Lincoln Hall Project
War Training at U of I
Excerpted from a submission by Wayne C. Temple, AB ’49, general curriculum; ’51 MA, and ’56 PhD, history
In May of 1942, I graduated as valedictorian of my senior class at Prospect, Ohio, and that fall entered the Ohio State University. Although I was already classified as a 1-A in the draft, I, nevertheless, proceeded down to Columbus and took up quarters in the Buckeye Club under the famous horseshoe stadium.
After just two quarters, I was drafted and assigned to the United States Army Air Corps. My destination for basic training was Greensboro, N.C. But before eight weeks of training had been completed, I was chosen for a brand-new branch of duty. So instead of going on to flight school, etc., I was pulled out of Air Corps and shipped to North Carolina State College (now University) at Raleigh. There, I joined several hundred other soldiers being collected in spot awaiting orders for the new Army Specialized Training Program.
Finally, a troop train puffed into Raleigh to pick us up. We men had no idea where we were bound. A number of colleges and universities had been chosen for participation in this program. After two tedious days of slow travel, our railroad cars arrived in Champaign, Ill. With our duffle, we marched to campus where we were assigned to fraternity houses now devoid of their rightful occupants, now long gone, mostly to various services.
Along our trek to campus, groups of coeds chanted in unison: “Welcome to Chambana; welcome to Urpaign; it’s a mighty fine place if you can only stand the rain!” They seemed delighted to see us. Furthermore, they were most cordial to us during our entire tour of duty there. Army men dominated the campus, although the Navy had sailors enrolled there in V-5, V-7, V-12, and Diesel Engine School.
We continued to wear whatever uniforms we had previously been issued but added the A.S.T.P. patch to our left shoulder. Our new equipment was textbooks, musette bags to carry them in, and—of course—slide rules. We were a most irreverent but happy bunch.
Since so many of us A.T.S.P. students had come up from training in the South to the U of I, I worked up a little routine whereby I would stand on a chair, etc., and proudly proclaim: “My name is Calhoun, and I’m from the South—South Carolina, that is, and there’s three places on this campus I never goes: The North Reserve in the Library, the Union Building and above all, Lincoln Hall.” All this was rendered in my best imitation Southern drawl.
Just like frat brothers who had previously occupied their spacious buildings, we slept in dorms on the top levels and studied in small rooms below where we stored our clothes. Our beds were double-deckers. My first billet was in the Sigma Phi Sigma house on Armory Street. Among my fellow “boarders” was an old acquaintance, big Bob Shaw, an All-American football player from Ohio State.
We attended classes on the quarter system while the rest of the university operated on the semester system. Each quarter we changed companies and houses, because there were many turnovers in our ranks. We marched to classes in sections (half a company) of which I was a section leader.
At first, we ate at the Tavern Cafeteria in the basement of the original Illini Union building where our meal checks were merely placed on a spindle at the cash register for the Army to pay. We had somewhat of a leeway in meal choice as we walked through a line. But in the second quarter, we had our own mess hall that had been established in the ice rink. And the food was not half bad there, but, of course, not on par with the Illini Union.
All of us carried an almost-impossible number of class hours. In addition to engineering subjects, we also had liberal arts, including English, history, geography, etc. Most of us were entirely competent to do college work. However, we simply did not have enough time in the day or night to make excellent grades. If you flunked out at the U of I, the armored infantry at Camp Polk, La., generally awaited you.
Since the student body at Illinois in 1943 was very slim compared to pre-war days of about 13,000, full professors with very scholarly reputations and high honors, often taught our classes. In my American history course, I had Professor James Garfield Randall (1881-1953), even then widely known as “Dean of the Lincoln Scholars.” He proved to be an excellent teacher and liberal grader. We became friends, and this chance meeting would change my entire life after I returned to the campus as a civilian in 1946.
On March 14, 1944, I received my diploma in basic engineering and shipped out with a small contingent to Camp Crowder near Neosho, Mo. Here, in the Signal Corps, I began attending classes in electricity, cable splicing, pole line construction and power equipment maintenance, etc. My next assignment was Army Communication Service—Plant Engineering Agency headquartered in Philadelphia. Our mission was to support the Air Corps and give it communications of all sorts. Our team of specialists could install everything needed at an airfield.
We sailed from New York aboard the Queen Mary for the European Theatre of Operations. Paris became our HQ for all of Europe, and I joined the 3431st Signal Equipment Installation Detachment of the 3352nd Signal Service Battalion of A.C.S—P.E.A. On the very dangerous excursion into Germany, I was cited twice for action under fire and later was awarded the Bronze Star Medal. Our destination was Frankfurt-am-Main, to install General of the Army Dwight D. Eisenhower’s personal air base. When our two teams finished, he flew in on a C-47 to lead the end of the fighting in Europe.
The views expressed in Storyography are not necessarily those of the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences or the University of Illinois.