CHAPTER III.MISCELLANEOUS QUARTERMASTER UNDERTAKINGS.

Sergt. Irving Berlin, one of the fountain sources of American jazz music, found a special job cut out for him when he was drafted into the military service. The needs of the war machine called upon a wide range of individual talents, and this range did not exclude the artists. The painters engaged in camouflage work and made sketches and pictures of such things as unusual surgical operations for the permanent records of the Government, the poets fired the zeal of the country, and the musicians inspired the soldiers by providing them with music.

The American Expeditionary Forces as they grew in size found themselves possessed of some 390 regimental bands. These bands organized themselves, gathered such music as they could get, practiced, and presently regaled the soldiers of units to which they were attached; and then the inevitable happened—they played and played the same old pieces until their audiences yearned for something new. One day a cry of distress trickled through the cables, and then the plight of the hapless lover of band music in France became the problem of the quartermaster organization in the United States, resulting in the largest purchase of band music ever made, 200,000 sheets of it, costing nearly $50,000.

The music problem of the American Expeditionary Forces was put into the hands of a special committee of three well-known authorities in the musical world. Sergt. Berlin was the authority on popular numbers; Lieut. R. C. Deming, the bandmaster at Camp Meigs, Washington, D. C., was the member in charge of the ceremonial numbers; while Mr. Ward Stephens, the well-known composer, organist, and accompanist, was in charge of the concerted numbers.

This committee picked out a repertoire of 333 selections, consisting of 172 concert pieces, 43 ceremonial numbers, and 118 popular numbers. Four hundred complete sets of these were bought, one for each of the 390 bands of the American Expeditionary Forces, with 10 sets as a reserve. The music was bought from some 27 music publishers, the largest suppliers being Carl Fischer, the Waterson, Berlin & Snyder Co., the Leo Feist Co., the Jerome H. Remick Co., and G. Schirmer (Inc.), all of New York, and the Oliver Ditson Co., of Boston.

Each complete set was packed in a separate case so that each case upon arrival in France could be sent immediately to a band of the American Expeditionary Forces without being disturbed. The sorting and packing of this consignment of sheet music was handled by Sergt. Berlin and a staff of technical musical assistants, who, at his request, contributed their services.

The supply of music was but one of hundreds of enterprises required to make the Army efficient, comfortable, and happy, quite aside from the more obvious ones of supplying guns and ammunition, artillery, aerial observation, and food and clothing. And these scattered undertakings in military supplies accounted for the expenditure of hundreds of millions of dollars. Nearly all of them were quartermaster enterprises. But before we lift the curtain on this, one of the most interesting branches of our military preparation, involving, as it did, the scientific solution of problems ranging from the production of super-gasoline for the fighting airplanes to the proper and most economical method of cutting up the carcass of a steer, let us continue the musical overture by observing how the Army secured its band instruments.

There was a special branch of the Quartermaster Corps which concerned itself exclusively with the musical requirements of the Army. This branch bought in all approximately 143,000 musical instruments. These were secured at a saving of about $500,000 under the prices which the Government had been paying for such instruments prior to the war. Without going into the details of how this economy was effected, one typical instance may be cited. For years it had been the custom of manufacturers of musical instruments to embellish the trumpets and brass horns of bandsmen with engraving, chasings, and other markings. These were decorative only and had nothing to do with the quality of tone produced. By eliminating all such markings from the specifications, a substantial saving in cost was attained.

The principal suppliers of musical instruments were the Wm. Frank Co., of Chicago; J. M. York & Son, of Grand Rapids, Mich.; and the H. M. White Co., of Cleveland, Ohio. C. S. Conn & Co., of Elkhart, Ind.; the Eugene Geisler Co., of Chicago; and the Rudolph Wurlitzer Co., of Cincinnati, also supplied several thousand musical instruments.

During the months of hostilities the American public was constantly informed in advertising literature that fuel would win the war, and indeed fuel would win it, and did win it, in the sense that without fuel or with any grave shortage of fuel we could not have won. In this sense there was no commodity contributing to success in the great drama more important than coal. Coal not only furnished the power that transported the khaki-clad millions to France, but it furnished the manufacturing power in the United States and supplied the coke, which is essential to the manufacture of steel, thus entering into every rifle and piece of artillery.

MINING COAL FOR THE GOVERNMENT'S NEEDS WITH ELECTRICALLY OPERATED MACHINES.

6-TON ELECTRIC LOCOMOTIVE PULLING A STRING OF COAL CARS.

PICKING TABLES AND LOADING BOOMS IN A WEST VIRGINIA COAL MINE.

TWENTY-TON ELECTRIC LOCOMOTIVE BRINGING COAL OUT OF MINE.

America began keeping the records of coal mining in the year 1807. Woodrow Wilson was inaugurated President of the United States in 1913. In the 106 years between 1807 and 1913, and including those years, American mines produced a total of 9,844,159,937 tons of coal. In the succeeding five years of President Wilson's administration American mines turned out 2,960,938,597 tons of coal, almost one-third as much as was mined in the entire 1807-1913 period, and almost one-fourth of all the coal mined in the United States since records have been kept.

The American coal miners in 1918 met the war emergency by producing 150,000,000 tons of coal more than they had dug in 1914. The shortage of coal in the winter of 1917-18 was due not to the inability of the mines to produce the required tonnage but to inadequate railroad transportation facilities and severe weather conditions.

The war-coal project was in the hands of the United States Fuel Administration, but the office of the Quartermaster General assisted in the effort. Army officers were stationed at the offices of the various district representatives of the Fuel Administration throughout the country. These officers kept in constant touch with the factories making war supplies and saw to it that coal was diverted from less essential enterprises to the munitions factories. This service operated with such excellent effect that few manufacturers working on Government contracts were compelled to suspend operations because of the lack of fuel, and those who did have to suspend were able to resume again within a few days.

During the summer of 1918 the usual seasonal slack in the demand for fuel was taken up by the action of the fuel branch in absorbing practically all of the excess coal in the United States and storing it at Army posts, camps, and stations. This action kept the mines working at maximum capacity during a period when there is normally a curtailment in output. Of course, at the time there was no realization that the fighting was to end so soon, and this policy was adopted in preparation for unchecked industrial activity during the winter of 1918-19.

The Army itself was a heavy user of fuel, requiring it not only at its various manufacturing establishments but also at the great camps for heating purposes. The following table shows the Army purchases of fuel for the calendar year 1918.

The Army was an enormous consumer of oil, the total oil purchases, both in the United States and in France, in the nine-month period from April 1 to December 31, 1918, amounting to $30,522,837. There were 49 items in the oil-purchasing schedule for the troops in the United States alone, including lubricating oils, fuel oils, oils for paints and varnishes, gasoline for motor trucks and airplanes, axle grease, floor oil, tempering oil, oil for the preservation and waterproofing of shoes, harness, and other leather equipment, and numerous other varieties of oils. The gasoline purchases were heaviest of all, Army motor trucks and cars in the United States requiring 484,282 barrels of it, worth $5,448,570, in the nine months between April 1 and December 31, 1918. The American Army motor trucks and cars with the American Expeditionary Forces were supplied with 703,104 barrels, worth $10,104,437, in the same period. For Army airplanes in the United States during the same months there were purchased 306,082 barrels of special aviation gasoline, at a cost of $3,906,650, and for the planes in France 146,780 barrels, worth $2,748,839.

To give the American aviator the hottest, most instantaneously explosive, and surest-fire gasoline ever produced, the American refiners turned out a naphtha along specifications drawn by the Government that was the highest refinement of gasoline ever produced in large quantities. This was done by taking the best gasoline that had ever been produced in commercial quantities and giving it another run through the distilling retorts. Thus it was literally the cream of the cream, containing only the most combustible elements of liquid fuel and nothing else.

This refinement became known as "257° fighting naphtha," and the Army confined its use to the service planes actually at the front. It was not supplied to the aviation training camps, either in this country or in France. In order to distinguish this naphtha as the finest engine fuel available and to mark it so that it would not be wasted by accident in any use other than that of service at the front, it was colored red with aniline dyes. The Army did not even trust 257° fighting naphtha to bulk transportation on tank ships, but stored it in steel drums and freighted it across the ocean in this form in cargo boats.

America has always been the largest producer of gasoline, and the experience and development in this country has resulted in many grades of the fuel. The ordinary commercial gasoline comes in five grades, the best grade being known as "straight-run" gasoline and the other grades, in the order of their cost and purity, as "casing-head," "blended," "pressure-still," and "cracked." For motor fuel for the Army the quartermaster specifications would accept nothing but "straight-run" gasoline, unblended and without dangerousadditions which have a damaging effect upon motor cylinders. This gasoline, the best that could be bought by the civilian users, is known as "428° gasoline;" and it was the fuel used universally in our motor trucks and motor cars.

Above that were the three grades of gasoline, or rather, naphtha, produced specially for the American Army airplanes. The lowest grade of these was called domestic aviation gasoline, and it was the best commercial gasoline refined until its boiling point had been brought down to 347° F. This fuel was used by our aviators in this country and was known as "347° domestic aviation naphtha." A still greater refinement was the splendid "302° export aviation naphtha," which was used by planes in France, other than those at the front. The fighting naphtha was obtained by taking the cream of export aviation naphtha. Although purchased in enormous quantities, it cost the Government more than 41 cents a gallon. The Government paid slightly less than 22 cents a gallon for its motor gasoline.

Another new development in the oil industry brought about by the Government's war needs was known as "Liberty aero oil." This was an airplane lubricating oil of pure mineral origin, a refined lubricant of excellent viscosity and a low cold test, an oil which proved itself to be capable and reliable under the ever-changing atmospheric and pressure conditions of mechanical flight at the front. Liberty aero oil was a success. Most of it which was shipped overseas was made from paraffin base oils, although in this country we used successfully many aero oils of asphaltum base.

The Ordnance Department submitted a requisition for a three-months' supply of pure neat's-foot oil, which was in quantity almost twice the total American production of neat's-foot oil in the preceding year. The Government oil experts worked out a satisfactory substitute by combining animal and mineral oils. This was not only equal to neat's-foot oil under tests, but it was considerably cheaper.

The American Expeditionary Forces submitted a rush order for 6,000,000 pounds of dark axle grease. The specifications called for containers made of tin. But it was almost impossible to secure the tin for such a shipment. Experiments were conducted with all possible haste, and the result was a container made of black iron sheets treated with a special varnish to prevent the moisture in the grease from rusting the iron. This container proved to be satisfactory.

Offhand, one would scarcely say that brushes play any part of vast importance in the life of an individual; yet to buy the brushes for the Army required a special organization, competent to spend money by the millions of dollars and get value received for it.

Indeed it was quite surprising how many brushes in variety the Army required. The tooth brush, the shaving brush, the hair brush, the clothes brush, the shoe brush, and the paint brush might occur to anybody as necessities; but the Army used all these and in addition, artists' brushes, bottle brushes, chimney brushes, whitewashing brushes, gun-cleaning brushes, floor brushes, roofing brushes, stove brushes, horse brushes, and dozens of other kinds. In all, the Government bought 9,224,210 brushes, at a cost of $3,039,000. It required 59 factories in the United States to manufacture these brushes. The most numerous class of all were the tooth brushes, more than 1,500,000 of these being ordered from one company alone.

Brushes are made from many different materials, such as bristle, horsehair, fiber of various kinds, imitation bristle, split quills, and the like, but the most important is bristle. Only a little bristle is produced in the United States in comparison to the demand for it, the bulk of the supply coming from China, India, Siberia, and Russia. The procurement of bristle was no small part of the problem of supplying brushes for the Army.

Not one in every 10 tooth brushes used in the United States was of American manufacture before the war, the rest coming from Japan, France, England, Germany, and Austria. When the European supply was cut off, Japan became the principal source of supply. The problem of tooth brushes was further complicated by an embargo on bristles coming into this country and another on the exporting of bone to Japan.

The Army bought no shaving brushes made of horsehair, even in part, since horsehair is known to be the carrier of the much dreaded anthrax germ. The Government specified a shaving brush with an abbreviated handle, making it more convenient to carry. A handle-less hairbrush was also specified. Paint brushes were largely standardized, but it was impossible to standardize toilet brushes because there were not enough facilities in the country to turn out sufficient quantities, if machinery had to be remodeled to meet Government specifications.

Those in charge of general quartermaster purchases designed and produced the liberty rolling field kitchen, an equipment which could cook for 200 men. Rolling field kitchens were not new to our Army or the trade, there being about six types of commercial kitchens manufactured at the time we entered the war. Most of these were being produced on foreign war orders. In order, however, to secure a standardized kitchen with interchangeable parts, thus insuring a constant supply of spare parts, the division designed the liberty kitchen. There were two types of it—the horse-drawn type and the motor-drawn or trailmobile type.

Each kitchen consisted of a stove and a limber. The stove unit contained a bake oven and three kettles. The limber contained four bread boxes, which were also used as water containers, one cook's chest, four fireless cookers, and four kettles. In July, 1918, contracts were awarded for 15,000 complete kitchens, including the necessary cooking and camp utensils. Deliveries of these kitchens eventually reached a rate of over 200 per day.

Two factories adopted and installed track conveyor equipment on which the assembling process was carried forward from operation to operation until the finished kitchen, painted and boxed, was delivered to the car for shipment to the port of embarkation. The kitchens were packed each in a single crate, ready to be delivered to the front after arriving in France.

Before this kitchen was designed the Army had been paying from $700 to $1,050 apiece for rolling kitchens. The average price of the liberty kitchen was $502. Subsequent orders brought the total projected purchases of mobile kitchens to 25,000, of which 10,000 were of the animal-drawn type.

Substantial shipments of these kitchens had been received overseas before hostilities ceased, and in November deliveries were expanding at a rate which would have exceeded several times the 3,000 liberty kitchens required by the American Expeditionary Forces by January 1, 1919. About 7,000 rolling kitchens of all types were shipped to France.

Another important result accomplished in the purchase of general supplies was the standardization of tool chests. At one time the Army was buying and using approximately 100 different kinds of quartermaster tool chests. A committee to standardize tools and tool chests was appointed, and this committee reduced the number of types of tool chests to seven standardized ones—the carpenter's chest, the blacksmith's, the farrier's, the saddler's, the electrician's, the plumber's, and the horseshoer's emergency chest.

The committee also standardized the tools. Many varieties of such things as drawknives and handsaws had been purchased previously. This committee adopted a standard type of draw knife and a standard handsaw, and also standardized many other tools. Standardization of tool chests effected a large saving in transportation space by keeping the dimensions to a minimum. The standardized carpenter's chest occupied 3½ cubic feet less space than the older type wooden chest.

Since at the time the armistice was signed the Army was in the market for approximately 135,000 tool chests of the seven standardized types, the saving in shipping space would have been no slightachievement. But there was also in sight an enormous saving of money, not to speak of the fact that standardization would greatly increase the rate of manufacturing the chests.

The general supplies division of the quartermaster organization operated much of the Army's hardware store. In this work the division not only standardized Army tools, but also standardized the proportions in which the various tools were bought. This was not only an intensely interesting development, but it was of utmost importance to the American people, since it saved large sums of money and great quantities of shipping space.

The supply officers of the American Expeditionary Forces early began making up their estimates of the materials that must be produced in the United States and shipped to France, to maintain the efficiency of an indefinitely growing Army over a protracted period of time. In the matter of hardware these estimates came originally from the company units. Each repair unit, for instance, would look over the future, and its officers would estimate kinds and quantities of tools required for such and such a period. These little estimates came together in larger groups, and so on, the consolidation of figures continuing until eventually in the case of a certain tool there would be one figure on file at headquarters. Then one day one of those long daily cablegrams from France, signed "Pershing," came to Washington, bringing the future requirements for tools and other hardware.

Theoretically it might be assumed that the proportioning of items in these requisitions would be correct and that the American Expeditionary Forces might be expected to need tools in the proportions named. Of course, Sergt. A, in a repair unit with the artillery, might estimate too many hammers and too few wrenches, but Machinist X, miles away in some base shop, might call for too many wrenches and too few hammers. These two estimates would thus balance correctly; and, following out this line of reasoning, it would seem that the entire American Expeditionary Forces' hardware requisitions, compiled as they were, would be properly proportioned.

Yet when these requisitions came to Washington and were found to call for the manufacture of such things as files and bolts by the tens of millions, the supply officers here would not accept the theory that the proportions of various sizes called for were correct, but turned the searchlight of science upon these estimates.

The method selected of checking these estimates was simplicity itself, yet unique in the history of American industry and almost majestic in the scope of its comprehensive vision. The officer in charge of the procurement of hardware, in the case of files, for instance, simply called together the entire file-manufacturing industry—and that means that not a single manufacturer was overlooked—and asked that industry to assemble the results of its experience over a period of the last five or six years. Each manufacturer would show, for instance, how many flat files he had sold of each length and of each type of cutting surface—either bastard, second cut, or smooth—how many half-round files, how many hand files, how many round files, how many square files, how many warding files, how many knife files, how many taper files, etc., all by lengths and by cutting surfaces. Thus when all these experience figures were assembled, the officers in charge at Washington knew exactly in what proportions the whole American industrial world had used files of various types throughout a considerable period of time.

This procedure was followed with respect to many common articles in hardware. The Hardware Manufacturers' Organization for War Service was formed to give just such assistance, cooperating up to 100 per cent of the hardware industry. The consolidation of the experience figures in American hardware consumption resulted in a schedule of supplies known as the Army's hardware tariff, a schedule showing the proportions in which hardware might be expected to be consumed.

The hardware tariff disclosed some surprising errors in the estimates from the American Expeditionary Forces. The American Expeditionary Forces' requisitions, for instance, had called for a total of 127,180,387 bolts of various kinds. The experience of bolt consumption in the American industry was able to correct this to a total of 125,285,000 bolts, or a saving of nearly 2,000,000 in number of pieces. The requisitions had called for 39,945,458 large carriage bolts. The experience of American consumption showed that only 9,700,000 large carriage bolts would be required. The original specifications had called for 31,839,741 small carriage bolts. The experience in American consumption showed that 60,300,000 would be necessary. In other words, the off-hand estimates of the American Expeditionary Forces had called for 30,000,000 too many large carriage bolts and nearly 30,000,000 too few small carriage bolts.

The specifications from France called for 5,000,000 stove bolts of the five-eighths-inch dimension. Since this size was not used or was not made at all by stove-bolt manufacturers, the item was canceled, and 2,000,000 smaller-dimension bolts substituted.

All bolts were supplied in quantities and proportions determined by following the proportions of the scientific tariff. They were shipped to France in these proportions, whence reports from the American Expeditionary Forces showed that the quantities sent completely covered the needs of the troops in the field. The saving in the manufacture of bolts alone came to nearly $4,000,000, and this says nothing of the saving in railroad and ocean freight charges, orthe still more important saving in ocean tonnage space, since the bolts supplied according to the scientific tariff occupied many hundreds of cubic feet less space than the bolts originally specified would have filled.

The same procedure was followed in the supplying of files. The hardware manufacturers consulted their records and on the basis of actual consumption in American industry discovered that a repair unit consisting of a machine shop, a horseshoeing shop, a blacksmith shop, and a woodworking shop, with 11 mechanics working in the unit, would consume 305 dozen files per year, the experience tables showing precisely the proportions of the various sizes of files in this consumption. Consequently, when the American Expeditionary Forces requested 439,200 dozen files, the quantities of each size, kind, and style as specified in the requisition from France were disregarded, and the so-called tariff proportions substituted. The files as supplied not only proved adequate in number in every style, but they cost $250,000 less than it would have cost to fill the original order. Moreover, by using tariff sizes the industry was able to make immediate shipments and to run at full production from the start, since it needed only to produce files in the proportions known in the regular trade.

What was done with bolts and files was done in many other lines of hardware. When the American Expeditionary Forces saw that its hardware was coming in correct quantities, its officers notified the hardware supply organization to ship all tools and hardware materials in accordance with the so-called tariffs. The executive committee of the Hardware Manufacturers' Association for War Service, which made possible this achievement in commercial science, consisted of Messrs. Murray Sargent, Alexander Stanley, Charles W. Asbury, Fayette R. Plumb, and Isaac Black.

The standardization of proportions in the hardware supply succeeded in cutting an original requisition of the American Expeditionary Forces for 8,750 tinners' machines to 860, and an original requisition for 21,600 tinners' assorted groovers to 240, and still met every need of the Army's tin shops in France.

The Army hardware office was also called upon to supply such small hardware as fasteners for gas-mask knapsacks and pistol holsters, and some metallic parts for cartridge belts and similar goods. Less than two months before the armistice was signed orders were in sight for the manufacture of some 500,000,000 pieces of these small metallic devices. Most of them were to be made of brass. The uses of the Army in October, 1918, were calling for these articles in such quantities that it required approximately 250,000 pounds of brass per working day to meet the demand.

AMBULANCE BODY BOXED FOR SHIPMENT OVERSEAS.

PHOTO SHOWING METHOD OF CRATING CHASSIS FOR OVERSEAS SHIPMENT.

INTERIOR VIEW OF COAT FACTORY OPERATED BY THE PHILADELPHIA QUARTERMASTER DEPOT.

INTERIOR VIEW OF FLAG AND CHEVRON FACTORY OPERATED BY THE PHILADELPHIA QUARTERMASTER DEPOT.

At one time there came an order to procure 135,000,000 stud fasteners within approximately 90 days. The result was that one manufacturer, who had been producing 400,000 such fasteners in a day succeeded in raising his production to 1,000,000 per day, and this was only typical of the expansion elsewhere in the industry. The demands of the Army overtaxed the brass rolling-mill capacity of the land. As a result the hardware specialists investigated the possibility of substituting iron and steel for brass, and these substitutes were under consideration when the war came to an end.

Vast quantities of large sizes of rope were requested for overseas to replace steel hoisting cables, which could not be secured in sufficient quantities. Standard specifications drawn by the Government in cooperation with rope manufacturers insured the supply to the Army of rope only of the highest grades. Approximately 14,000,000 pounds of manila rope, 2,500,000 pounds of halter rope, and 2,000,000 pounds of cotton and jute twine were purchased at a cost of approximately $9,000,000.

Army hardware men bought 1,534,679 axes, at a cost of $1,838,979. They bought 1,256,994 shovels at a cost of $1,140,412, and 425,522 wrenches costing $395,776. They purchased 380,752 fire extinguishers at a cost of $1,761,711. They purchased 2,621,521 safety razors and 45,300,000 safety razor blades, the razors costing $3,171,806 and the blades $1,318,750. These items selected at random give some idea of the extent of the Army's hardware business.

It may not be generally known that the Quartermaster organization was an extensive manufacturer of war goods in Government shops. In another chapter has been described the method by which the Army was supplied with clothing. While many of the clothing contractors were private manufacturers, the Government itself manufactured more uniforms than it secured from any single outside source.

There were two Government uniform factories—one at the plant of the Philadelphia Quartermaster Depot and the other at the Jeffersonville (Ind.) Quartermaster Depot. The Philadelphia factory also manufactured chevrons, flags, and tents. The Jeffersonville depot produced army shirts in addition to outer clothing. The Jeffersonville depot expanded in size during the war until it became the largest shirt manufacturing establishment in the world. When the armistice was signed the Philadelphia uniform factory was rapidly gaining the eminence of being the largest clothing manufacturing plant in the United States.

The total value of the articles manufactured by the Philadelphia Quartermaster Depot during the war was $26,230,000. The garment factory at Philadelphia was started in June, 1918, and in five months it turned out 751,883 garments and 45,578 flags of various kinds. It was working toward an output of 12,000 pairs of trousers and 6,000 woolen coats per day. There were 3,000 employees in the shop and 2,000 outside seamstresses. The outside seamstresses made denim jumpers and trousers, white clothing, and olive drab shirts, the production of shirts alone reaching a total of 1,359,801 garments.

The Philadelphia factory attained an output of 5,000 pairs of chevrons per day, most of them embroidered by hand or by machinery. Before the war the Philadelphia factory had a maximum capacity of 68 pyramidal tents per day. This output was raised to 300 per day.

The Jeffersonville uniform factory was established in February, 1918. Jeffersonville is just a few minutes' ride from Louisville, Ky., which is a clothing center, and therefore there was little trouble in securing experienced workers. The factory was operated day and night with two shifts, each working eight hours. The plant reached a capacity of 750 woolen coats and 1,500 pairs of woolen trousers per day. The salaries of the women employees ranged from $50 to $80 per month. The Government established at Jeffersonville one of the most modern woolen cloth shrinking plants in the United States, costing approximately $50,000 and providing a capacity for sponging 10,000 yards of cloth per day. The Army supply officers pronounced the uniforms turned out at Jeffersonville to be the best and most honestly made clothing delivered to the Army during the war, yet the cost of manufacturing uniforms in this plant was at least 25 per cent under the average price paid to private contractors. The average cost of making a woolen service coat at Jeffersonville was $1.02, and the average cost of making a pair of woolen trousers was 54 cents.

The shirt factory at Jeffersonville was that depot's largest manufacturing enterprise. The Jeffersonville depot had been making army shirts since 1872. The shirt factory greatly expanded during the Spanish-American War, until it was employing nearly 2,000 operatives, mostly home workers. Thereafter the depot continued to make shirts at the rate of about 200,000 per year until the United States declared war against Germany, and in that time it had accumulated a roll of 2,000 sewing operatives who had worked for the factory at one time or other.

A PAIR OF ARMY SHOES BEFORE AND AFTER BEING SALVAGED AT JEFFERSONVILLE QUARTERMASTER DEPOT.

TWO VIEWS OF THE RESCO SHOE-FITTING MACHINE.

SHOE-FITTING MACHINE WITH PLUNGER AND WINGS OPEN.

SHOE-FITTING SCHOOL, CAMP MEIGS, D. C.

When the great demand for shirts came in the spring of 1917, the most expert of these seamstresses were hired outright by the month to act as instructors in the homes of new sewing women who had volunteered for the work. Advertisements were then sent out through the newspapers of that entire section for women workers, and presently the factory had a sewing force of 20,000 operatives from practically every town and village throughout southern Indiana and northwestern Kentucky. The output of shirts was increased from 600,000 per year to 8,500,000. Each home worker was supplied with one complete shirt to be used as a guide, and she secured from the factory as often as she needed it shirt material cut from the pattern and tied up in bundles of 10 sets. A large corps of sanitary inspectors was employed to visit the thousands of homes and see to it that the shirts were made under proper conditions. All shirts accepted from the home workers were thoroughly fumigated before being issued from the depot.

The Quartermaster Department, along with its other activities, was a school-teacher on a large scale. Without going into a general description of the quartermaster schools and the branches they taught, we will here consider some of the most interesting educational enterprises such as the shoe-fitting schools, the schools for butchers, and the school of goods packing.

Elsewhere in this volume the mechanical system of shoe measuring, perfected and adopted by the War Department, was described. Studies made at the camps at various times during 1917 and 1918, studies which examined nearly 59,000 men, showed that a little more than 70 per cent were wearing shoes too short, more than 9 per cent were wearing shoes too long, while less than 19 per cent were correctly fitted. It is probable that these proportions ran clear through the Army before shoe fitting was scientifically taken up, and there is no reason to believe that in civil life the averages of correct shoe fitting are any better.

After the so-called Resco system of shoe fitting was adopted, schools for shoe measuring were held at Camp Meigs, D. C., and at Jefferson Barracks, Mo. Each camp and cantonment in the country sent two officers to one or the other of these schools. The course of instruction lasted five days and consisted of lectures by experts and demonstrations of the various appliances. In this way the science of correct shoe fitting was scattered throughout the Army.

It is no easy trick to teach a man to cut meat properly; butchering is a skilled trade. As soon as it was apparent that the American Expeditionary Forces in France were to be greatly expanded in size, our officers overseas sent requests that several trained and experienced butchery companies be sent over to cut meats properly for the organizations abroad. In order to comply with this request there was added to the curriculum of the quartermaster training camp in Florida a butchery course in the cutting, boning, rolling, and tying of fresh and frozen beef.

In this course there was developed an entirely new method of cutting beef known as the "natural guide" method; and by it men who had never cut meat before were developed into practical meat cutters in less than eight weeks of instruction and practice. The natural guide method, which was found to be far superior for Army use to any other meat-cutting system which had been known, was exactly what it was named, as it was essentially a separating rather than a cutting process. The beef quarters were boned and divided into their major parts by following the natural separations between muscles, tissues, and bones.

This method, which is not at all like that in commercial use, proved to be more economical than any meat-cutting system known, because it utilized every ounce of meat and produced a greater proportion of choice cuts suitable for pot roasts and other roasts than the older Army Cooks' Manual method of meat cutting. The Cooks' Manual method was similar to the method used by the retail butcher, in that it cut meat along artificial indetermined lines. The natural guide method actually produced 3 per cent more edible meat than the other method, since even the most expert meat cutters can not remove all meat from the bones by the Cooks' Manual method. Moreover, by the natural guide method all cuts are uniform, and the fats, suets, and bones are separated as clean, sweet, edible products.

Butchery companies were trained by the natural guide method and sent overseas in numbers sufficient for the requirements of the American Expeditionary Forces.

After the discovery of this method and the fact that it produced at least 3 per cent more meat than even the expert cutters could secure by the artificial cutting system, it was evident that further research work along this line would be profitable. Even expert butchers, in spite of all their skill and care, wasted meat. What must be the conditions in the mess kitchens of the Army where the cooks, with no expert knowledge of butchery, cut the meats? It was evident that numerous edible by-products of meat, such as fats and marrow, were going into the kitchen garbage pails and thence to the rendering plants.

The result of the investigation was a project to establish central meat-cutting and rendering plants for all large concentrations of troops, where all meats would be cut, boned, rolled, and tied, by experts, and delivered direct to the company kitchens ready for roasting or cooking in any manner. The fat and suet at such plants would not be soiled or made unsound by handling, and so it could be rendered and its food value retained. The oil could be cooked from the bones as a valuable by-product, the bones could be dried and sold commercially, and the plant could also have machinery for making sausage and hamburg steak. A plant of this character was put inoperation during the summer and autumn of 1918 at Camp Johnston, the quartermaster training camp, and it proved to be a complete success. When the armistice was signed, the General Staff was considering the proposition of establishing these centralized meat plants at all the larger camps.

The meat experts also effected notable economies in ship space by developing what was known as shankless beef. Shank-less beef was beef quarters with the four shanks removed. Quarters thus prepared occupied 14 per cent less freezer, cargo, and shipping space than quarters with their shanks.

A still further economy in shipping space was projected in the plan to bone all beef at the packing plants and ship it boxed or frozen in molds and wrapped in burlap. This method saved about 50 per cent of cargo space, and it began to be extensively used during the winter of 1918-19. One set of packages included tenderloins, sirloins, butts, loin steaks, top rounds, and shoulder steaks. Another set of packages contained roasts, including prime ribs, rumps, bottom rounds, and bottom chucks. A third set was for stews, including flanks, plates, blades, necks, shanks, and trimmings.

American exporters generally for many years have had the reputation of packing goods improperly for overseas shipment. Time and again travelers and investigators in foreign lands have pointed out that if America expected to compete successfully with other manufacturing nations in foreign trade, she must learn to pack goods so that the packages will not break en route and damage the contents. When we sent an Army of over 2,000,000 men to France, it was evident that unless we learned quickly how to put up our supplies properly for overseas shipment, our lack of knowledge would be costly to us.

Accordingly the packing service branch of the Quartermaster Department was established. One of its first acts was to set up a school of baling, packing, and crating, this school being located at the Forest Products Laboratory at Madison, Wis., where studies of packing were being made by scientists. The school started in July, 1918, and before the armistice came it had graduated 400 students from its six-weeks' course.

Now, while it was important that Army supplies reached the other side in good condition, it was soon seen that of even greater importance would be the economy that might be effected in shipping space by the scientific packing of goods. This obscure and little known packing service branch was really one of the most important agencies in the whole war organization, since the results which it accomplished in the saving of ship space were nothing short of astonishing. These economies came at a time when the German submarines were stillhighly destructive to American and allied shipping, and the shortage of ocean tonnage was one of the most disturbing factors in the whole war situation. The American packing service, in saving thousands of tons of shipping space, in reality offset the operations of the U-boats over a considerable period of time.

These space economies resulted usually from specifications drawn by the packing experts reducing the sizes of packing cases that were too large for the goods contained, and also by packing articles more compactly. For instance, these experts studied the rolling kitchen and determined the most compact assembly of its parts in a crate. The crate was then carefully designed to occupy a minimum amount of space. Some 18,000 rolling kitchens were packed ready for shipment to France. Had all of these been floated, a total of 22,500 cubic tons of ship space would have been saved, or the equivalent of five or six whole shiploads. As it was, room aboard ship could be found for only 6,940 rolling kitchens, which by being scientifically packed occupied 8,700 cubic tons less cargo space, or about two whole shiploads, than they would have occupied otherwise.

Wherever possible, entire units of such heavy articles as escort wagons and ambulances were packed in single crates. Wherever open spaces were inevitable in the crating, these vacancies were filled with various subsistence stores, such as dried peas or beans. Galvanized-iron cans, for instance, were packed with two sacks of flour inside each one.

The experts studied boxing to determine the best thickness of wood required by various commodities and the proper method of strapping or otherwise fastening the boxes. As a result there was a great improvement in the condition of goods arriving in France.

In no respect did the packing service effect greater space economy than in the packing of clothes for the American Expeditionary Forces. Formerly clothing had gone forward to troops packed loosely in wooden boxes. The packing service devised the system of baling all clothing, and a baling plant was set up at the Army supply base in Brooklyn. The service gave scientific attention to the proper folding of garments and eventually, after exhaustive experiments, developed a system of folding that allowed the maximum number of pieces which could go into a bale. It was found that these new methods saved two-thirds of the space that had been used formerly for the shipment of the same quantity of goods in boxes, to say nothing of the great saving both in labor and in boxing materials.

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