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service. Their training, he insisted, better fitted them for the
technical services that were so vital to a great conflict. During the
year 1916 the introduction of military science into the Institute
curriculum was frequently debated by the faculty, but action was
delayed pending the development of plans for the newly established
Officers' Reserve Corps.
Soon after the declaration of war a valiant but very amateurish
attempt was made to establish a military unit on the campus. It was
similar to numerous volunteer organizations throughout the country,
all of which were pitiful exhibitions of badly organized
patriotism. Three hundred students and teachers were organized into a
battalion of four companies by a sergeant of the National Guard. In
motley array and without equipment they drilled on Alumni Field during
periods assigned to physical education, which had been introduced into
the curriculum the previous fall. The unit existed for only about two
months.
The spring of 1917 also saw a great increase in the already large
volume of war-material production in the Washburn Shops. All available
machines were manned by skilled workmen at abnormally high rates of
pay. Further to conserve foodstuffs for the army these workmen were
encouraged to cultivate war gardens. Plots of none too arable land on
the campus and nearby property were assigned to the men, whose
spare-time agricultural efforts produced amazing results.
One of the first requisitions from Washington was for an index of
military and industrial preparedness of graduates. This was compiled
by Professor Butterfield, and a similar survey of undergraduates was
made by the Tech Council. The newly organized National Research
Council also sought information about personnel and facilities for
research at the ,Institute and in nearby industrial laboratories. In a
report on this subject by the executive committee of Sigma Xi it was
recommended that instructors interested in research be given lighter
teaching schedules or sabbatical leaves, that funds be secured for
necessary apparatus, and that expenses of faculty
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