com- mand. The company commander instructs his recruits how to keep themselves, their clothing, their equipment and their living quarters in a smart and shipshape manner while he leads them in military and physical drill so that they gain military proficiency and physical stamina. He also helps them to exercise increasing amounts of individual and group responsibility as they grow in the qualities of self-discipiine necessary to carry out the exacting routines of life as men of the United States Navy. The company commander is genuinely interested in the needs, welfare and problems of the recruits he commands. He must be formal yet friendly so that though he is fully and firmly in control, the recruits do not have to hesitate to approach him for his assistance with their problems or for his referral to the appropriate member of the Navy's professional corps: the chaplain, the medical officer or the legal officer. The company commander, most of all, is an inspiring example of the successful Navyman upon whom the recruits can pattern their own lives as sailors and as citizens.

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GRADUATION The graduation review is the climax of training for the recruits. Under the leadership of fellow recruits, the graduates display their newly learned abilities in military drill and military bearing in the Navy's traditional pomp and ceremony, not only to the reviewing of- ficials but also to relatives and friends who are visitors. The special recruit units-the State Flags Company, the Drum and Bugle Corps, the Drill Team, and the Bluejacket Choir, composed of and commanded by recruits in training-help to create a vivid and exciting picture that will last in the recruit's memory for the rest of his life. ML Sm 12st aw: : swwem Mwwwr

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BARRACKS LIFE One of the more important lessons the recruit learns during boot camp is how to live with others in a military organiza- tion. Life and living conditions in the Navy differ so greatly from anything he has known in civilian life that learning to live in close quarters as a member of a military group becomes a major function of recruit training. Quarterdeck Division Entrance