The Lincoln Hall Project « College of Liberal Arts & Sciences « University of Illinois

Leon Gottfried (AB ’48, general curriculum; MA ’51, PhD ’58, English) describes changes to campus during World War II and how taking a test as a chemical engineering student probably saved his life.

One of the changes was the appearance on campus of large groups of young men in uniform. The army started a program really to keep young men getting their education, but nevertheless subject to orders. It was a program called ASTP, Army Specialized Training Program. They took over various dormitories and fraternity houses, so there were changes in living arrangements. The ASTP boys went to class in a group, always a—, you’d see a platoon marching from one building to another. The navy at about the same time started several programs similarly intended to try to keep education going. And the main naval program at the University of Illinois was called V-12. And the navy program was more, shall we say, genteel? Because the boys who got into that just remained as—, almost like civilians except that they wore uniforms. They went to classes as individuals; they didn’t march around in platoons. And that was a pretty attractive program. A lot of us thought it was worth trying to get into it. I tried, but I was turned down because I had flat feet, and I guess they didn’t think a naval officer should be flawed in any way.

So then there was the question of, what do I do next? I mean, do I just sit around and wait to be drafted, or what? And the navy came along with another option, that you could take a test to see if you had the aptitude to learn to be an electronics technician, and I took that test and passed it. It was not overly difficult for an engineering student, and sure enough in May of ’44 I got the notice that my draft date had been picked. While most of the guys were being sworn into the army, I was sworn into the navy. And that was really a very lucky break not only because I got wonderful training, but more importantly, it probably saved my life because lots and lots of the boys who were drafted with me that day or any of those days that followed, they ended up in the American Fifth Army, which was used a few months later in the invasion of Italy. And the Italian campaign was brutal, just a brutal campaign.

Years and years later, I went to visit the American cemetery just down the road from Florence, and rows upon rows and rows of these American graves, and as I walked among them, I noticed over and over again the boys’ hometown would be listed. It was either Chicago or small towns in the vicinity of Chicago. Their birthdates were around mine, they were similar to me in age, they were from the same part of the world, and they were dead. And I was alive. And I kind of owed it to the fact that I took that electronics test and went off to become an electronics technician in the navy instead of an infantryman to die on the hills of Italy.