Notes

INTRODUCTION: MODERN WAR, MODERN FITNESS

1. Ely J. Kahn, Army Life (Washington: Infantry Journal, 1943), 46.

2. Carl von Clausewitz, On War, trans. Michael Howard and Peter Paret, indexed ed. (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1989), 101.

3. Harold M. Barrow and Janie P. Brown, Man and Movement: Principles of Physical Education, 4th ed. (Philadelphia: Lea & Febiger, 1988), 66–74.

4. Michael Anton Budd, The Sculpture Machine: Physical Culture and Body Politics in the Age of Empire (New York: New York University Press, 1997), x.

5. Barrow and Brown, Man and Movement, 83.

6. Kristin L. Hoganson, Fighting for American Manhood: How Gender Politics Provoked the Spanish-American and Philippine-American Wars (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1998), 9–13.

7. John Keegan, The Face of Battle (New York: Penguin, 1978), 230.

8. Michael Howard, “Men against Fire: The Doctrine of the Offensive in 1914,” in Makers of Modern Strategy from Machiavelli to the Nuclear Age, ed. Peter Paret (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1986), 510–511.

9. Frederic N. Maude, Notes on the Evolution of Infantry Tactics (London: William Clowes and Sons, 1905), x.

10. Antulio J. Echevarria, “The ‘Cult of the Offensive’ Revisited: Confronting Technological Change before the Great War,” Journal of Strategic Studies 25, no. 1 (2002): 209; Howard, “Men against Fire,” 515–521.

11. Gail Bederman, Manliness & Civilization: A Cultural History of Gender and Race in the United States, 1880–1917 (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1995), 4–5, 78–79, 92–93; Christopher E. Forth, Masculinity in the Modern West: Gender, Civilization and the Body (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2008), 142–145.

12. For a succinct summary of the “crisis in masculinity,” and a critique of its classification as a “crisis,” see Bederman, Manliness & Civilization, 11–15; for a deeper treatment of the crisis, see Forth, Masculinity in the Modern West; for more on the specific American context of the crisis, see John F. Kasson, Houdini, Tarzan, and the Perfect Man: The White Male Body and the Challenge of Modernity in America (New York: Hill and Wang, 2001), 10–11.

13. Wilhelm Balck, Tactics, trans. Walter Krueger, 4th ed., vol. 1 (Fort Leavenworth, KS: US Cavalry Association, 1911), 194.

14. Historians have thoroughly explored period beliefs in physical perfectibility, but they have rarely applied this concept to military training. For some literature on perfectibility, see James C. Whorton, Crusaders for Fitness: The History of American Health Reformers (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1982), 271–294; Joanna Bourke, Dismembering the Male: Men’s Bodies, Britain and the Great War (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1996), 171–174, 209; Kasson, Houdini, Tarzan, and the Perfect Man, 7, 29, 49; Roberta J. Park, “Healthy, Moral, and Strong: Educational Views of Exercise and Athletics in Nineteenth-Century America,” in Fitness in American Culture: Images of Health, Sport, and the Body, 1830–1940, ed. Kathryn Grover (Amherst: University of Massachusetts Press, 1989), 123, 46–58.

CHAPTER 1. BODIES AND BATTLEFIELDS: CONTEXTUALIZING MARTIAL FITNESS FOR MODERN WAR

1. Modern US Army physical training practices continue to evolve. The most recent doctrinal publication on physical training, Training Circular 3-22.20, dates to 2010. The current Army Physical Fitness Test (APFT) consisting of a two-mile run and two minutes each of push-ups and sit-ups dates to 1980. Testing only became mandatory in 1963. In late 2018, Army officials revealed a new six-event, age- and gender-neutral physical fitness test set to take effect in 2021.

2. War Department, Manual of Physical Training for Use in the United States Army (New York: Military Publishing, 1914), 3.

3. Hermann Hagedorn, That Human Being, Leonard Wood (New York: Harcourt, Brace, and Howe, 1920), 11.

4. War Department, Manual of Physical Training for Use in the United States Army, 3. The US Army’s Army’s implementation of systematic physical training had been haphazard and belated in comparison to European militaries and to wider American society. The US Military Academy, which was the US Army’s torchbearer for physical training, introduced its first comprehensive program in 1859, but abandoned it during the Civil War. Physical training did not return in a systematic way until the late 1870s. Whitfield B. East, A Historical Review and Analysis of Army Physical Readiness Training and Assessment (Fort Leavenworth, KS: Combat Studies Institute Press, 2013), 28–31.

5. Kristin L. Hoganson, Fighting for American Manhood: How Gender Politics Provoked the Spanish-American and Philippine-American Wars (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1998), 3.

6. E. Anthony Rotundo, “Body and Soul: Changing Ideals of American Middle-Class Manhood, 1770–1920,” Journal of Social History 16, no. 4 (1983): 25–26.

7. E. Anthony Rotundo, American Manhood: Transformations in Masculinity from the Revolution to the Modern Era (New York: Basic, 1993), 248–250.

8. Frederick Jackson Turner, The Frontier in American History (New York: Henry Holt, 1920), 2–4; Michael S. Kimmel, Manhood in America: A Cultural History, 3rd ed. (New York: Oxford University Press, 2012), 87–89.

9. Kimmel, Manhood in America, 87.

10. Simultaneous threats came from working-class men and immigrants when political machines leveraged these populations’ latent political power. See Gail Bederman, Manliness & Civilization: A Cultural History of Gender and Race in the United States, 1880–1917 (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1995), 82–83.

11. Hoganson, Fighting for American Manhood, 109–116, 29–31.

12. Rotundo, “Body and Soul,” 30.

13. G. Stanley Hall, “Feminization in School and Home,” World’s Work 16 (1908): 10238.

14. Bederman, Manliness & Civilization, 13; German military theorist Wilhelm Balck spoke directly to this point in blaming the day’s “fast manner of living” for the Western soldier’s decline. See Wilhelm Balck, Tactics, trans. Walter Krueger, 4th ed., vol. 1 (Fort Leavenworth, KS: U.S. Cavalry Association, 1911), 194.

15. Rotundo, American Manhood, 251–55; Bederman, Manliness & Civilization, 16–17.

16. Bederman, Manliness & Civilization, 77–84.

17. Rotundo, “Body and Soul,” 29; Kimmel, Manhood in America, 119–20; Bederman, Manliness & Civilization, 18–19.

18. John F. Kasson, Houdini, Tarzan, and the Perfect Man: The White Male Body and the Challenge of Modernity in America (New York: Hill and Wang, 2001), 28–30.

19. Harvey Green, Fit for America: Health, Fitness, Sport, and American Society (New York: Pantheon, 1986), 137–39; “near epidemic” from Bederman, Manliness & Civilization, 85.

20. George M. Beard, American Nervousness: Its Causes and Consequences (New York: Putnam, 1881), 5–6.

21. Beard, viii.

22. Permutations of Beard’s “American nervousness” and neurasthenia appeared in European societies also, especially France, Britain, and Germany. See Antulio J. Echevarria, “The ‘Cult of the Offensive’ Revisited: Confronting Technological Change before the Great War,” Journal of Strategic Studies 25, no. 1 (2002): 205–207.

23. Beard, American Nervousness, vi; “brain workers” on ix.

24. Beard, 35.

25. Bederman, Manliness & Civilization, 84–88.

26. Beard, American Nervousness, ix.

27. For more on recapitulation, see Bederman, Manliness & Civilization, 88–101.

28. James C. Whorton, Crusaders for Fitness: The History of American Health Reformers (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1982), 271–294; Joanna Bourke, Dismembering the Male: Men’s Bodies, Britain and the Great War (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1996), 171–174; Kasson, Houdini, Tarzan, and the Perfect Man, 7, 29, 49; Roberta J. Park, “Healthy, Moral, and Strong: Educational Views of Exercise and Athletics in Nineteenth-Century America,” in Fitness in American Culture: Images of Health, Sport, and the Body, 1830–1940, ed. Kathryn Grover (Amherst: University of Massachusetts Press, 1989), 123, 46–58.

29. Scholars often refer to this body of ideas as “Social Darwinism,” though the term is problematic because of the diverse, often paradoxical conclusions biological thought produced in social sciences. For a brief but thorough exploration of the term, see Daniel Becquemont, “Social Darwinism: From Reality to Myth and from Myth to Reality,” Studies in History and Philosophy of Science 42, no. 1 (2011): 12–19.

30. Hoganson, Fighting for American Manhood, 12–13; Carl N. Degler, In Search of Human Nature: The Decline and Revival of Darwinism in American Social Thought (New York: Oxford University Press, 1991), 14–15; Becquemont, “Social Darwinism,” 16.

31. James J. Schneider, “The Theory of the Empty Battlefield,” Royal United Services Institute for Defence Studies Journal 132, no. 3 (1987): 37.

32. Walter E. Kretchik, U.S. Army Doctrine from the American Revolution to the War on Terror (Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 2011), 78–80.

33. James J. Schneider, “The Theory of the Empty Battlefield,” Royal United Services Institute for Defence Studies Journal 132, no. 3 (1987): 37–38; Michael Howard, “Men against Fire: The Doctrine of the Offensive in 1914,” in Makers of Modern Strategy from Machiavelli to the Nuclear Age, ed. Peter Paret (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1986), 511; Kretchik, U.S. Army Doctrine, 66–86; Perry D. Jamieson, Crossing the Deadly Ground: United States Army Tactics, 1865–1899 (Tuscaloosa: University of Alabama Press, 1994), 64–72.

34. Echevarria, “The ‘Cult of the Offensive’ Revisited,” 202.

35. Kretchik, U.S. Army Doctrine, 66–72; Jamieson, Crossing the Deadly Ground, 64–72.

36. Kretchik, U.S. Army Doctrine, 84–86.

37. Azar Gat, The Development of Military Thought: The Nineteenth Century (Oxford: Clarendon, 1992), 138; Jamieson, Crossing the Deadly Ground, 75–86.

38. For an overivew and critique of the cult of the offensive’s historiography, see Echevarria, “The ‘Cult of the Offensive’ Revisited,” 199–201.

39. G. F. R. Henderson, The Science of War: A Collection of Essays and Lectures, 1891–1903 (London: Longmans, Green, 1906), 159.

40. Henderson, 160.

41. Howard, “Men against Fire,” 515.

42. Echevarria, “The ‘Cult of the Offensive’ Revisited,” 200–201.

43. Charles Ardant du Picq, Battle Studies: Ancient and Modern Battle, trans. John N. Greely and Robert C. Cotton, 8th ed. (New York: Macmillan, 1921), 123.

44. Du Picq, 123–124.

45. Du Picq, 111.

46. Gat, The Development of Military Thought, 140.

47. Howard, “Men against Fire,” 514–522.

48. Wilhelm Karl Friedrich Gustav von Sherff, The New Tactics of Infantry, trans. Lumley Graham (Leavenworth, KS: C. J. Smith, 1891), 17–18, 20–23.

49. US officers came to similar conclusions about the need for new tactics. The many manuals released between 1867 and the Field Service Regulations from 1914 attest to this doctrinal ferment. For more on US tactical development, which is closely related to European development, see Kretchik, U.S. Army Doctrine, 78–120 and Jamieson, Crossing the Deadly Ground, 92–112.

50. John A. English, On Infantry, rev. ed. (Westport, CT: Praeger, 1994), 4–5.

51. Henderson, The Science of War, 371.

52. Henderson, 373–374.

53. Howard, “Men against Fire,” 517.

54. Kretchik, U.S. Army Doctrine, 114–115.

55. Echevarria, “The ‘Cult of the Offensive’ Revisited,” 204–205.

56. The lessons derived from this interpretation most heavily influenced the tactical thought and practice of Western militaries in 1914. Studies of the Balkan Wars of 1912 and 1913 may have refuted some of these lessons, but World War I exploded before many militaries had time to process Balkan Wars experiences. English, On Infantry, 7.

57. Archibald F. Becke, An Introduction to the History of Tactics, 1740–1905 (London: Hugh Rees, 1909), 95.

58. Frederic N. Maude, Notes on the Evolution of Infantry Tactics (London: William Clowes and Sons, 1905), 146.

59. Becke, An Introduction to the History of Tactics, 1740–1905, 65.

60. For a concise statement of the “cult of the offensive” argument and a guide to further reading, see Stephen Van Evera, “The Cult of the Offensive and the Origins of the First World War,” International Security 9, no. 1 (1984).

61. Howard, “Men against Fire,” 510–511; Echevarria, “The ‘Cult of the Offensive’ Revisited,” 199–202; “compelling rationale” on 201.

62. Quoted in Howard, “Men against Fire,” 520.

63. Echevarria, “The ‘Cult of the Offensive’ Revisited,” 208–209.

64. Balck, Tactics, 1:194.

65. Balck, 1:194–195.

66. Brian McAllister Linn, Echo of Battle: The Army’s Way of War (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2007), 110–111.

67. Muscular Christianity originated in England in the first half of the nineteenth century and migrated to America, chiefly the northeast, beginning in the 1850s. Harvey Green, “Introduction,” in Fitness in American Culture: Images of Health, Sport, and the Body, 1830–1940, ed. Kathryn Grover (Amherst: University of Massachusetts Press, 1989); Whorton, Crusaders for Fitness, 271. For a thorough analysis of the movement, see Clifford Putney, Muscular Christianity: Manhood and Sports in Protestant America, 1880–1920 (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2001).

68. Green, Fit for America, 195–197; T. J. Jackson Lears, “American Advertising and the Reconstruction of the Body, 1880–1930,” in Grover, Fitness in American Culture.

69. Macfadden and his magazine are the subject of many studies. See, for example, Mark Adams, Mr. America: How Muscular Millionaire Bernarr Macfadden Transformed the Nation through Sex, Salad, and the Ultimate Starvation Diet (New York: Harper, 2009); Lisa Robin Grunberger, Bernarr Macfadden’s “Physical Culture”: Muscles, Morals, and the Millennium (PhD diss., University of Chicago, 1997); Robert Ernst, Weakness Is a Crime: The Life of Bernarr Macfadden (Garden City, NY: Syracuse University Press, 1991); William R. Hunt, Body Love: The Amazing Career of Bernarr Macfadden (Bowling Green, OH: Bowling Green State University Popular Press, 1989).

70. Gertrud Pfister, “The Role of German Turners in American Physical Education,” International Journal of the History of Sport 26, no. 13 (October 2009): 1910.

71. Green, Fit for America, 181–182.

72. Edward Mussey Hartwell, Physical Training Treated from American and European Points of View (Boston: G. H. Ellis, 1890), 8.

73. Frederic L. Paxson, “The Rise of Sport,” Mississippi Valley Historical Review 4, no. 2 (1917): 145.

74. Donald J. Mrozek, Sport and American Mentality, 1880–1910 (Knoxville: University of Tennessee Press, 1983), 28–31.

75. Steven Pope, Patriotic Games: Sporting Traditions in the American Imagination, 1876–1926 (New York: Oxford University Press, 1997), 3–6.

76. For extended treatments of this point, see Wanda Ellen Wakefield, Playing to Win: Sports and the American Military, 1898–1945 (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1997); Steven Pope, “An Army of Athletes: Playing Fields, Battlefields, and the American Military Sporting Experience, 1890–1920,” Journal of Military History 59, no. 3 (1995).

77. The Master of the Sword was (and remains) responsible for the physical development of cadets. Calls for physical training in the Army predated Koehler’s appointment, but Koehler was deeply influential in securing official sanction for standardized, systematic physical training.

78. James Huff McCurdy, The Objectives of the American Physical Education Association (Springfield, MA: American Physical Education Association, 1927), 1–2.

79. Roberta J. Park, “Physiologists, Physicians, and Physical Educators: Nineteenth-Century Biology and Exercise, Hygienic and Educative,” in Sport and Exercise Science: Essays in the History of Sports Medicine, ed. Jack W. Berryman and Roberta J. Park (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1992), 138.

80. Isabel C. Barrows, ed., Physical Training: A Full Report of the Papers and Discussions of the Conference Held in Boston in November, 1889 (Boston: Press of George H. Ellis, 1890), 1–2.

81. Park, “Physiologists, Physicians, and Physical Educators,” 138–139.

82. Fred Eugene Leonard, Pioneers of Modern Physical Training (New York: Association Press, 1919), 147–155.

83. Edward Mussey Hartwell, “The Nature of Physical Training, and the Best Means of Securing Its Ends,” in Physical Training: A Full Report of the Papers and Discussions of the Conference Held in Boston in November, 1889, ed. Isabel C. Barrows (Boston: Press of George H. Ellis, 1890), 5.

84. Hartwell, 8–17.

85. Hartwell, 20.

86. Jakob Bolin, What Is Gymnastics? (New York: Willett Press, 1902), 3.

87. Park, “Physiologists, Physicians, and Physical Educators,” 166–168.

CHAPTER 2. ORIGINS OF A US ARMY PHYSICAL CULTURE, 1885–1916

1. Charles R. Greenleaf, “Physical Training in the U.S. Army,” in Proceedings of the American Association for the Advancement of Physical Education at Its Sixth Annual Meeting (Ithaca, NY: Andrus & Church, 1891), 58–59.

2. Greenleaf, 59.

3. T. Gentz, “Gymnastics as a Branch of Military Education,” Army and Navy Journal 9, no. 35 (1872): 562.

4. Gentz, 593.

5. James E. Pilcher, “The Building of the Soldier,” United Service 7, no. 4 (1892): 336.

6. The French gymnastic school accepted one sergeant or corporal from every regiment and independent battalion for a six-month program. Graduates returned to their units as trainers, and the best remained at the school for another six months as assistant instructors. The course included training in “gymnastics, scaling walls, swimming, fencing with the bayonet, singing, dancing, reading, writing,” and more. McClellan reported that the “efficiency of the French infantry is in no small degree attributable to the great attention paid to these points throughout the army.” George B. McClellan, Report of the Secretary of War Communicating the Report of Captain George B. McClellan, One of the Officers Sent to the Seat of War in Europe in 1855 and 1856 (Washington: A.O.P. Nicholson, Printer, 1857), 44.

7. Greenleaf, “Physical Training in the U.S. Army,” 60.

8. Edward Mussey Hartwell, “Physical Training in American Colleges and Universities,” in Circulars of Information of the Bureau of Education (Washington, DC: Bureau of Education, 1886), 180; more on Hartwell’s analysis of gymnastics training in European militaries can be found in his comments on Lieutenant Colonel Greenleaf’s presentation to the AAAPE in 1891, see Greenleaf, “Physical Training in the U.S. Army,” 77–80.

9. Greenleaf, “Physical Training in the U.S. Army,” 59.

10. Pilcher, “The Building of the Soldier,” 323. American experience in Cuba and the Philippines between 1898 and 1902 tended to reinforce these earlier assessments. For instance, Brig. Gen. W. H. Carter claimed in 1905 that American success in the Spanish-American War derived largely from a training system that “aimed to secure its results in war by putting every man on the firing line in physical condition to run from cover to cover without becoming so winded as to be unable to shoot straight.” See W. H. Carter, “A Meet in the Philippines: A Rational Plan of Athletic Training,” Journal of the Military Service Institution of the United States 36, no. 135 (1905): 455–456.

11. Bowers Davis, “A System for Army Athletics,” Infantry Journal 3, no. 2 (1906): 83.

12. John Stewart Kulp, “What to Avoid in Army Athletics,” in Proceedings of the Seventh Annual Meeting of the Association of Military Surgeons of the United States, ed. James E. Pilcher (Columbus: Berlin Publishing, 1897), 314.

13. Edmund Butts, “Athletic Training,” Infantry Journal 2, no. 1 (1905): 18.

14. War Department, Manual of Physical Training for Use in the United States Army (New York: Military Publishing, 1914), 3.

15. Frank S. Besson, “Physical Training in the Army,” Journal of the Military Service Institution of the United States 55 (1914): 39–40; criticisms of the Army’s proliferation of manuals, circulars, and orders on physical training were not new, nor were complaints that this proliferation prevented systematic training. For instance, see Guy G. Palmer, “Physical Culture and Training in the Army,” Journal of the United States Infantry Association 2, no. 4 (1906): 126.

16. Besson, “Physical Training in the Army,” 42.

17. The two other board members were Lt. Col. Fred Sladen and 1st Lt. Philip Mathews. The former was West Point’s commandant of cadets and Koehler’s superior in the Department of Tactics. Sladen likely provided supervision and the weight of his rank and position. Mathews was an officer in the Department of Tactics and Koehler’s assistant instructor of gymnastics. Besson, 42; Official Register of the Officers and Cadets United States Military Academy (West Point, NY: United States Military Academy Printing Office, 1913), 7.

18. Michael J. Reagor, “Herman J. Koehler: The Father of West Point Physical Education,” Assembly 51, no. 3 (1993).

19. Robert Degen, “The Evolution of Physical Education at the United States Military Academy” (master’s thesis, University of Wisconsin, 1966), 46–49; Herman J. Koehler, “The Physical Training of Cadets, 1802–1902,” in The Centennial of the United States Military Academy at West Point, New York, 1802–1902 (Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 1904), 897–898.

20. Annual Report of the Board of Visitors to the United States Military Academy for the Year 1881 (Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 1881), 7.

21. For a complete overview of Farrow’s system, see Edward Samuel Farrow, A Military System of Gymnastic Exercises and a System of Swimming (New York: Metropolitan, 1881). Farrow’s system descended directly from Archibald MacLaren’s A System of Physical Education (1869).

22. Koehler, “The Physical Training of Cadets,” 898–899.

23. Whitfield B. East, A Historical Review and Analysis of Army Physical Readiness Training and Assessment (Fort Leavenworth, KS: Combat Studies Institute Press, 2013), 31.

24. The Milwaukee Normal School was one of the nation’s premier schools for physical educators.

25. Brosius came to the search committee’s notice for two reasons. First, his 1880 team’s success at the Fifth German Turner Festival in Frankfurt won wide recognition in Turner circles and in American newspapers. Second, one of his former students, a Captain Reed, was involved in the search. Reed was an advocate of applying the “Milwaukee idea of physical exercises” at West Point. George Brosius, Fifty Years Devoted to the Cause of Physical Culture, 1864–1914 (Milwaukee, WI: Germania, 1914), 89–90.

26. Lance Betros, Carved from Granite: West Point since 1902 (College Station: Texas A & M University Press, 2012), 164–166.

27. Elliott C. Cutler, “Lt. Col. Herman J. Koehler, Master of the Sword: An Account of His Service and Influence,” Assembly 39, no. 3 (1980): 20.

28. Koehler, “The Physical Training of Cadets,” 899.

29. Koehler, 900.

30. Koehler, 902, 904.

31. Report of the Board of Visitors to the United States Military Academy for the Year 1889 (Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 1889), 38–39.

32. The manual of 1892 resulted from a suggestion by the West Point superintendent, Col. John Wilson, to Koehler that he publish his system for use in the wider Army. The Army’s adjutant-general reviewed the manual and the secretary of war urged calisthenic instruction of enlisted soldiers to conform to Koehler’s system. However, little seems to have come of this urging, given continued complaints about a lack of system two decades later. Herman J. Koehler, Manual of Calisthenic Exercises (Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 1892), v.

33. Degen, “The Evolution of Physical Education,” 63–68.

34. Degen, 64–65.

35. Fred Eugene Leonard, A Guide to the History of Physical Education, ed. George Baird Affleck, 3rd ed. (Philadelphia, PA: Lea & Febiger, 1947), 86–87.

36. Gertrud Pfister, “The Role of German Turners in American Physical Education,” International Journal of the History of Sport 26, no. 13 (2009): 1896; Deobald B. Van Dalen and Bruce L. Bennett, A World History of Physical Education: Cultural, Philosophical, Comparative, 2nd ed. (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall, 1971), 96, 399.

37. At least five thousand Turners served in the Union Army, which represented more than 50 percent of the total Turners in America at the time. Leonard, A Guide to the History of Education, 298.

38. Pfister, “The Role of German Turners,” 1908–1916.

39. Pfister, 1902.

40. Paula D. Welch, History of American Physical Education and Sport, 3rd ed. (Springfield, IL: Charles C. Thomas, 2004), 111; Van Dalen and Bennett, A World History of Physical Education, 425.

41. The manual listed ten categories: setting-up exercises (calisthenics), marching and running, work with dumbbells and other implements, climbing, jumping, apparatus work, gymnastic contests, athletics (track-and-field), swimming, and boxing and wrestling. War Department, Manual of Physical Training, 6.

42. Cutler, “Lt. Col. Herman J. Koehler,” 21.

43. Herman Koehler Biographical Sketch; 201 File, Headquarters, USMA, February 17, 1919, United States Military Academy Special Collections.

44. Herman J. Koehler, “Physical Training in the Army,” Infantry Journal 1, no. 1 (1904): 11–13; Greenleaf, “Physical Training in the U.S. Army,” 64–66.

45. Palmer, “Physical Culture and Training in the Army,” 119–120. Gym construction boomed in the 1890s, but it began a few years earlier. For instance, Maj. Gen. Nelson Miles wrote enthusiastically about a new gym at Vancouver Barracks (Washington Territory) in 1884. Greenleaf, “Physical Training in the U.S. Army,” 65.

46. Congress appropriated funds for construction of these gymnasia in June 1890 and also authorized construction of similar buildings at other posts as deemed necessary by the secretary of war. Greenleaf, 67.

47. A. B. Donworth, “Gymnasium Training in the Army,” Journal of the Military Service Institution of the United States 21 (1897): 509–512; for pictures and diagrams of an sample gym, see Photographs of Gymnastic Apparatus in United States Army Post Plattsburg, N.Y.: Arranged to List and Plans of Lieut. Herman J. Koehler, U.S.A. (Providence, RI: Narragansett Machine, 1903). Book is available in the United States Military Academy library.

48. Koehler, “Physical Training in the Army,” 10; Herschel Tupes, “Annual Athletic and Gymnastic Tests for the Army,” Infantry Journal 2, no. 2 (1905): 103.

49. Herman J. Koehler, Manual of Gymnastic Exercises: Prepared for Use in Service Gymnasiums (Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 1904), 17.

50. Edmund L. Butts, “Physical Training of the American Soldier,” Journal of the Military Service Institution of the United States 61, no. 75 (1895): 499.

51. Butts, 500–501.

52. Edmund L. Butts, “Soldierly Bearing, Health and Athletics,” Outing, March 1904, 707.

53. Butts, “Physical Training of the American Soldier,” 506.

54. Butts, 506–509.

55. Butts, “Soldierly Bearing, Health and Athletics,” 707.

56. Manual of Physical Drill, United States Army (New York: D. Appleton, 1900), iii.

57. Manual of Physical Drill, iii.

58. Manual of Physical Drill, 1.

59. Manual of Physical Drill, 3–4.

60. Butts, “Physical Training of the American Soldier,” 505.

61. Robert Smart, “The Physical Development of the Recruit,” in Proceedings of the Association of Military Surgeons of the United States at Its Tenth Annual Meeting (Carlisle: Association of Military Surgeons, 1901), 572–573.

62. Smart, 575.

63. Koehler, “Physical Training in the Army,” 8.

64. Koehler, 10.

65. Robert L. Bullard and H. S. Hawkins, “Athletics in the Army,” Journal of the Military Service Institution of the United States 37 (1905): 400.

66. Herman J. Koehler, “General Remarks on Physical Training in the Service,” Infantry Journal 3, no. 4 (1907): 103.

67. Koehler, 103.

68. The Army Gymnastic Staff was renamed the Army Physical Training Staff in 1918, was made a corps in 1940, and is known today as the Royal Army Physical Training Corps. For more on this center’s development and structure, see James D. Campbell, “The Army Isn’t All Work”: Physical Culture in the Evolution of the British Army, 1860–1920 (Burlington, VT: Ashgate, 2012).

69. Greenleaf, “Physical Training in the U.S. Army,” 74.

70. Greenleaf, 75. Medical officers, citing possession of expert knowledge, typically argued for other medical officers to take charge of physical training. For other examples, see Pilcher, “The Building of the Soldier,” 334–335; Smart, “The Physical Development of the Recruit,” 575.

71. Koehler, Manual of Calisthenic Exercises, v; Brigadier General Albert L. Mills, August 6, 1906, Herman Koehler Vertical File, United States Military Academy Special Collections.

72. Palmer, “Physical Culture and Training in the Army,” 121.

73. “Showing Off His Stamina, Gen. Miles Making Ninety-Mile Horseback Ride,” Los Angeles Times, July 15, 1903, 11.

74. Michael D. Krause, “History of U.S. Army Soldier Physical Fitness,” in National Conference on Military Physical Fitness: Proceedings Report, ed. Lois A. Hale (Washington, DC: US Department of Health and Human Services in cooperation with the National Defense University, 1990), 21.

75. East, A Historical Review and Analysis, 42.

76. Krause, “History of U.S. Army Soldier Physical Fitness,” 21.

77. General Order, No. 44 (Washington: War Department, March 1, 1906), 1–2.

78. East, A Historical Review and Analysis, 43.

79. “Roosevelt Led 60 on a Bully Tramp,” New York Times, November 8, 1908.

80. East, A Historical Review and Analysis, 43.

81. Edward M. Coffman, The Regulars: The American Army, 1898–1941 (Cambridge, MA: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 2004), 87–88.

82. War Department, Manual of Physical Training, 5–6.

83. War Department, 6.

84. War Department, 6.

85. Roberta J. Park, “Physiologists, Physicians, and Physical Educators: Nineteenth-Century Biology and Exercise, Hygienic and Educative,” in Sport and Exercise Science: Essays in the History of Sports Medicine, ed. Jack W. Berryman and Roberta J. Park (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1992), 137–142.

86. War Department, Manual of Physical Training, 14.

87. War Department, 14–15.

88. War Department, 12.

89. War Department, 12.

90. War Department, 3.

91. War Department, 193–196.

92. War Department, 10.

93. War Department, 3.

94. Herman J. Koehler, “Letter from Captain Herman J. Koehler,” American Physical Education Review 21, no. 3 (1916): 149.

95. War Department, Manual of Physical Training, 6. Variations on the confidence theme can be found in Edmund L. Butts, “Military Athletics,” Harper’s Weekly, no. 41 (January 9, 1897): 41; Merch B. Stewart, The Physical Development of the Infantry Soldier (Menasha: George Banta, 1913), 7; Edward L. King, “Athletics for the Physical Betterment of the Enlisted Men in the Army,” Outing, January 1902, 432.

96. Edmund L. Butts, “Soldierly Bearing, Health and Athletics,” 707.

97. Koehler, “Letter from Captain Herman J. Koehler,” 149.

98. Koehler, 151.

99. G. Stanley Hall, “Some Relations between Physical and Mental Training,” in Report of the Ninth Annual Meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Physical Education (New Haven, CT: Press of Clarence H. Ryder, 1894), 31.

100. Draft of Manual of Physical Training, 2, Herman Koehler Vertical File, United States Military Academy Special Collections.

101. James E. Pilcher, “The Place of Physical Training in the Military Service,” in The Proceedings of the Fourth Annual Meeting of the Association of Military Surgeons of the United States (St. Louis: Suxton & Skinner Stationery, 1894), 178.

102. Donworth, “Gymnasium Training in the Army,” 513.

103. Park, “Physiologists, Physicians, and Physical Educators,” 139, 144–146, 155.

104. Koehler, “Physical Training in the Army,” 10.

105. L. S. Upton, “Physical Training in the Army,” Infantry Journal 2, no. 2 (1905): 110.

106. Butts, “Physical Training of the American Soldier,” 502.

107. War Department, Manual of Physical Training, 13.

108. For examples, see Koehler, Manual of Calisthenic Exercises, 2; Koehler, “General Remarks on Physical Training in the Service,” 121; Edmund L. Butts, Manual of Physical Drill, United States Army (New York: D. Appleton, 1900), 2; Enoch B. Garey, Manual of Physical Drill (Kansas City: Franklin Hudson, 1911), 54.

109. Pilcher, “The Building of the Soldier,” 334–335.

110. Koehler, Manual of Gymnastic Exercises, 9.

111. Koehler, “Physical Training in the Army,” 11–12.

112. Butts, “Physical Training of the American Soldier,” 512.

113. Palmer, “Physical Culture and Training in the Army,” 121.

114. Henry S. Kilbourne, “The Physical Proportions of the American Soldier,” in Proceedings of the Seventh Annual Meeting of the Association of Military Surgeons of the United States, ed. James E. Pilcher (Columbus: Berlin, 1897), 332, quote on 39.

115. Draft of Manual of Physical Training, 2–4.

116. Stewart, The Physical Development of the Infantry Soldier, 2–4.

117. Jeffery Allen Charlston, “Disorganized and Quasi-Official but Eventually Successful: Sport in the U.S. Military, 1814–1914,” International Journal of the History of Sport 19, no. 4 (2002): 76–78.

118. Steven Pope, “An Army of Athletes: Playing Fields, Battlefields, and the American Military Sporting Experience, 1890–1920,” Journal of Military History 59, no. 3 (1995): 438–441.

119. On synergy, see Charlston, “Disorganized and Quasi-Official,” 76.

120. Henry G. Beyer, “Military Physical Training,” in Pilcher, Proceedings of the Seventh Annual Meeting of the Association of Military Surgeons of the United States, 266.

121. Bullard and Hawkins, “Athletics in the Army,” 405. In a response to this set of articles, Lt. Col. A. C. Sharpe characterized field days as the “most irrational feature of our garrison life.” A. C. Sharpe, “Comment & Criticism: Athletics in the Army,” Journal of the Military Service Institution of the United States 38, no. 141 (1906): 538.

122. Bullard and Hawkins, “Athletics in the Army,” 402.

123. Butts, “Physical Training of the American Soldier,” 707.

124. Butts never listed a program of events, but for an example of one that meets Butts’s criteria and intent, see Davis, “A System for Army Athletics,” 79–80.

125. Butts, “Physical Training of the American Soldier,” 511.

126. Also, Butts did not author the chapter on track-and-field competition. Instead, he borrowed the material from a book titled “Track Athletic in Detail.” Butts, Manual of Physical Drill, iii, 136.

127. William H. Edwards, Football Days: Memories of the Game and of the Men Behind the Ball (New York: Moffat, Yard, 1916), 214–215.

128. Koehler, “Physical Training in the Army,” 2.

129. Koehler, “General Remarks on Physical Training in the Service,” 103–104, 15.

130. Herman Koehler, The Theory and Practice of Athletics at the Military Academy (West Point, NY: Military Academy Printing Office, 1909), 2.

131. Koehler, “Physical Training in the Army,” 9.

132. The Army Athletic Association, renamed in 1903, was originally known as the Army Officers Athletic Association.

133. Betros, Carved from Granite, 168–171.

134. Roberta J. Park, “Healthy, Moral, and Strong: Educational Views of Exercise and Athletics in Nineteenth-Century America,” in Fitness in American Culture: Images of Health, Sport, and the Body, 1830–1940, ed. Kathryn Grover (Amherst: University of Massachusetts Press, 1989) 138–143.

135. For a concise statement of this position, see Edward Mussey Hartwell, “The Nature of Physical Training, and the Best Means of Securing Its Ends,” in Physical Training: A Full Report of the Papers and Discussions of the Conference Held in Boston in November, 1889, ed. Isabel C. Barrows (Boston: Press of George H. Ellis, 1890), 5–22, 20.

136. Park, “Healthy, Moral, and Strong,” 167–171.

CHAPTER 3. THE US ARMY’S BATTLE OF THE SYSTEMS, 1914–1920

1. Antulio J. Echevarria, “The ‘Cult of the Offensive’ Revisited: Confronting Technological Change before the Great War,” Journal of Strategic Studies 25, no. 1 (2002): 199–202.

2. Luther H. Gulick, “Physical Fitness in the Fighting Armies,” American Physical Education Review 23, no. 6 (1918): 341–350.

3. Jennifer D. Keene, Doughboys, the Great War, and the Remaking of America (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2001), 9.

4. Herman J. Koehler, Manual of Gymnastic Exercises: Prepared for Use in Service Gymnasiums (Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 1904), 9.

5. George J. Fisher, “Physical Training in the Army,” American Physical Education Review 23, no. 2 (1918): 65.

6. Keene, Doughboys, 24–25.

7. James Mennell, “The Service Football Program of World War I: Its Impact on the Popularity of the Game,” Journal of Sport History 16, no. 3 (1989), 251–252.

8. For the CTCA’s portrayal of its task, purpose, and method, see Edward Frank Allen, Keeping Our Fighters Fit for War and After (New York: Century, 1918), 3–8, quotation on 16; War Department, Commission on Training Camp Activities (Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 1917), 3–5; Raymond B. Fosdick, “The Commission on Training Camp Activities,” Proceedings of the Academy of Political Science in the City of New York 7, no. 4 (1918): 163–170.

9. Allen, Keeping Our Fighters Fit, preface.

10. Nancy K. Bristow, Making Men Moral: Social Engineering during the Great War (New York: New York University Press, 1996), 1–8; War Department, Commission on Training Camp Activities, 3–6; Fosdick, “Commission,” 819; on the Progressive-era cultural debate about the identity of American soldiers as either innocent boys or adult men and the moral implications of that identity, see Anni Baker, “The Abolition of the U.S. Army Canteen, 1898–1914,” Journal of Military History 80, no. 3 (2016).

11. Bristow, Making Men Moral, 11.

12. Allen, Keeping Our Fighters Fit, preface.

13. Bristow, Making Men Moral, 4–7.

14. Allen, Keeping Our Fighters Fit, 3–6.

15. Bristow, Making Men Moral, 38–40.

16. Allen, Keeping Our Fighters Fit, 40.

17. Noted football coach Walter Camp headed the Athletic Division in the Navy’s CTCA. Camp created and promoted the now-famous “Daily Dozen” exercise program. Although the Daily Dozen became extremely popular and appeared occasionally in the physical training practices of some Army units, it was never part of the Army’s official physical culture.

18. Quotation in Joseph E. Raycroft, “Safeguarding the Health of College Students,” Science 39, no. 1011 (1914): 709, 711; Curriculum Vitae: Joseph Edward Raycroft, 1948, Series 1, Biographical, Box 2, Joseph Edward Raycroft Papers (JERP), Department of Rare Books and Special Collections, Princeton University Library (PUL); Joseph E. Raycroft, “The Educational Value of Athletics in Schools and Colleges,” School and Society 3, no. 61 (1915): 295–296; Joseph E. Raycroft, “Training Camp Activities,” American Physical Education Review 23, no. 3 (1918): 143.

19. “Proceedings of the Society of Directors of Physical Education in Colleges,” American Physical Education Review 22, no. 4 (1917): 190–192.

20. Joseph E. Raycroft, Memorandum Concerning Physical Training in the New Army, May 1917, Box 4, JERP, PUL.

21. For a brief overview of the YMCA’s involvement in military athletics, see Steven Pope, “An Army of Athletes: Playing Fields, Battlefields, and the American Military Sporting Experience, 1890–1920,” Journal of Military History 59, no. 3 (1995): 442–444.

22. Joseph E. Raycroft, Memorandum Concerning Physical Training in the New Army, May 1917, Box 4, JERP, PUL.

23. Raycroft, Memorandum, May 1917, Box 4, JERP, PUL.

24. Draft of Efficiency in Army Physical Training, Presented to the Athletic Research Society, Joseph E. Raycroft, pg. 2, 1920, Series 3, Physical Education During Wartime, 1917–1944, Box 4, JERP, PUL.

25. Joseph E. Raycroft, Memorandum Concerning Physical Training in the New Army, May 1917, Box 4, JERP, PUL.

26. Joseph Raycroft to Raymond Fosdick, 14 June 1917; Fosdick No. 1, box 25; Records of the War Department General & Special Staffs, Commission on Training Camp Activities, Correspondence of the Athletic Division, 1917–1919, Record Group (RG) 165, National Archives at College Park, MD (NACP).

27. Joseph E. Raycroft, Memorandum Concerning Physical Training in the New Army, May 1917, Box 4, JERP, PUL.

28. Joseph E. Raycroft, Memorandum Outlining the Various Steps Taken in the Development of a Program of Physical Training, Boxing, Bayonet Fighting, Athletics, Etc., as a Part of the Training Program of a Soldier, 1917–1920, pg. 3, 1941, Box 4, JERP, PUL; for a description of the Canadian physical training system and its use of boxing in bayonet training, see Percy Hobbs, “Bayonet Fighting and Physical Training,” Infantry Journal 14, no. 2 (1917).

29. Studies of foreign practices generated much literature in the United States. For a sample, see Fisher, “Physical Training in the Army,” 69; “Military Training in Foreign Countries,” American Physical Education Review 22, no. 8 (1917); Army War College, Notes on Bayonet Training Compiled from Foreign Reports (Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 1917); Marc Bellin du Coteau, “The Physical Education of the Fighting Man: Method in Use in the National Military School of St. Cyr, France,” American Physical Education Review 22, no. 9 (1917); Raycroft, “Training Camp Activities,” 145.

30. House of Representatives Select Committee on Expenditures in the War Department, War Expenditures: Hearings before the Select Committee on Expenditures in the War Department (Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 1919), 157.

31. James D. Campbell, “The Army Isn’t All Work”: Physical Culture in the Evolution of the British Army, 1860–1920 (Burlington, VT: Ashgate, 2012), 63–64, 70–71, 112.

32. Select Committee on Expenditures in the War Department, War Expenditures, 157.

33. Select Committee on Expenditures in the War Department, 157; Herbert Reed, “‘Not a Minute’ Koehler Takes the Team,” Independent, July 14, 1917.

34. Issued in May 1917, this publication was a stripped-down version of the Manual of Physical Training of 1914. Koehler’s disciplinary drill formed this document’s core. Most elements of the manual of 1914 that required additional equipment or apparatus were removed, as were the sections dealing with athletics.

35. Select Committee on Expenditures in the War Department, War Expenditures, 157.

36. Joseph E. Raycroft, Memorandum Outlining the Various Steps Taken in the Development of a Program of Physical Training, Boxing, Bayonet Fighting, Athletics, Etc., as a Part of the Training Program of a Soldier, 1917–1920, pg. 2, 1941, Box 4, JERP, PUL.

37. Raycroft, 5; Letter, Major General J. Franklin Bell to Colonel Traub, 12 July 1917, Series 3, Physical Education during Wartime, 1917–1944, Box 4, JERP, PUL; Letter, Joseph Raycroft to Col. Samuel W. Miller, 29 June 1917, Series 3: Physical Education During Wartime, 1917–1944, Box 4, JERP, PUL.

38. Meeting of War Department Commission on Training Camp Activities Report, 21 November 1917; Fosdick Letters No. 1; Commission on Training Camp Activities, Correspondence of the Athletic Division, 1917–1919, box 25; RG 165, NACP.

39. Joseph E. Raycroft, Memorandum Outlining the Various Steps Taken in the Development of a Program of Physical Training, Boxing, Bayonet Fighting, Athletics, Etc., as a Part of the Training Program of a Soldier, 1917–1920, pg. 5–6, 1941, Box 4, JERP, PUL.

40. Raycroft, 7.

41. Letter, Joseph Raycroft to James A. Babbitt, 9 December 1942, Series 1, Personal Correspondence—Professional Career, Box 1, JERP, PUL.

42. Keene, Doughboys, 41.

43. Report of Fred W. Marvel, (Temporary) Inspector of Athletics, to Joseph E. Raycroft, MD, 1918, Series 3, Box 4, JERP, PUL.

44. Fisher, “Physical Training in the Army,” 66.

45. Raycroft’s association with President Wilson (both were Princeton men) probably helped too. Letter, John L. Griffith to George A. Barton, 19 April 1944, Series 1, Personal Correspondence—Professional Career, Box 1, JERP, PUL.

46. Letter, Newton Baker to Raymond Fosdick, 21 June 1917, Series 3, Box 4, JERP, PUL.

47. Thomas Browne to Joseph Raycroft, 16 June 1918; Commission on Training Camp Activities, Correspondence of the Athletic Division, 1917–1919, box 8; RG 165, NACP.

48. Letter, Joseph Raycroft to Raymond Fosdick, 26 May 1917, Series 3, Physical Education during Wartime, 1917–1944, Box 4, JERP, PUL.

49. Raymond Fosdick to Joseph Raycroft, 14 December 1917; Fosdick Letters No. 1; Commission on Training Camp Activities, Correspondence of the Athletic Division, 1917–1919, box 25; RG 165, NACP.

50. John Biddle, Memorandum for the Adjutant General of the Army, Subject: Commission for Athletic Directors, 26 January 1918, Series 3, Physical Education During Wartime, 1917–1944, Box 4, JERP, PUL.

51. Joseph Raycroft to J. S. Tichenor, undated; folder 45; Commission on Training Camp Activities, Correspondence of the Athletic Division, 1917–1919, box 35; RG 165, NACP.

52. Memorandum Regarding the Relationship in Camps That Should Exist between YMCA Directors and War Department Athletic Directors, 18 January 1918; folder 45; Commission on Training Camp Activities, Correspondence of the Athletic Division, 1917–1919, box 35; RG 165, NACP.

53. Report of Fred W. Marvel, (Temporary) Inspector of Athletics, to Joseph E. Raycroft, MD, 1918, pg. 8, Series 3, Box 4, JERP, PUL.

54. Joseph E. Raycroft, Suggestions for Colleges from the Army Experience in Physical Training, pg. 14, December 1918, Series 3, Physical Education during Wartime, 1917–1944, Box 4, JERP, PUL.

55. Fisher, “Physical Training in the Army,” 66; for an example of sharing diverse experiences, see “Extracts from Occasional Letters from Physical Directors in Army Camps to Dr. George J. Fisher, Director, War Work Council, Young Men’s Christian Association,” American Physical Education Review 22, no. 9 (1917): 558–566.

56. Draft of History of War Department Commission on Training Camp Activities Athletic Division, April 1917—January 1919, pg. 17, Series 3, Physical Education during Wartime, 1917–1944, Box 4, JERP, PUL; Draft of Efficiency in Army Physical Training, Presented to the Athletic Research Society, pg. 3, 1920, Series 3, Physical Education during Wartime, 1917–1944, Box 4, JERP, PUL.

57. Joseph E. Raycroft, Memorandum Outlining the Various Steps Taken in the Development of a Program of Physical Training, Boxing, Bayonet Fighting, Athletics, Etc., as a Part of the Training Program of a Soldier, 1917–1920, pg. 10–11, 1941, Box 4, JERP, PUL.

58. Report of Fred W. Marvel, (Temporary) Inspector of Athletics, to Joseph E. Raycroft, MD, 1918, pg. 4, Series 3, Box 4, JERP, PUL; Fisher, 69.

59. Joseph E. Raycroft, Memorandum Outlining the Various Steps Taken in the Development of a Program of Physical Training, Boxing, Bayonet Fighting, Athletics, Etc., as a Part of the Training Program of a Soldier, 1917–1920, pg. 11–13, 1941, Box 4, JERP, PUL.; Raycroft, “Training Camp Activities,” 147.

60. War Plans Division, Training Circular No. 19: Organization of Physical and Bayonet Training (Washington, DC: War Department, 1918), 8.

61. Raycroft claimed that such schools had trained “tens of thousands” of commissioned and noncommissioned officers in his system by November 1918. Draft of Efficiency in Army Physical Training, Presented to the Athletic Research Society, pg. 3, 1920, Series 3, Physical Education during Wartime, 1917–1944, Box 4, JERP, PUL.

62. Joseph E. Raycroft, Memorandum Outlining the Various Steps Taken in the Development of a Program of Physical Training, Boxing, Bayonet Fighting, Athletics, Etc., as a Part of the Training Program of a Soldier, 1917–1920, pg. 14, 1941, Box 4, JERP, PUL.

63. Raycroft, 14–15.

64. Joseph E. Raycroft, Suggestions for Colleges from the Army Experience in Physical Training, pg. 4, December 1918, Series 3, Physical Education during Wartime, 1917–1944, Box 4, JERP, PUL.

65. Joseph Raycroft to Johnny Griffiths, 14 December 1918, Commission on Training Camp Activities, Correspondence of the Athletic Division, 1917–1919, box 1; RG 165, NACP.

66. “Physical and Bayonet Training (Editorial),” Infantry Journal 16, no. 6 (1919): 515; Whitfield B. East, A Historical Review and Analysis of Army Physical Readiness Training and Assessment (Fort Leavenworth, KS: Combat Studies Institute Press, 2013), 70.

67. Memorandum, Joseph Raycroft to Captain Brosius, George V. Blake, and Lt. Brook Leman, 30 August 1919, Series 3, Physical Education During Wartime, 1917–1944, Box 4, JERP, PUL.

68. Notably, one of the first three instructors assigned was Koehler’s cousin, Capt. Carl Brosius. Joseph E. Raycroft, Mass Physical Training for Use in the Army and the Reserve Officers’ Training Corps (Washington, DC: United States Infantry Association, 1920), ix; for a full instructor roster, see J. C. Drain, “New Physical and Bayonet Training Course,” Infantry Journal 16, no. 6 (1919): 475.

69. “Physical and Bayonet Training (Editorial),” 515–516.

70. War Department, Commission on Training Camp Activities (1917), 3–4.

71. Raycroft, Mass Physical Training, vi, viii.

72. War Plans Division, Training Circular No. 19, 8.

73. Joseph E. Raycroft, Draft of Efficiency in Army Physical Training, Presented to the Athletic Research Society, pg. 1, 1920, Series 3, Physical Education during Wartime, 1917–1944, Box 4, JERP, PUL.

74. Joseph E. Raycroft, Suggestions for Colleges from the Army Experience in Physical Training, pg. 8, December 1918, Series 3, Physical Education during Wartime, 1917–1944, Box 4, JERP, PUL.

75. Joseph E. Raycroft, Draft of Efficiency in Army Physical Training, Presented to the Athletic Research Society, pg. 23–25, 1920, Series 3, Physical Education during Wartime, 1917–1944, Box 4, JERP, PUL. In examining Raycroft’s and the CTCA’s files, I have found no evidence for a comprehensive effort to quantify and measure physiological performance requirements in the US Army prior to 1942. More research may yet bring such data to light.

76. Raycroft, Mass Physical Training, 1–2.

77. Raycroft, “Training Camp Activities,” 144–145.

78. Joseph E. Raycroft, Draft of Efficiency in Army Physical Training, Presented to the Athletic Research Society, pg. 2, 1920, Series 3, Physical Education during Wartime, 1917–1944, Box 4, JERP, PUL.

79. Joseph E. Raycroft, Suggestions for Colleges from the Army Experience in Physical Training, pg. 2, December 1918, Series 3, Physical Education during Wartime, 1917–1944, Box 4, JERP, PUL.

80. Hilton Howell Railey, “Your Boy in Camp,” Independent, August 11, 1917.

81. Raycroft, “Training Camp Activities,” 144.

82. Allen, Keeping Our Fighters Fit, 42.

83. Letter, Joseph Raycroft to John G. Hibben, 13 November 1919, Series 3, Physical Education during Wartime, 1917–1944, Box 4, JERP, PUL.

84. Raycroft, Mass Physical Training, iii–iv.

85. Raycroft, iv.

86. Raycroft, 4.

87. Thomas Browne to Joseph Raycroft, 19 May 1918; Commission on Training Camp Activities, Correspondence of the Athletic Division, 1917–1919, box 8; RG 165, NACP.

88. Raycroft, Mass Physical Training, vii.

89. Joseph E. Raycroft, Suggestions for Colleges from the Army Experience in Physical Training, pg. 9, December 1918, Series 3, Physical Education during Wartime, 1917–1944, Box 4, JERP, PUL.

90. Raycroft, Mass Physical Training, 45.

91. Raycroft, vii, quotation on 40.

92. Raycroft, 34.

93. Raycroft, vii–viii.

94. War Department, Manual of Physical Training for Use in the United States Army (New York: Military Publishing, 1914), 9.

95. Raycroft, Mass Physical Training, 71.

96. Raycroft, viii.

97. Raycroft, 110.

98. High valuation of the bayonet was not a feature exclusive to US military culture. Practically all Western-style armies embraced the bayonet before World War I. As historian Hew Strachan has observed, the bayonet was representative of an acknowledgment that morale was of “increasing and legitimate importance” on modern battlefields. According to Strachan, technology “did not remove the need for men to cope, but increasing the pressures loaded on them, intensified the search for palliatives.” Bayonet training cultivated an aggressive spirit and the individual soldier’s confidence, and was therefore useful to improving an organization’s moral forces. Hew Strachan, “Training, Morale and Modern War,” Journal of Contemporary History 41, no. 2 (2006): 218.

99. Raycroft, Mass Physical Training, 3.

100. Quotation on War Department, Commission on Training Camp Activities (1917), 13; see also Raycroft, Mass Physical Training, 84; Joseph E. Raycroft, Memorandum Outlining the Various Steps Taken in the Development of a Program of Physical Training, Boxing, Bayonet Fighting, Athletics, Etc., as a Part of the Training Program of a Soldier, 1917–1920, pg. 7, 1941, Box 4, JERP, PUL.

101. Allen, Keeping Our Fighters Fit, 55–56.

102. Raycroft, “Training Camp Activities,” 146.

103. “Defence Opposed in Boxing Rules for Army Camps,” New York Tribune, June 23, 1918; War Department Commission on Training Camp Activities, Rules for Boxing (Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 1918).

104. War Department, Commission on Training Camp Activities (1917), 13.

105. Hiram A. Jones, “The Revised Preparedness Bill: The Status of the Physical Preparedness Legislation,” Journal of Health and Physical Education 12, no. 2 (1941).

106. War Department, Outline of Plan for Military Training in Public Schools of the United States (Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 1916), 1.

107. War Department, Outline of Plan, 1.

108. Joseph E. Raycroft, Memorandum Outlining the Various Steps Taken in the Development of a Program of Physical Training, Boxing, Bayonet Fighting, Athletics, Etc., as a Part of the Training Program of a Soldier, 1917–1920, pgs. 7–8, 1941, Box 4, JERP, PUL.

109. Raycroft, 8.

110. J. V. Fitzgerald, “See a Revival of Boxing as Army Takes up Sport,” Washington Post, November 5, 1917.

111. Quotation in Allen, Keeping Our Fighters Fit, 53–54.

112. Allen, 57–58.

113. War Department, Commission on Training Camp Activities (1917), 12.

114. Pope, “An Army of Athletes,” 436–40; Wanda Ellen Wakefield, Playing to Win: Sports and the American Military, 1898–1945 (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1997), 6–9; Mrozek, Sport and American Mentality, 51–59.

115. War Department, Manual of Physical Training for Use in the United States Army, 309.

116. War Department, 309.

117. War Department, 309–13; Herman J. Koehler, “General Remarks on Physical Training in the Service,” Infantry Journal 3, no. 4 (1907): 103–104.

118. Drain, “New Phyiscal and Bayonet Training Course,” 475.

119. Quotation in Raycroft, “Training Camp Activities,” 143; see also “Raycroft Tells of Sports in the Army,” Sporting Goods Dealer, 1918.

120. Raycroft, Mass Physical Training, viii; Joseph E. Raycroft, Memorandum Outlining the Various Steps Taken in the Development of a Program of Physical Training, Boxing, Bayonet Fighting, Athletics, Etc., as a Part of the Training Program of a Soldier, 1917–1920, pg. 6, 1941, Box 4, JERP, PUL.

121. Allen, Keeping Our Fighters Fit, 52–53.

122. Allen, 47–48.

123. Koehler, “General Remarks on Physical Training in the Service,” 103–105.

124. Joseph E. Raycroft, Suggestions for Colleges from the Army Experience in Physical Training, pgs. 8–10, December 1918, Series 3, Physical Education during Wartime, 1917–1944, Box 4, JERP, PUL.

125. Raycroft, 11; Raycroft, “Training Camp Activities,” 147.

126. Raycroft, Mass Physical Training, viii.

127. Obstacle courses were a new feature in US Army physical training. The idea for them had largely been borrowed from contemporary British training practices intended to deliver realistic combat training.

128. Raycroft, Mass Physical Training, 142–148.

129. Koehler had used an intensive program body and performance measurements of his own creation at West Point since the mid-1880s. In 1906 President Theodore Roosevelt mandated a three-day, ninety-mile horseback-riding test for all field-grade officers. East, A Historical Review, 42–43; the riding test fell into disuse just prior to World War I and the Army discarded it formally after the war. “Physical Fitness,” Military Engineer 14, no. 75 (1922): 163.

130. Joseph E. Raycroft, Draft of Efficiency in Army Physical Training, Presented to the Athletic Research Society, pg. 4, 1920, Series 3, Physical Education during Wartime, 1917–1944, Box 4, JERP, PUL.

131. War Plans Division, Training Circular No. 19, 7.

132. Raymond B. Fosdick, Memorandum Concerning Suggestions for Demobilizing the Work of the Commission on Training Camp Activities, 25 November 1918, Series 3, Physical Education during Wartime, 1917–1944, Box 4, JERP, PUL.

133. Joseph E. Raycroft, Memorandum Outlining the Various Steps Taken in the Development of a Program of Physical Training, Boxing, Bayonet Fighting, Athletics, Etc., as a Part of the Training Program of a Soldier, 1917–1920, pgs. 18–19, 1941, Box 4, JERP, PUL.

134. Raycroft.

135. William H. Waldron, Army Physical Training (New York: H. Holt, 1919), iii.

CHAPTER 4. REVERSION, DISAGGREGATION, AND “PREHABILITATION,” 1919–1940

1. F. J. Morrow, “Military Preparedness,” American Physical Education Review 24, no. 5 (1919): 280.

2. Morrow, 280.

3. A. D. Browne, “Physical Education in the Light of the Present National Situation,” American Physical Education Review 24, no. 2 (1919): 74.

4. Joseph E. Raycroft, Mass Physical Training for Use in the Army and the Reserve Officers’ Training Corps (Washington, DC: United States Infantry Association, 1920), ix; full instructor roster in J. C. Drain, “New Physical and Bayonet Training Course,” Infantry Journal 16, no. 6 (1919): 475.

5. Joseph E. Raycroft, Memorandum Outlining the Various Steps Taken in the Development of a Program of Physical Training, Boxing, Bayonet Fighting, Athletics, Etc., as a Part of the Training Program of a Soldier, 1917–1920, pp. 18–19, box 4, folder 8, Joseph Edward Raycroft Papers (JERP), Department of Rare Books and Special Collections, Princeton University Library (PUL).

6. The service schools represented the Infantry, Cavalry, Field Artillery, Coast Artillery, and Engineer branches.

7. Memorandum from Maj. Gen. Charles S. Farnsworth to the Chief of the Training and Instruction Branch, General Staff, 25 September 1919, Box 4, JERP, PUL.

8. Letter, Joseph Raycroft to John G. Hibben, 13 November 1919, Series 3, Physical Education during Wartime, 1917–1944, Box 4, JERP, PUL.

9. Drain, “New Physical and Bayonet Training Course,” 474.

10. Drain, 475–476.

11. Drain, 484.

12. “Physical and Bayonet Training (Editorial),” Infantry Journal 16, no. 6 (1919): 515–516.

13. Office of the Chief of Staff, Resume of Important Papers in the Day’s Work, January 23, 1920, Box 4, JERP, PUL.

14. Whitfield B. East, A Historical Review and Analysis of Army Physical Readiness Training and Assessment (Ft. Leavenworth, KS: Combat Studies Institute Press, 2013), 199.

15. Joseph E. Raycroft, Memorandum Outlining the Various Steps Taken in the Development of a Program of Physical Training, Boxing, Bayonet Fighting, Athletics, Etc., as a Part of the Training Program of a Soldier, 1917–1920, pp. 18–19, box 4, folder 8, JERP, PUL.

16. Drain, “New Physical and Bayonet Training Course,” 475.

17. Letter, Major General Charles Farnsworth to Joseph Raycroft, 5 March 1920, Box 4, JERP, PUL.

18. Series of correspondence between Farnsworth, Raycroft, and later CPT Braun between MAR 1920 and SEP 1923, Box 4, Series 3, JERP, PUL.

19. A. W. Bjornstad, “Athletic Policy of Infantry School,” Infantry Journal 26, no. 1 (1925): 44.

20. G. J. Braun, “Physical Training at Infantry School,” Infantry Journal 25, no. 2 (1924): 149.

21. On the haphazard development of military sport, see Jeffery Allen Charlston, “Disorganized and Quasi-Official but Eventually Successful: Sport in the U.S. Military, 1814–1914,” International Journal of the History of Sport 19, no. 4 (2002): 70–88, quotation at 70–71.

22. Raycroft, Mass Physical Training, iii–iv.

23. East, A Historical Review, 70. Stewart served as superintendent between 1926 and 1927. Though he departed the office before TR 115-5 was published, Stewart had supervised the regulations’ development during his tenure.

24. Merch B. Stewart, The Physical Development of the Infantry Soldier (Menasha, WI: George Banta, 1913), 2.

25. Stewart, 4.

26. Merch B. Stewart, “A Thirty-Minute Talk: Military Discipline,” Infantry Journal 16, no. 6 (1919): 492.

27. Stewart, Physical Development, 6–7.

28. These included setting-up exercises, gymnastics, calisthenics, rifle drills, and limited use of games as a supplement to make drill more interesting. Stewart, Physical Development, 24–27.

29. War Department, Training Regulations No. 115-5: Physical Training (Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 1928), 1–2.

30. War Department, 2.

31. Training Regulations 115-5 was divided into two parts. The first and most commonly used part represented a basic program that units could implement anywhere, even without additional equipment. Activities covered included setting-up drills, marching, running, and group games. The second part was designed for use by trained instructors with access to equipment and included activities such as rifle and dumbbell exercises, and gymnastic drills requiring an apparatus.

32. War Department, Training Regulations No. 115-5: Physical Training, 3.

33. War Department, 49.

34. War Department, 49.

35. War Department, 50.

36. War Department, 56.

37. War Department, 55–56.

38. Raycroft, Mass Physical Training, 149.

39. War Department, Training Regulations No. 115-5: Physical Training, 3; War Department, Manual of Physical Training for Use in the United States Army (New York: Military Publishing, 1914), 310–311.

40. Herman J. Koehler, Koehler’s West Point Manual of Disciplinary Physical Training (New York: E. P. Dutton, 1919).

41. War Department, Basic Field Manual, vol. 1, chap. 4, Physical Training (Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 1936).

42. War Department, Field Manual 21-20: Basic Field Manual—Physical Training (Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 1941), 2.

43. Steven Pope, “An Army of Athletes: Playing Fields, Battlefields, and the American Military Sporting Experience, 1890–1920,” Journal of Military History 59, no. 3 (1995): 453.

44. This represented a notable break from the debates over the faddishness of sport and physical training in the Army that had been active less than they had been two decades earlier. R. H. Allen, “Athletics and the Infantry Spirit,” Infantry Journal 28, no. 1 (1926): 24.

45. Allen, “Athletics and the Infantry Spirit,” 26.

46. Wanda Ellen Wakefield, Playing to Win: Sports and the American Military, 1898–1945 (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1997), 62.

47. Quotation in Wakefield, 63.

48. Wakefield, 62–78.

49. United States Military Academy, Annual Report of the Superintendent (West Point, NY: United States Military Academy Press, 1922), 10.

50. Herman J. Koehler, “Competitive Athletics at the United States Military Academy,” Pointer (September 29, 1923): 11.

51. Allen, “Athletics and the Infantry Spirit,” 24.

52. War Department, Army Regulations No. 850–120: Athletics (Washington: War Department, 1928).

53. Wakefield, Playing to Win, 54.

54. Allen, “Athletics and the Infantry Spirit,” 24.

55. For the full analysis, see Albert G. Love and Charles B. Davenport, Defects Found in Drafted Men (Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 1920); for a summary of key findings, see Albert G. Love and Charles B. Davenport, “Defects Found in Drafted Men,” Scientific Monthly 10, no. 1 (1920): 5–25; Albert G. Love and Charles B. Davenport, “Defects Found in Drafted Men, II,” Scientific Monthly 10, no. 2 (1920): 125–141.

56. Love and Davenport, “Defects Found in Drafted Men,” 7.

57. Defects rendering men unsuitable for service were included in categories Vg, which were rejected by local draft boards, and D. Men sufficiently fit for immediate service fell in category A, while men eligible for service after remedial action fell in category B. Category C included men who were only deemed capable of limited military service, such as in clerical positions. Love and Davenport, 8–10.

58. Love and Davenport, 11.

59. Paula D. Welch, History of American Physical Education and Sport, 3rd ed. (Springfield, IL: Charles C. Thomas, 2004), 172.

60. Walter Camp, Keeping Fit All the Way: How to Obtain and Maintain Health, Strength, and Efficiency (New York: Harper, 1919), chap. 7, kindle.

61. Willard S. Small, “The Nation’s Need of Physical Education,” American Journal of Public Health 8, no. 11 (1918): 830.

62. Thomas A. Storey, “War-Time Revelations in Physical Education,” American Physical Education Review 25, no. 2 (1920): 47.

63. Storey, 47.

64. John Sundwall, “Health Education and Activities in Colleges and Universities,” American Physical Education Review 26, no. 4 (1921): 164.

65. Sundwall, 165.

66. Dudley A. Sargent, “Taking Account of Stock,” American Physical Education Review 27, no. 2 (1922): 49–50.

67. George J. Fisher, “Points of Emphasis in a Post-War Program of Physical Training,” American Physical Education Review 24, no. 3 (1919): 126.

68. F. W. Maroney, “Physical Education Looks Ahead,” Journal of Health and Physical Education 5, no. 8 (1933): 4.

69. Marilyn J. Gibbs and Claudius W. Griffin, “Physical Fitness,” in Handbook of American Popular Culture, ed. M. Thomas Inge (New York: Greenwood, 1989), 931; Maroney, “Physical Education Looks Ahead,” 4.

70. James Huff McCurdy, “Physical Efficiency as a National Asset,” American Physical Education Review 25, no. 3 (1920): 101.

71. McCurdy, 101.

72. Fisher, “Points of Emphasis,” 126.

73. “The Army Builds Men,” Infantry Journal 18, no. 1 (1921): 80–81.

74. Deobald B. Van Dalen and Bruce L. Bennett, A World History of Physical Education: Cultural, Philosophical, Comparative, 2nd ed. (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall, 1971), 468.

75. Van Dalen and Bennett, 460–461.

76. Van Dalen and Bennett, 461.

77. McCurdy, “Physical Efficiency,” 105.

78. This was a joint statement also approved by the Navy Department, US Civil Service Commission, Department of the Interior, and the Commissioner of Education. “The Need in the Army and Navy,” American Physical Education Review 23, no. 4 (1918): 251.

79. Morrow, “Military Preparedness,” 280–281.

80. Early advocates of systematic physical training had long urged this line of thinking within the Army. For instance, Koehler wrote in vehement opposition to the use of military drill in schools as early as 1896. Herman J. Koehler, “Military Drill Vs. Gymnastics,” Mind and Body 3, no. 28 (1896): 79–80.

81. Joseph E. Raycroft, Suggestions for Colleges from the Army Experience in Physical Training, 26 December 1918, Box 4, JERP, PUL.

82. Raycroft, 8.

83. Raycroft, 10–11.

84. Raycroft, 11–14; the popularity of intercollegiate athletics, which was already growing rapidly, exploded after World War I. For more, see Van Dalen and Bennett, A World History of Physical Education, 430, 45–53.

85. Van Dalen and Bennett, A World History of Physical Education, 431–432.

86. James Edward Rogers, “Trends in Physical Education,” Journal of Health and Physical Education 2, no. 8 (1931): 19, 47.

87. This reflected traditional conceptions of citizenship that closely associated citizenship with military duty. Mass armies reinforced and amplified this connection. Derek Heater, A Brief History of Citizenship (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2004), 4–5; Keith Faulks, Citizenship (New York: Routledge, 2000), 169.

88. Morrow, “Military Preparedness,” 280; Storey, “War-Time Revelations,” 47, 51; Sundwall, “Health Education,” 104; McCurdy, “Physical Efficiency,” 101–105; Welch, History of American Education and Sport, 172–173.

89. Morrow, “Military Preparedness,” 280.

90. Thomas D. Wood, “Schools Hold Health Key for All Future Citizens,” Journal of Health and Physical Education 1, no. 3 (1930): 3.

91. Quotation in R. J. Francis, “Toward a Philosophy of Physical Education,” Journal of Health and Physical Education 10, no. 4 (1939): 216–217. Interest in European physical education systems ran high in the 1930s, especially as they related to nationalist efforts to mold young citizens: see Charles Edward Merriam, The Making of Citizens: A Comparative Study of Methods of Civic Training (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1931), 328–329; Maroney, “Physical Education Looks Ahead,” 45; Van Dalen and Bennett, A World History of Physical Education, 479.

92. P. S. Bond et al., The Red, White and Blue Manual: A Text Book for the Citizens’ Military Training Camp, vol. 1, Red Course (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins Press, 1921), 1.

93. Very little scholarship exists on the CMTC. For one of the only manuscripts on the subject, see Donald M. Kington, Forgotten Summers: The Story of the Citizens’ Military Training Camps, 1921–1940 (San Francisco: Two Decades, 1995), 1–5.

94. Generally speaking, each camp was aligned with an Army Corps Area. The initial camps were held at Camp Devens, Fort Snelling, Plattsburg, the Presidio, Camp Lewis, Camp Meade, Camp Jackson, Camp Knox, Camp Grant, Camp Pike, Fort Logan, and Camp Travis. Kington, Forgotten Summers, 14–16.

95. Kington, 107.

96. On the campaign for universal compulsory military training, see John Garry Clifford, The Citizen Soldiers: The Plattsburg Training Camp Movement, 1913–1920 (Lexington: University Press of Kentucky, 1972), 193.

97. George Wheeler Hinman, “Citizens Military Training Camps,” Infantry Journal 18, no. 6 (1921): 579–83, quotation on 581.

98. Hinman, 581.

99. Bond et al., The Red, White and Blue Manual, 1–2.

100. Bond et al., 2.

101. P. S. Bond, Your Boy & the Other in Universal Training: The Nation’s School for Citizenship (Washington, DC: Press of the Military Engineer, 1920), 92.

102. Love and Davenport, “Defects Found in Drafted Men,” 7–8.

103. About 218 of every one thousand men examined revealed defects in this category. Of these, about ninety involved deformed or injured appendages, or hernias. Love and Davenport, 8.

104. Bond, Your Boy, 100–101; the emphasis on health education was also in keeping with trends in civilian physical education. See Rogers, “Trends in Physical Education,” 18–19, 47.

105. Bond et al., The Red, White and Blue Manual, 4–5.

106. Bond et al., 1.

107. For the series of exercises used by the CMTC, see Bond et al., 1–22; among the existing manuals, the CMTC’s routine most closely resembled that found in War Department, Special Regulations, No. 23: Field Physical Training of the Soldier (Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 1917); Raycroft’s manual also included a similar system, though it was borrowed from Koehler’s earlier work. See Raycroft, Mass Physical Training, 8–33.

108. H. W. Fleet, “Citizens’ Military Training Camps,” Infantry Journal 32, no. 5 (1928): 497–498.

109. Bond et al., The Red, White and Blue Manual, 2.

110. Bond, Your Boy, 26.

111. Bond et al., The Red, White and Blue Manual, 22.

112. Wakefield, Playing to Win, 78.

113. Fleet, “Citizens’ Military Training Camps,” 498.

114. Kington, Forgotten Summers, 115–117.

115. Bond et al., The Red, White and Blue Manual, part 8, 1.

116. For several years, Babe Ruth even contributed autographed balls and bats to the best player at each camp. Kington, Forgotten Summers, 115–117.

117. Bond et al., The Red, White and Blue Manual, part 8, 1.

118. Fleet, “Citizens’ Military Training Camps,” 499.

119. Bond, Your Boy, 97.

120. Christina S. Jarvis, The Male Body at War: American Masculinity during World War II (DeKalb: Northern Illinois University Press, 2004), 19.

121. James J. McEntee, Now They Are Men: The Story of the CCC (Washington, DC: National Home Library Foundation, 1940), 1–7.

122. Jarvis, The Male Body at War, 20.

123. A typical camp leadership cadre included two Regular Army officers, one acting as commander and the other as a deputy, plus two noncommissioned officers and four or five enlisted men. Charles E. Heller, “The U.S. Army, the Civilian Conservation Corps, and Leadership for World War II, 1933–1942,” Armed Forces & Society 36, no. 3 (2010): 442–444.

124. Heller, 444.

125. Jarvis, The Male Body at War, 21.

126. McEntee, Now They Are Men, 18.

127. Jarvis, The Male Body at War, 23; McEntee, Now They Are Men, 60–61.

128. McEntee, Now They Are Men, 58.

129. McEntee, 27.

130. McEntee, 37.

131. For more on the daily life of a CCC enrollee, see John A. Salmond, The Civilian Conservation Corps, 1933–1942: A New Deal Case Study (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1967), 135–144.

132. The article’s purpose appears to have been to reassure officers about the quality of the new draftees, but the authors had to acknowledge lower standards in doing so. Lewis B. Hershey and Thomas M. Watlington, “The Man Selected for Service,” Infantry Journal 47, no. 6 (1940): 533.

CHAPTER 5. PHYSICAL CULTURES FOR TOTAL WAR, 1936–1946

1. “Kelly Says Nation Must Toughen Up,” New York Times, November 6, 1942.

2. “Kelly Says Nation Must Toughen Up.”

3. Peter R. Mansoor, The GI Offensive in Europe: The Triumph of American Infantry Divisions, 1941–1945 (Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 2002), 2. This argument is a historiographical reaction to arguments made by John Ellis and others that Allied superiority in terms of manpower, materiel, and production alone determined victory. See also Richard Overy, Why the Allies Won (New York: W. W. Norton, 1997); Williamson Murray and Allan R. Millett, A War to Be Won: Fighting the Second World War (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2000).

4. “President Asks Fitness Training, Picks John B. Kelly, Olympic Sculler, to Devise ‘Physical Preparedness’ Program for Nation’s Manhood,” New York Times, September 13, 1940.

5. William B. Foster et al., Physical Standards in World War II (Washington, DC: Office of the Surgeon General, Department of the Army, 1967), 2.

6. In late December 1941, new regulations made local induction procedures more uniform. Local boards began using DSS Form 220, a “List of Defects,” in lieu of the MR 1–9 standards. Local boards made determinations just on “easily detectable defects disqualifying for general service” and Army reception centers conducted more detailed examinations involving physical profiling, blood typing, and immunizations. Foster et al., 11–14.

7. Foster et al., 16.

8. Leonard G. Rowntree, “National Program for Physical Fitness,” Journal of American Medical Association 125, no. 12 (1944): 821; Hiram A. Jones, “Report on National Fitness: A Program through Schools and Colleges,” Journal of Health and Physical Education 13, no. 3 (1942): 133.

9. G. St. J. Perrott, “Selective Service Rejection Statistics and Some of Their Implications,” American Journal of Public Health 36 (April 1946): 336.

10. Michael M. Davis, “How Healthy Are We?,” New York Times, February 22, 1942.

11. “Urges Rebuilding of Rejected Men: Rehabilitation Board Presses Plan for U.S. Financing of Voluntary Health Plan,” New York Times, August 16, 1941.

12. Luther Huston, “Draft System Assays Man Power: Quantity and Quality of Human Material Is Measured,” New York Times, April 20, 1941.

13. “Health of the Youth of the Nation (Editorial),” Journal of American Medical Association 114, no. 5 (1940): 414–415; “U.S. Army Standards Put above Reich’s,” New York Times, November 16, 1941.

14. John H. Shaw, “American Physical Fitness,” Phi Delta Kappan 24, no. 7 (1942): 285; “The Nation’s Health,” New York Times, October 12, 1941; for a general treatment of the public discourse, see Christina S. Jarvis, The Male Body at War: American Masculinity during World War II (DeKalb: Northern Illinois University Press, 2004), 60–62; on the response of physical educators to accusations of prewar failures on behalf of schools to address remedial defects, see Deobald B. Van Dalen and Bruce L. Bennett, A World History of Physical Education: Cultural, Philosophical, Comparative, 2nd ed. (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall, 1971), 484–485.

15. Davis, “How Healthy Are We?”

16. Foster et al., Physical Standards in World War II, 19–20.

17. Davis, “How Healthy Are We?”

18. The six elements included general stamina, upper extremities, lower extremities, hearing, vision, and emotional stability. Physical ratings appeared as a six-digit code. The highest physical grade was a 111111. A man whose hearing qualified him only for limited service but was otherwise healthy received a rating of 111311. Robert R. Palmer, “Manpower for the Army: How the Physical Profile System Affected the Infantry,” Infantry Journal 41, no. 6 (1947): 38–45.

19. Robert R. Palmer, I. Wiley Bell, and William R. Keast, The Army Ground Forces: The Procurement and Training of Ground Combat Troops (Washington, DC: Center of Military History, 1991), 66–69.

20. “Army to Build up Health of 200,000 Dropped in Draft,” New York Times, October 11, 1941. The rehabilitation policy had a precedent in registrants with correctable defects being rejected for service in 1917–1918 being classified as “remediable.” Foster et al., Physical Standards in World War II, 17–19.

21. William L. Hughes, “The Civilian Defense Physical Fitness Program,” Journal of Health and Physical Education 13, no. 2 (1942): 71.

22. Hughes, 73; “National Physical Fitness Program: A Statement by the Board of Directors,” Journal of Health and Physical Education 12, no. 10 (1941): 548.

23. Executive Office of the Committee on Physical Fitness, “Civilian Physical Fitness,” Journal of Health and Physical Education 14 (1943): 518.

24. Jarvis, The Male Body at War, 66–69; Whitfield B. East, A Historical Review and Analysis of Army Physical Readiness Training and Assessment (Fort Leavenworth, KS: Combat Studies Institute Press, 2013), 80, 97.

25. Rowntree, “National Program for Physical Fitness,” 822–823.

26. Shaw, “American Physical Fitness,” 285.

27. Rowntree, “National Program for Physical Fitness,” 825.

28. Theodore P. Bank, “The Army Physical Conditioning Program,” Journal of Health and Physical Education 14, no. 4 (1943): 197.

29. Bank, 197.

30. Eli Ginzberg et al., The Ineffective Soldier: Lessons for Management and the Nation—the Lost Divisions (New York: Columbia University, 1959), 26–28.

31. War Department, Field Manual 21-20: Basic Field Manual—Physical Training (Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 1941), 1.

32. War Department, 3.

33. War Department, 2.

34. War Department, 2.

35. War Department, 2–3.

36. War Department, 36.

37. Joseph E. Raycroft, Mass Physical Training for Use in the Army and the Reserve Officers’ Training Corps (Washington, DC: United States Infantry Association, 1920), 38, 142–147; East, A Historical Review and Analysis, 86–87.

38. War Department, Field Manual 21-20: Basic Field Manual, 44–45.

39. War Department, 5.

40. Raycroft, Mass Physical Training, 148.

41. War Department, Field Manual 21-20: Basic Field Manual, 96.

42. War Department, 97.

43. Francis Keppel to Prof. A. A. Esslinger, 6 May 1942; Joint Army and Navy Committee on Welfare and Recreation, General Subject Files, 1941–1942, box 10; Joint Boards and Committees, Record Group (RG) 225, National Archives Building, College Park, MD (NACP).

44. Committee members included Frank Lloyd, Charles McCloy, T. Nelson Metcalf, Carl Schott, Seward Staley, and Joseph Raycroft. Report of the Special Survey Committee Made to the Chief, Bureau of Navigation, Navy Department, Subject: The Physical Fitness Program at the Naval Training Station at Norfolk, Virginia, 31 March 1942; Joint Army and Navy Committee on Welfare and Recreation, General Subject Files, 1941–1942, box 10; RG 225, NACP.

45. Report of the Special Survey Committee Made to the Chief, Bureau of Navigation, Navy Department, Subject: The Physical Fitness Program at the Naval Training Station at Norfolk, Virginia, 31 March 1942, p. 2; Physical Fitness Program Survey of Special Survey Committee; Joint Army and Navy Committee on Welfare and Recreation, General Subject Files, 1941–1942, box 10; Joint Boards and Committees, RG 225, NACP.

46. Report of the Special Survey Committee, 5.

47. Report of the Special Survey Committee, 17–21.

48. Report of the Special Survey Committee, 53.

49. Francis Keppel to Prof. A. A. Esslinger, 6 May 1942; Joint Army and Navy Committee on Welfare and Recreation, General Subject Files, 1941–1942, box 10; Joint Boards and Committees, RG 225, NACP.

50. Eleanor B. English, “Charles H. Mccloy: The Research Professor of Physical Education,” Journal of Physical Education, Recreation & Dance 54, no. 4 (1983): 16.

51. Francis Keppel to Prof. Philip O. Badger, 8 April 1942; Joint Army and Navy Committee on Welfare and Recreation, General Subject Files, 1941–1942, box 10; Joint Boards and Committees, RG 225, NACP; Francis Keppel to Brig. General F. H. Osborn, 7 April 1942; Physical Fitness Program Survey of Special Survey Committee; Joint Army and Navy Committee on Welfare and Recreation, General Subject Files, 1941–1942, box 10; Joint Boards and Committees, RG 225, NACP.

52. Brig. General F. H. Osborn, Memorandum, Subject: Physical Conditioning and Physical Efficiency Tests, 13 April 1942; Joint Army and Navy Committee on Welfare and Recreation, General Subject Files, 1941–1942, box 10; Joint Boards and Committees, RG 225, NACP.

53. The Special Services Division is also sometimes referred to as the Special Services Branch. “Division” will be used in this chapter for the sake of consistency. John D. Millet, The Organization and Role of the Army Service Forces (Washington, DC: Center of Military History, 1998), 348.

54. Millet, 36–38.

55. East, A Historical Review and Analysis, 111.

56. East, 88–89.

57. Brig. General F. H. Osborn, Memorandum, Subject: Physical Conditioning and Physical Efficiency Tests, 13 April 1942; Joint Army and Navy Committee on Welfare and Recreation, General Subject Files, 1941–1942, box 10; Joint Boards and Committees, RG 225, NACP.

58. Francis Keppel to Mr. Harper, 17 April 1942; Joint Army and Navy Committee on Welfare and Recreation, General Subject Files, 1941–1942, box 10; Joint Boards and Committees, RG 225, NACP.

59. Francis Keppel to Mr. Harper, 17 April 1942, and Francis Keppel to Prof. A. A. Esslinger, 6 May 1942; Joint Army and Navy Committee on Welfare and Recreation, General Subject Files, 1941–1942, box 10; Joint Boards and Committees, RG 225, NACP.

60. Charles McCloy to Francis Keppel, 25 June 1942; Joint Army and Navy Committee on Welfare and Recreation, General Subject Files, 1941–1942, box 10; Joint Boards and Committees, RG 225, NACP.

61. Francis Keppel to Lt. Col. Leon T. David, 17 April 1942; Joint Army and Navy Committee on Welfare and Recreation, General Subject Files, 1941–1942, box 10; Joint Boards and Committees, RG 225, NACP.

62. Theodore P. Bank to Francis Keppel, undated; Joint Army and Navy Committee on Welfare and Recreation, General Subject Files, 1941–1942, box 10; Joint Boards and Committees, RG 225, NACP.

63. Charles McCloy to Francis Keppel, 25 June 1942; Joint Army and Navy Committee on Welfare and Recreation, General Subject Files, 1941–1942, box 10; Joint Boards and Committees, RG 225, NACP.

64. East, A Historical Review and Analysis, 90. A decade later, Army officers responsible for physical training policy agreed. They hailed TC 87 as a “radical departure from a century of formalism.” Annex F—Training Literature and Training Aids, p. 1, enclosed in Physical Training Research and Development Studies—A Study of the Adequacy of the Present Army Physical Conditioning Program (Adequacy Study), October 1955; Research and Development Project Case Files—1955; R & D Case Files; U.S. Army Schools, Infantry School, Fort Benning, Georgia, box 67; Records of the United States Continental Army Command, RG 546, NACP.

65. War Department, War Department Pamphlet No. 21-9: Physical Conditioning (Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 1944), cover page.

66. War Department, Field Manual 21-20: Physical Training (Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 1946), i.

67. War Department, Field Manual 21-20: Basic Field Manual—Physical Training (Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 1941), 2.

68. War Department, Pamphlet No. 21-9: Physical Conditioning, 2.

69. War Department, 2.

70. War Department, Field Manual 21-20: Physical Training (1946), 2–3.

71. Bank, “The Army Physical Conditioning Program,” 195.

72. “What Combat Veterans Think of Army Training,” What the Soldier Thinks, no. 4 (March 1944): 1–2.

73. War Department, Field Manual 21-20: Physical Training (1946), 4.

74. War Department, 4.

75. War Department, Pamphlet No. 21-9: Physical Conditioning, 15.

76. War Department, 6.

77. The test battery consisted of pull-ups, push-ups, sit-ups, broad jumps, twenty-second Burpee drills, a seventy-five-yard “pick-a-back” run, a three-hundred-yard run, and a “dodging run.” War Department, 6.

78. War Department, 6.

79. War Department, 1.

80. War Department, 2.

81. War Department, Field Manual 21-20: Physical Training (1946), 3.

82. War Department, 1.

83. War Department, Pamphlet No. 21-9: Physical Conditioning, 1. Historians writing after the war endorsed this view. For instance, authors of one book in the Army’s official history asserted that “the mobile tactics and open formations of World War II demanded the greatest possible physical vigor and mental alertness in individual combat soldiers and required strong powers of leadership in commanders, even in units as small as the squad. The intelligence, skill, and stamina of semi-isolated riflemen and small-unit commanders were to determine not only individual survival on the battlefield but also in many cases the outcome of battle.” Palmer, Bell, and Keast, The Army Ground Forces, 3.

84. Antulio J. Echevarria, “The ‘Cult of the Offensive’ Revisited: Confronting Technological Change before the Great War,” Journal of Strategic Studies 25, no. 1 (2002): 201.

85. War Department, Field Manual 21-20: Physical Training (1946), 1.

86. Bank, “The Army Physical Conditioning Program,” 195.

87. War Department, Field Manual 21-20: Physical Training (1946), 2.

88. Bank, “The Army Physical Conditioning Program,” 197.

89. War Department, Pamphlet No. 21-9: Physical Conditioning, 5.

90. Herman J. Koehler, “The Physical Training of Cadets, 1802–1902,” in The Centennial of the United States Military Academy at West Point, New York, 1802–1902 (Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 1904), 893–908, quotation on 901–902.

91. Sargent’s vertical jump test is still used today and commonly known as the “Sargent jump.” Institute of Medicine, Fitness Measures and Health Outcomes in Youth (Washington, DC: National Academies Press, 2012), 24; Carolyn de la Pena, “Dudley Allen Sargent: Health Machines and the Energized Male Body,” Iron Game History 8, no. 2 (2003): 11–16.

92. Raycroft, Mass Physical Training, viii.

93. Institute of Medicine, Fitness Measures and Health Outcomes in Youth, 24.

94. Institute of Medicine, 25.

95. Quantifying and standardizing fitness, then policing normalized “fit bodies,” has also mirrored trends in US government advisory state actions designed to encourage citizens to become healthier since the early twentieth century. Rachel Louise Moran, Governing Bodies: American Politics and the Shaping of the Modern Physique (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2018), 5–7.

96. War Department, Pamphlet No. 21-9: Physical Conditioning, 71.

97. War Department, Field Manual 21-20: Physical Training (1946), 333.

98. War Department, Pamphlet No. 21-9: Physical Conditioning, 71.

99. War Department, Field Manual 21-20: Physical Training (1946), 340–341.

100. Other alleged benefits included the instructor’s reception of feedback about the efficacy of his program, the pointing out of specific deficiencies among a unit’s men, provision of motivation to improve, and the ability to measure the effectiveness of different training programs. War Department, Pamphlet No. 21-9: Physical Conditioning, 69.

101. War Department, 69.

102. War Department, Manual of Physical Training for Use in the United States Army (New York: Military Publishing, 1914), 6.

103. No difference existed between TC 87 (1942) and War Department, Pamphlet 21-9 (1944), except for the addition of some supplemental guerrilla exercises. The latter was a graphic amplification of the former’s system.

104. The calisthenic program as of 1944 included sets of the high jumper, Burpee, squad bender, rowers, push-up, sit-up, side bender, bank twist, squat jump, trunk twister, stationary run, eight-count push-up, straddle pull-up, mountain climber, woodchopper, and bridge exercises. In 1946, FM 21-20 added a four-exercise warm-up drill and, for variety, a second twelve-exercise conditioning drill.

105. Movement toward functional fitness activities also seems to have bubbled up from below in the Army during World War II. For examples, see “Steeplechase for Soldiers,” Infantry Journal 49, no. 1 (1941): 46–47; Avery Ashwood, “Building Brawn,” Infantry Journal 53, no. 2 (1943): 47–50.

106. War Department, No. 21-9: Physical Conditioning, 7.

107. War Department, 7–8, 47–50.

108. Bank, “The Army Physical Conditioning Program,” 195.

109. War Department, Manual of Physical Training, 30.

110. War Department, Pamphlet No. 21-9: Physical Conditioning, 62.

111. Quotation in War Department, Manual of Physical Training; Raycroft similarly urged progression without giving any detail. See Raycroft, Mass Physical Training, 3.

112. War Department, Pamphlet No. 21-9: Physical Conditioning, 61.

113. War Department, 63–68.

114. War Department, Field Manual 21-20: Physical Training (1946), 31–44.

115. Bank, “The Army Physical Conditioning Program,” 195.

116. Bank, 195.

117. Palmer, Bell, and Keast, The Army Ground Forces, 326.

118. Palmer, Bell, and Keast, 338.

119. The Morale Branch had been a General Staff agency responsible for studying, devising, and implementing “psychological measures among the troops to produce and maintain good morale” in 1918. The Commission on Training Camp Activities (CTCA) had responsibility for providing the actual facilities and staff for recreation and welfare. The Morale Branch dissolved shortly after World War I, but some of its functions continued under the G-1. In March 1941, the Special Services Branch stood up under the G-1, combining the responsibilities of both the Morale Branch and CTCA. The Special Services Branch was later renamed the Special Service in 1942 and realigned under the new Army Service Force. War Department, Technical Manual 21-205: Special Service Officer (Washington, DC: United States Government Printing Office, 1942), 3.

120. War Department, 15–17; Bank, “The Army Physical Conditioning Program,” 195.

121. War Department, Field Manual 28–105: The Special Service Company (Washington, DC: United States Government Printing Office, 1944), 1–3.

122. War Department, Field Manual 28–105: The Special Service Company, 5.

123. Bank, “The Army Physical Conditioning Program,” 195.

124. Jeffery Allen Charlston, “From Indifference to Obsession: Origins of Athletic Programs in the United States Military, 1865–1935,” (PhD diss., George Washington University, 2000).

125. Wanda Ellen Wakefield, Playing to Win: Sports and the American Military, 1898–1945 (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1997), 110.

126. Wakefield, 110.

127. Bank, “The Army Physical Conditioning Program,” 195.

128. War Department, Pamphlet No. 21-9: Physical Conditioning, 2.

129. War Department, 2.

130. Bank, “The Army Physical Conditioning Program,” 238.

131. Bank, 238–239.

132. War Department, Field Manual 21-20: Physical Training (1946), 187.

133. War Department, Pamphlet No. 21-9: Physical Conditioning, 66; War Department, Field Manual 21-20: Physical Training (1946), 39.

134. War Department, Field Manual 21-20: Physical Training (1946), 187–188.

135. Bank, “The Army Physical Conditioning Program,” 238.

136. Wakefield cites trophies, beer, and cigarettes as among the most common prizes used to incentivize participation and victory. Wakefield, Playing to Win, 86–87.

137. Examples of “practical courses” included Army administration, dealing with required reports and correspondence, Army mess, dealing with mess supplies and reports, and “Explanation of the Allied Cause.” Mattie E. Treadwell, The Women’s Army Corps (Washington, DC: Center of Military History, 1991), 635–638.

138. Treadwell, The Women’s Army Corps, 638–639.

139. Van Rensselaer’s background included training at Russell Sage College (a Progressive upstate New York college founded in 1916 to advance women’s independence through liberal arts education and preparation for specific professional careers), as well as teaching experience at the Central School for Hygiene and Physical Education and at the American Woman’s Association in New York. “Physical Training Planned for WAAC,” New York Times, July 1, 1942.

140. The three assistant instructors were Mary Loomis from Syracuse University, Angela Kitzinger from Russell Sage, and Mary Foster from Stephens College. Public Relations Office, “The Physical Training Program of the W.A.A.C.,” Journal of Health and Physical Education 14, no. 4 (1943): 209.

141. Public Relations Office, 209.

142. “Physical Training Planned for WAAC.”

143. Treadwell, The Women’s Army Corps, 639.

144. Treadwell, 639.

145. Public Relations Office, “The Physical Training Program of the W.A.A.C.,” 240.

146. Public Relations Office, 209.

147. Donna I. Niles, “Physical Fitness and the W.A.C.,” Journal of Health and Physical Education 14, no. 8:410.

148. War Department, W.A.C. Field Manual: Physical Training (Washington, DC: United States Government Printing Office, 1943), 4.

149. Niles, “Physical Fitness and the W.A.C.,” 410; War Department, W.A.C. Field Manual: Physical Training, 1. The divide between these conceptions of fitness generally mirrored a similar divide in the civilian world over the value of strenuous exercise for women. Treadwell, The Women’s Army Corps, 639–640.

150. War Department, W.A.C. Field Manual: Physical Training, 1.

151. War Department, 6.

152. War Department, 8.

153. Stability was defined as the ability to “be on the job all day, every day, as long as you are needed.” Reliability, “regular” elimination, and “normal and easy” menstruation were all desired qualities. War Department, 8.

154. War Department, 12–14.

155. War Department, Pamphlet No. 21-9: Physical Conditioning, 1.

156. This is a change from the Army’s Koehler-era physical culture, which had sought appearance-based outcomes such as symmetry and posture to a greater extent. War Department, 11.

157. War Department, W.A.C. Field Manual: Physical Training, 10, 14.

158. War Department, 24.

159. War Department, War Department Pamphlet 35–3: WAC Life (Washington, DC: United States Government Printing Office, 1943), 154.

160. War Department, W.A.C. Field Manual: Physical Training, 83.

161. War Department, 83.

162. Niles, “Physical Fitness and the W.A.C.,” 409.

163. Niles, 408.

164. Niles, 409.

165. Basic and specialist training referred to the intitial entry training women underwent. First came a common basic training period, and then the more duty-specific specialist training. War Department, W.A.C. Field Manual: Physical Training, 117.

166. War Department, 123.

167. War Department, 123; War Department, Pamphlet No. 21-9: Physical Conditioning, 62.

168. War Department, Pamphlet No. 21-9: Physical Conditioning, 12–15; War Department, Field Manual 21-20: Physical Training (1946), 9–12.

169. War Department, W.A.C. Field Manual: Physical Training, 114.

170. War Department, 130.

171. Niles, “Physical Fitness and the W.A.C.,” 450.

172. Treadwell, The Women’s Army Corps, 640.

173. The Military Training Division test about which Culp and others complained was a four-event test, using the dip, sit-up, and wing-lift exercises from the WAC strength progressions, plus a squat-thrust event. For a “Good” rating, a woman of fifty had to do three to eight dips in a minute, twenty-eight to forty-eight sit-ups in a minute, sixty-nine to eight-five wing-lifts in a minute, and fifteen to eighteen squat thrusts in thirty seconds. Standards for younger women were higher. Treadwell, The Women’s Army Corps, 664–665.

174. Treadwell, The Women’s Army Corps, 666.

175. Treadwell, 666.

176. Director of the Service, Supply, and Procurement Division, Logistics in World War II: Final Report of the Army Service Forces (1948; Washington, DC: Center of Military History, 1993), 29.

177. Leisa D. Meyer, Creating GI Jane: Sexuality and Power in the Women’s Army Corps during World War II (New York: Columbia University Press, 1996), 2.

178. Meyer, Creating GI Jane, 34–35.

179. Janann Sherman, “‘They Either Need These Women or They Do Not’: Margaret Chase Smith and the Fight for Regular Status for Women in the Military,” Journal of Military History 54 (January 1990): 61.

180. Meyer, Creating GI Jane, 8.

181. Colonel Hobby’s quotation in Treadwell, The Women’s Army Corps, 665.

182. According to Christina Jarvis, American institutions shaped male bodies to “re-masculininze” the nation during World War II and to produce a “powerful male ‘body politic’” to portray the United States’ power and status. Improving American manhood by way of martial physical training thus remained very relevant in the 1940s. Jarvis, The Male Body at War, 4–5, 65.

183. This finding harmonizes with similar conclusions drawn by historian Wanda Wakefield about the role of sport in the Army during World War II. She argues that the Army’s sporting culture created a hierarchy in which the “strongest and most courageous” athletes were valorized and those uninterested or less talented in athletics were disadvantaged. See Wakefield, Playing to Win, 110.

184. D’Ann Campbell, “Women in Combat: The World War II Experience in the United States, Great Britain, Germany, and the Soviet Union,” Journal of Military History 57 (April 1993): 306.

185. Bank, “The Army Physical Conditioning Program,” 196.

186. War Department, Pamphlet No. 21-9: Physical Conditioning, 2–5.

187. War Department, 15.

CHAPTER 6. HARD BODIES FOR A COLD WAR: CONDITIONING AND PREHABILITATION, 1945–1957

1. Maxwell D. Taylor, Memorandum Extract, Subject: Physical Fitness; vertical file, Office of Physical Education, USMA, September 1957, United States Military Academy Special Collections.

2. Taylor.

3. Physical Fitness Seminar Report (Fort Benning, GA: United States Army Infantry School, 1958), 4.

4. Ingo Trauschweizer, The Cold War U.S. Army: Building Deterrence for Limited War (Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 2008), 18–19.

5. Trauschweizer, 19, 22.

6. War Department, Field Manual 21-20: Physical Training (Washington, DC: US Government Printing Office, 1946), 1–4; War Department, War Department Pamphlet No. 21–9: Physical Conditioning (Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 1944), 1–5.

7. Annex F—Training Literature and Training Aids, p. 1, enclosed in Physical Training Research and Development Studies—A Study of the Adequacy of the Present Army Physical Conditioning Program (Adequacy Study), October 1955; Research and Development Project Case Files—1955; R & D Case Files; U.S. Army Schools, Infantry School, Fort Benning, Georgia, box 67; Records of the United States Continental Army Command, Record Group 546 (RG 546), National Archives Building, College Park, MD (NACP).

8. War Department, Field Manual 21-20: Physical Training (1946), 36–38, 43.

9. “Until it hurts” from War Department, War Department Pamphlet No. 21-9: Physical Conditioning (Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 1944), 61. In terms of progression, FM 21-20 recommended toughening for one to two weeks, slow improvement for six to ten weeks, and sustaining or maintaining beyond that. War Department, Field Manual 21-20: Physical Training (1946), 33–34.

10. War Department, 2–3.

11. War Department, 4.

12. War Department, 12.

13. For a description of “mass games,” which were differentiated from organized athletics by their ease of organization and minimal equipment requirements, see Department of the Army, Field Manual 21-20: Physical Training (Washington: US Government Printing Office, 1950), 227.

14. Memorandum, Subject: A Study of the Adequacy of the Present Army Physical Conditioning Program, p. 3, 6 October 1955, enclosed in Adequacy Study, October 1955; Research and Development Project Case Files—1955; R & D Case Files; U.S. Army Schools, Infantry School, Fort Benning, Georgia, box 67; United States Continental Army Command, RG 546, NACP.

15. Quoted in Staff Study: Institute of Physical Fitness (Fort Benning, GA: United States Army, 1970), Appendix I to Annex B—1944 Conference on Physical Training.

16. Brian McAllister Linn, Elvis’s Army: Cold War GIs and the Atomic Battlefield (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2016), 28.

17. This corresponds well with a general “postwar lethargy” in the Eighth Army between 1945 and 1949 that historian Thomas Hanson found in his study. See Thomas E. Hanson, Combat Ready? The Eighth U.S. Army on the Eve of the Korean War (College Station: Texas A & M University Press, 2010), 14–15.

18. Colonel S. M. Prouty to the Quartermaster General, Subject: Establishment of Course for Directors of Physical Training and Athletics at the Quartermaster School, 30 November 1945; School Organization—Physical Training School, 1946–1953; General Orders and Organization Planning Files (GOOPF), 09/05/1946—07/28/1966; Fort Bragg, North Carolina/Physical Training School (PTS), box 1; United States Continental Army Command, RG 546, NACP.

19. Table of Distribution, Physical Training School; GOOPF, 09/05/1946—07/28/1966; PTS, box 1; United States Continental Army Command, RG 546, NACP.

20. General Jacob L. Devers to Major General Thomas B. Larkin, 20 September 1947; Physical Training and Athletic Director’s Course, Schools Division—1947; Army Field Forces HQs, General Staff, G-3 Section, Training Group, Schools Division, Classified Decimal File, 1942–48, box 150; HQ Army Ground Forces, RG 337, NACP.

21. Ransom to Colonel Hendrix, 29 October 1947; Physical Training and Athletic Director’s Course, Schools Division—1947; Army Field Forces HQs, General Staff, G-3 Section, Training Group, Schools Division, Classified Decimal File, 1942–48, box 150; HQ Army Ground Forces, RG 337, NACP.

22. In one example of many, First Corps’s Maj. Gen. John “Iron Mike” O’Daniel ranked physical conditioning as a top priority alongside maintaining offensive mindedness and discipline in a September 1951 meeting with his subordinate commanders. HQ, I Corps, Corps and Army Unit Commanders Meeting, June 9, 13 June 1952; Folder 3—I U.S. Corps Commanders Notes, 1951–1953; Box 1—Correspondence, 1943–1953: North Africa, Italy, Korea; Lt. Gen. John W. O’Daniel Papers; Citadel Museum and Archives, Charleston SC.

23. Linn, Elvis’s Army, 56–7, 69–72; Shelly McKenzie, Getting Physical: The Rise of Fitness Culture in America (Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 2013), 44.

24. Charles S. Young, Name, Rank, and Serial Number: Exploiting Korea War POWs at Home and Abroad (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2014), 3–5; McKenzie, Getting Physical, 44–46.

25. Hanson, Combat Ready?, 5.

26. McKenzie, Getting Physical, 46; for “give-it-upitis,” see Linn, Elvis’s Army, 11, 71; on the general political culture of the period characterized by an “excessive preoccupation” with masculinity and a “hard/soft dichotomy,” see Kyle A. Cuordileone, “‘Politics in an Age of Anxiety’: Cold War Political Culture and the Crisis in American Masculinity, 1949–1960,” Journal of American History 87, no. 2 (2000): 515–545.

27. Whitfield B. East, A Historical Review and Analysis of Army Physical Readiness Training and Assessment (Fort Leavenworth, KS: Combat Studies Institute Press, 2013), 119.

28. Department of the Army, Field Manual 21-20: Physical Training (Washington, DC: US Government Printing Office, 1957), 10.

29. Department of the Army, Field Manual 21-20: Physical Fitness Training (Washington, DC: Headquarters, Department of the Army, 1998), iii.

30. Infantry Instructors’ Conference Report, 16–21 June 1952 (Fort Benning, GA: Infantry School, 1952), 36.

31. Linn, Elvis’s Army, 194.

32. Annex G—Command Emphasis, p. 3, enclosed in Adequacy Study, October 1955; Research and Development Project Case Files—1955; R & D Case Files; U.S. Army Schools, Infantry School, Fort Benning, Georgia, box 67; United States Continental Army Command, RG 546, NACP. See also Staff Study: Institute of Physical Fitness, Appendix II to Annex B.

33. Department of the Army, Field Manual 21-20: Physical Training (1950), 227.

34. Annex F—Training Literature and Training Aids, p. 1, enclosed in Adequacy Study, October 1955; Research and Development Project Case Files—1955; R & D Case Files; U.S. Army Schools, Infantry School, Fort Benning, Georgia, box 67; United States Continental Army Command, RG 546, NACP.

35. Training Circular No. 27, Physical Training, 31 August 1951, enclosed in Adequacy Study, October 1955; Research and Development Project Case Files—1955; R & D Case Files; U.S. Army Schools, Infantry School, Fort Benning, Georgia, box 67; United States Continental Army Command, RG 546, NACP.

36. Specifically, TC 27 called attention to FM 21-20’s chapters 1–4 and 16. These chapters covered the definition of fitness, program planning, the set conditioning drills, and posture training. Exceptions to mandatory use of set drills with supplementary exercises such as guerrilla exercises were given to units finished with the unit training phase, those in postcycle training, in standby status, and in overseas commands, and those units not engaged in field exercises of maneuvers who “have attained a high degree of individual physical fitness” already. Those units could enter a sustaining phase that emphasized “highly competitive intracompany and intercompany athletics” so long as a “short intense warm-up” using one of the set drills preceded each period.

37. Army Ground Forces (AGF), referenced earlier, became the Army Field Forces in 1948.

38. Annex A—Authorization for Research Project, enclosed in Staff Study—The Army Physical Fitness Testing Program, August 1955; Research and Development Project Case Files—1955; R & D Case Files; U.S. Army Schools, Infantry School, Fort Benning, Georgia, box 67; United States Continental Army Command, RG 546, NACP.

39. Memorandum, The Army Physical Fitness Testing Program, p. 1, enclosed in Staff Study—The Army Physical Fitness Testing Program, August 1955; Research and Development Project Case Files—1955; R & D Case Files; U.S. Army Schools, Infantry School, Fort Benning, Georgia, box 67; United States Continental Army Command, RG 546, NACP.

40. Different numbers are given in various documents. For the eight-thousand-range estimate, see Tab D, Annex A—Total Number of Cases Used to Determine Tables, enclosed in Staff Study—The Army Physical Fitness Testing Program, August 1955; Research and Development Project Case Files—1955; R & D Case Files; U.S. Army Schools, Infantry School, Fort Benning, Georgia, box 67; United States Continental Army Command, RG 546, NACP. The ten-thousand-result upper estimate comes from Memorandum—Projects Deemed Necessary by the Physical Training Department in Order to Fulfill the Mission of the Department; Research & Development Administrative Files—1954; U.S. Army Schools, Infantry School, Fort Benning, Georgia, box 67; United States Continental Army Command, RG 546, NACP. A wide variety of units produced these cards. OCAFF directed each training center and training division to test four companies each three times. The first two tests, conducted in the second and fourteenth weeks of training, used the existing assessment test. The third used a new “Physical Achievement Test” designed to measure skills and conditioning in events more closely aligned with combat requirements, such as a five-second rope climb and a 150-yard man carry. Additional data came from PTS classes, the Airborne School, Ranger Training Centers, and various units.

41. Colonel T. J. Smith to the Commandant, Physical Training School Fort Bragg, North Carolina, Subject: Research in Physical Fitness Tests, 29 April 1952, enclosed in Staff Study—The Army Physical Fitness Testing Program, August 1955; Research and Development Project Case Files—1955; R & D Case Files; U.S. Army Schools, Infantry School, Fort Benning, Georgia, box 67; United States Continental Army Command, RG 546, NACP.

42. Annex A—History of Study, enclosed in Staff Study—The Army Physical Fitness Testing Program, August 1955; Research and Development Project Case Files—1955; R & D Case Files; U.S. Army Schools, Infantry School, Fort Benning, Georgia, box 67; United States Continental Army Command, RG 546, NACP.

43. Captain Harold S. Tavzel to Commanding General, Third Army, 21 July 1953; School Organization—Physical Training School, 1946–53; General Orders and Organization Planning Files, 09/05/1946—07/28/1966; Fort Bragg, North Carolina/Physical Training School, box 1; United States Continental Army Command, RG 546, NACP.

44. The Ground General School was organized in 1946 and outlived the PTS by only two years, closing in 1955. The school’s mission included basic training for all officers, running an officer candidate school, and providing some instruction for intelligence officers. At the General School, the new Physical Training Department shrank to a mere two training officers, a single civilian physical education instructor, and two enlisted mathematical-statistical research assistants. Lt. Col. L. E. Barber to Commanding General, Fifth Army, Subject: Establishment of Physical Training Department at the Army General School, 28 October 1953; School Organization—Physical Training School, 1946–53; General Orders and Organization Planning Files, 09/05/1946—07/28/1966; Fort Bragg, North Carolina/Physical Training School, box 1; United States Continental Army Command, RG 546, NACP.

45. Lt. Col. Earl F. Klinck, Study for Continuation of Physical Training and Athletic Directors Course, undated; School Organization—Physical Training School, 1946–53; General Orders and Organization Planning Files, 09/05/1946—07/28/1966; Fort Bragg, North Carolina/Physical Training School, box 1; United States Continental Army Command, RG 546, NACP.

46. Staff Studies of Problems 1–4, 31 August 1953; School Organization—Physical Training School, 1946–53; General Orders and Organization Planning Files, 09/05/1946—07/28/1966; Fort Bragg, North Carolina/Physical Training School, box 1; United States Continental Army Command, RG 546, NACP.

47. Circular No. 72, Physical Training Proficiency, 19 August 1953; Research & Development Administration Files—1954; U.S. Army Schools, Infantry School, Fort Benning, Georgia, box 67; United States Continental Army Command, RG 546, NACP; Captain Harold S. Tavzel to Commandant, Physical Training School, Subject: Staff Study—Problem 1, 25 August 1953; School Organization—Physical Training School, 1946–53; General Orders and Organization Planning Files, 09/05/1946—07/28/1966; Fort Bragg, North Carolina/Physical Training School, box 1; United States Continental Army Command, RG 546, NACP.

48. A Study of the Adequacy of the Present Army Physical Conditioning Program, 6 October 1955, enclosed in Adequacy Study, p. 2, October 1955; Research and Development Project Case Files—1955; R & D Case Files; U.S. Army Schools, Infantry School, Fort Benning, Georgia, box 67; United States Continental Army Command, RG 546, NACP.

49. Memorandum—Projects Deemed Necessary by the Physical Training Department in Order to Fulfill the Mission of the Department; Research & Development Administrative Files—1954; U.S. Army Schools, Infantry School, Fort Benning, Georgia, box 67; United States Continental Army Command, RG 546, NACP.

50. James Dawson became the sole human continuity between the PTS and its later reincarnation at the US Army Infantry School, working consecutively at Forts Bragg, Riley, and Benning. Lt. Col. L. E. Barber to Commandant, Army General School, Subject: Establishment of Physical Training Department at the Army General School, 28 October 1953; School Organization—Physical Training School, 1946–53; General Orders and Organization Planning Files, 09/05/1946—07/28/1966; Fort Bragg, North Carolina/Physical Training School, box 1; United States Continental Army Command, RG 546, NACP.

51. Physical Fitness Seminar Report, 25.

52. John Kelly, the former chairman of the World War II Committee on Physical Fitness who worried that America was becoming a “nation of weaklings,” brought this report to Eisenhower’s attention. John B. Kelly, “Are We Becoming a Nation of Weaklings?,” American Magazine 161 (March 1956).

53. Col. James H. Kellers to Commanding General, Continental Army Command, Subject: Physical Conditioning Program, 13 August 1955, enclosed in Adequacy Study, October 1955; Research and Development Project Case Files—1955; R & D Case Files; U.S. Army Schools, Infantry School, Fort Benning, Georgia, box 67; United States Continental Army Command, RG 546, NACP.

54. Lt. Col. Samuel J. Chilk to Commanding Generals, First, Second, Third, Fourth, Fifth, and Sixth Armies, Subject: Physical Conditioning Program, 29 August 1955, enclosed in Adequacy Study, October 1955; Research and Development Project Case Files—1955; R & D Case Files; U.S. Army Schools, Infantry School, Fort Benning, Georgia, box 67; United States Continental Army Command, RG 546, NACP.

55. Those “certain modifications” primarily concerned increasing physical conditioning time allotments in the Specialized Assignment Phase of a soldier’s training, adjusting the physical fitness test scoring tables based on new research, updating training literature, revising service school programs to provide more instruction on developing and leading physical training programs, and adopting the new physical achievement test for combat units. The study does not appear to have sought or used quantitative measures of physical demands in combat. Proper physical condition remained an absolute measure of physiological performance capacity, not a relative measure of an individual’s ability to function effectively on the battlefield. Headquarters, the Infantry School to Commanding General, Continental Army Command, Subject: Physical Conditioning Program, Conclusions, p. 1, enclosed in Adequacy Study, October 1955; Research and Development Project Case Files—1955; R & D Case Files; U.S. Army Schools, Infantry School, Fort Benning, Georgia, box 67; United States Continental Army Command, RG 546, NACP.

56. Annex A—The Physical Training Program, p. 2, enclosed in Adequacy Study, October 1955; Research and Development Project Case Files—1955; R & D Case Files; U.S. Army Schools, Infantry School, Fort Benning, Georgia, box 67; United States Continental Army Command, RG 546, NACP.

57. A Study of the Adequacy of the Present Army Physical Conditioning Program, 6 October 1955, pp. 1–5, enclosed in Adequacy Study, October 1955; Research and Development Project Case Files—1955; R & D Case Files; U.S. Army Schools, Infantry School, Fort Benning, Georgia, box 67; United States Continental Army Command, RG 546, NACP.

58. Headquarters, the Infantry School to Commanding General, Continental Army Command, Subject: Physical Conditioning Program, Conclusions, p. 1, enclosed in Adequacy Study, October 1955; Research and Development Project Case Files—1955; R & D Case Files; U.S. Army Schools, Infantry School, Fort Benning, Georgia, box 67; United States Continental Army Command, RG 546, NACP.

59. A Study of the Adequacy of the Present Army Physical Conditioning Program, 6 October 1955, p. 7, enclosed in Adequacy Study, October 1955; Research and Development Project Case Files—1955; R & D Case Files; U.S. Army Schools, Infantry School, Fort Benning, Georgia, box 67; United States Continental Army Command, RG 546, NACP.

60. Field Manual 21-20: Physical Training (1950), 3; Training Circular No. 27, Physical Training, 31 August 1951, enclosed in Adequacy Study, October 1955; Research and Development Project Case Files—1955; R & D Case Files; U.S. Army Schools, Infantry School, Fort Benning, Georgia, box 67; United States Continental Army Command, RG 546, NACP.

61. Annex G—Command Emphasis, p. 2, enclosed in Adequacy Study, October 1955; Research and Development Project Case Files—1955; R & D Case Files; U.S. Army Schools, Infantry School, Fort Benning, Georgia, box 67; United States Continental Army Command, RG 546, NACP.

62. Physical Fitness Seminar Report, 11.

63. Annex G—Command Emphasis, pp. 1–2, enclosed in Adequacy Study, October 1955; Research and Development Project Case Files—1955; R & D Case Files; U.S. Army Schools, Infantry School, Fort Benning, Georgia, box 67; United States Continental Army Command, RG 546, NACP.

64. Annex A—The Physical Training Program, pp. 4–5, enclosed in Adequacy Study, October 1955; Research and Development Project Case Files—1955; R & D Case Files; U.S. Army Schools, Infantry School, Fort Benning, Georgia, box 67; United States Continental Army Command, RG 546, NACP.

65. Linn, Elvis’s Army, 293–294.

66. Annex H—Physical Training Leadership, p. 2, enclosed in Adequacy Study, October 1955; Research and Development Project Case Files—1955; R & D Case Files; U.S. Army Schools, Infantry School, Fort Benning, Georgia, box 67; United States Continental Army Command, RG 546, NACP.

67. A Study of the Adequacy of the Present Army Physical Conditioning Program, 6 October 1955, pp. 5–6, enclosed in Adequacy Study, October 1955; Research and Development Project Case Files—1955; R & D Case Files; U.S. Army Schools, Infantry School, Fort Benning, Georgia, box 67; United States Continental Army Command, RG 546, NACP.

68. Annex A—The Physical Training Program, p. 5, enclosed in Adequacy Study, October 1955; Research and Development Project Case Files—1955; R & D Case Files; U.S. Army Schools, Infantry School, Fort Benning, Georgia, box 67; United States Continental Army Command, RG 546, NACP.

69. Annex B—Activities Comprising the Physical Training Program, p. 3, enclosed in Adequacy Study, October 1955; Research and Development Project Case Files—1955; R & D Case Files; U.S. Army Schools, Infantry School, Fort Benning, Georgia, box 67; United States Continental Army Command, RG 546, NACP.

70. Annex G—Command Emphasis, pp. 1–3, enclosed in Adequacy Study, October 1955; Research and Development Project Case Files—1955; R & D Case Files; U.S. Army Schools, Infantry School, Fort Benning, Georgia, box 67; United States Continental Army Command, RG 546, NACP.

71. A Study of the Adequacy of the Present Army Physical Conditioning Program, 6 October 1955, p. 12, enclosed in Adequacy Study, October 1955; Research and Development Project Case Files—1955; R & D Case Files; U.S. Army Schools, Infantry School, Fort Benning, Georgia, box 67; United States Continental Army Command, RG 546, NACP.

72. United States Army Infantry School, Infantry Instructors’ Conference Report, 17–21 June 1957 (Fort Benning, GA: Infantry School, 1957), 132.

73. Specifically, the regulation required officers to spend one half day per work week, exclusive of Sundays and holidays, in physical exercise. The nature of that exercise was not prescribed. Department of the Army, Army Regulations 600-160: Maintenance of Physical Fitness and Detecting and Correcting Physical Abnormalities among Officers (Washington, DC: US Government Printing Office, 1955), 1–3. The regulation also reflected a growing concern about the health of Army officers, especially their heart health, in encouraging them to take full advantage of their annual leave and to act to correct medical issues. These moves coincided with a growing awareness in America about the dangers of cholesterol that culminated in the “first cholesterol scare” of 1961. Harvey Levenstein, Paradox of Plenty: A Social History of Eating in Modern America (New York: Oxford University Press, 1993), 135–136.

74. A Study of the Adequacy of the Present Army Physical Conditioning Program, 6 October 1955, pp. 9–10, enclosed in Adequacy Study, October 1955; Research and Development Project Case Files—1955; R & D Case Files; U.S. Army Schools, Infantry School, Fort Benning, Georgia, box 67; United States Continental Army Command, RG 546, NACP.

75. A Study of the Adequacy of the Present Army Physical Conditioning Program, 10.

76. Annex H—Physical Training Leadership, p. 2, enclosed in Adequacy Study, October 1955; Research and Development Project Case Files—1955; R & D Case Files; U.S. Army Schools, Infantry School, Fort Benning, Georgia, box 67; United States Continental Army Command, RG 546, NACP.

77. East, Historical Review and Analysis, 158.

78. For a full explanation of changes, see Annex C—Physical Fitness Testing, enclosed in Adequacy Study, October 1955; Research and Development Project Case Files—1955; R & D Case Files; U.S. Army Schools, Infantry School, Fort Benning, Georgia, box 67; United States Continental Army Command, RG 546, NACP.

79. The PAT had been under study since at least 1952. A Study of the Adequacy of the Present Army Physical Conditioning Program, 6 October 1955, p. 6, enclosed in Adequacy Study, October 1955; Research and Development Project Case Files—1955; R & D Case Files; U.S. Army Schools, Infantry School, Fort Benning, Georgia, box 67; United States Continental Army Command, RG 546, NACP.

80. Annex C—Physical Fitness Testing, enclosed in Adequacy Study, October 1955, p. 7; Research and Development Project Case Files—1955; R & D Case Files; U.S. Army Schools, Infantry School, Fort Benning, Georgia, box 67; United States Continental Army Command, RG 546, NACP.

81. Physical training policy at this time did not stipulate any mandatory consequences for failing tests. The tests were explicitly intended to be assessment tools for commanders and thus did not include anything punitive. United States Army Infantry School, Infantry Instructors’ Conference Report, 17–21 June 1957, 134.

82. Linn, Elvis’s Army, 243–244.

83. Col. James H. Kellers to Commanding General, Continental Army Command, Subject: Physical Conditioning Program, 13 August 1955, enclosed in Adequacy Study, October 1955; Research and Development Project Case Files—1955; R & D Case Files; U.S. Army Schools, Infantry School, Fort Benning, Georgia, box 67; United States Continental Army Command, RG 546, NACP.

84. Albert E. Lockhart, “Overweight in Grade,” Infantry School Quarterly 46, no. 3 (1956): 75–79.

85. Peter N. Stearns, Fat History: Bodies and Beauty in the Modern West (New York: New York University Press, 2002), 51–53, 60, 72, 100–22; Rachel Louise Moran, Governing Bodies: American Politics and the Shaping of the Modern Physique (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2018), 87; Jesse Berrett, “Feeding the Organization Man: Diet and Masculinity in Postwar America,” Journal of Social History 30, no. 4 (1997): 805–825; the first major cholesterol scare did not come until 1961, but reports linking cholesterol, obesity, and heart disease had been appearing since 1950. Levenstein, Paradox of Plenty, 135–137.

86. Annex E—Diet and Overweight, p. 1, enclosed in Adequacy Study, October 1955; Research and Development Project Case Files—1955; R & D Case Files; U.S. Army Schools, Infantry School, Fort Benning, Georgia, box 67; United States Continental Army Command, RG 546, NACP.

87. Annex E—Diet and Overweight, p. 1.

88. Tab A, Annex E—Weight Control Program of XVIII Airborne Corps, pp. 1–2, enclosed in Adequacy Study, October 1955; Research and Development Project Case Files—1955; R & D Case Files; U.S. Army Schools, Infantry School, Fort Benning, Georgia, box 67; United States Continental Army Command, RG 546, NACP.

89. Tab A, Annex E—Weight Control Program, 1.

90. Annex E—Diet and Overweight, p. 4, enclosed in Adequacy Study, October 1955; Research and Development Project Case Files—1955; R & D Case Files; U.S. Army Schools, Infantry School, Fort Benning, Georgia, box 67; United States Continental Army Command, RG 546, NACP.

91. The Army Weight Control Program (AWCP) became official policy in October 1963 through the publication of Army Regulations 600-7. The AWCP strongly resembled the Eighteenth Airborne Corps’s program recommended in the adequacy study of 1955. For more on the AWCP program of 1963, see East, Historical Review and Analysis, 131–132.

92. The pentomic concept grew out of a “Pentana” study by CONARC in 1955. The pentomic experiment was problematic and short-lived. A second round of reorganization began in 1960 and culminated in the Reorganization Objectives Army Divisions (ROAD) in 1963. Trauschweizer, The Cold War U.S. Army, 58–59; Linn, Elvis’s Army, 84.

93. Historian Brian Linn has argued that the pentomic concept may also have been a scheme by Taylor to maintain or grow the number of Army divisions without additional manpower. Linn, Echo of Battle: The Army’s Way of War (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2007), 178.

94. Battlegroup headquarters also contained a heavy mortar battery, plus reconnaissance, signals intelligence, maintenance, and medical assets. Battlegroups remained reliant on the division for combat and combat service support, however. Richard W. Kedzior, Evolution and Endurance: The U.S. Army Division in the Twentieth Century (Arlington: RAND, 2000), 25–26; Linn, Echo of Battle, 87–89.

95. G. C. Reinhardt and W. R. Kintner, Atomic Weapons in Land Combat, 2nd ed. (Harrisburg, PA: Military Service Publishing, 1954), 72.

96. Kedzior, Evolution and Endurance, 25.

97. Trauschweizer, The Cold War U.S. Army, 33.

98. Carl F. Fritzsche, “Physical Fitness—a Must!,” Army Information Digest 10, no. 7 (1955): 41–42.

99. Fritzsche, 41. Labeling soldiers “soft” carried meaning beyond battlefield endurance. It also suggested effeminacy, indolence, a lack of rugged individualism, and weakness in both mental and moral dimensions. See Berrett, “Feeding the Organization Man,” 805–825; Cuordileone, “‘Politics in an Age of Anxiety,’” 515–545; Kyle A. Cuordileone, Manhood and American Political Culture in the Cold War (New York: Routledge, 2005), 124–145.

100. Physical Fitness Seminar Report, 20.

101. Simon A. McNeely, “Physical Fitness in the Pentomic Age,” Journal of Health-Physical Education-Recreation 29, no. 6 (1958): 21–22.

102. TM 21-200’s material was essentially just the middle chapters of earlier field manuals. FM 21-20 expanded on guidance in earlier field manuals about how to construct a program and evaluate fitness. The new field manual also added synopsis of the human body’s structure and functions.

103. Department of the Army, Field Manual 21-20: Physical Training (1957), 8.

104. Department of the Army, 8–11.

105. Department of the Army, 9.

106. Department of the Army, 12.

107. Department of the Army, 12–36.

108. Department of the Army, 39, 41, 45.

109. Department of the Army, Technical Manual 21-200: Physical Conditioning (Washington, DC: US Government Printing Office, 1957), 5–7, 13–15; Department of the Army, Field Manual 21-20: Physical Training (1957), 5–7.

110. Department of the Army, Field Manual 21-20: Physical Training (1957), 5–7.

111. Department of the Army, 133.

112. Linn, Echo of Battle, 294–297.

113. Department of the Army, Field Manual 21-20: Physical Training (1957), 146.

114. Department of the Army, 72.

115. Department of the Army, Technical Manual 21-200: Physical Conditioning, 13–15.

116. Both the traditional physical fitness test and the PAT remained completely optional, except for two mandatory fitness tests during a new soldier’s basic training phase.

117. United States Army Infantry School, Infantry Instructors’ Conference Report, 17–21 June 1957, 133.

118. James E. Reilly and Robert M. Garrison, “Our Physical Unfitness,” Infantry 49, no. 2 (1959): 20.

119. War Department, Manual of Physical Training for Use in the United States Army (New York: Military Publishing, 1914), 5.

120. Herman J. Koehler, “Letter from Captain Herman J. Koehler,” American Physical Education Review 21, no. 3 (1916): 148–149.

121. Department of the Army, Technical Manual 21-200: Physical Conditioning, 44. Raycroft and his team had similarly articulated a greater focus on individual fitness between 1917 and 1920. Though submerged in the interwar years, the individual returned to the spotlight in 1942 and grew more prominent through 1957 and beyond.

122. Physical Fitness Seminar Report, i.

123. Physical Fitness Seminar Report, 5.

124. See, for instance, Physical Fitness Seminar Report, 18, 20.

125. Physical Fitness Seminar Report, 32, 34.

126. USAIS conducted this survey. The school sent one hundred questionnaires to division and Army headquarters, which in turn distributed copies to subordinate units. Of the one hundred questionnaires sent, eighty-three were returned. Physical Fitness Seminar Report, 11.

127. Physical Fitness Seminar Report, 11–12.

128. Physical Fitness Seminar Report, 26.

129. Specifically, the conferees recommended a central school like the defunct Physical Training School for training program managers and division- or post-level schools for producing unit instructors. Physical Fitness Seminar Report, 31–33.

130. Physical Fitness Seminar Report, 30.

131. Physical Fitness Seminar Report, 4.

132. Jeffrey Montez de Oca, “‘As Our Muscles Get Softer, Our Missile Race Becomes Harder’: Cultural Citizenship and the ‘Muscle Gap,’” Journal of Historical Sociology 18, no. 3 (2005): 149.

133. Christina S. Jarvis, The Male Body at War: American Masculinity during World War II (DeKalb: Northern Illinois University Press, 2004), 21.

134. Michael M. Davis, “How Healthy Are We?,” New York Times, February 22, 1942.

135. US Office of Civilian Defense Physical Fitness Committee, Report on National Fitness: A Program through Schools and Colleges, by Hiram A. Jones, Anne Schley Duggan, and August H. Pritzlaff, February 1942; Records of the Physical Fitness Committee, General Records, 1942–45, box 10; Records of the Community War Services, RG 215, NACP.

136. See chapter 5 for a more thorough discussion of John Kelly’s organizations. Many physical educators from the American Association for Health, Physical Education, and Recreation eagerly participated and explained the goals of the program in their own publications. For contemporary explanations of this evolving organization’s purpose, see “National Physical Fitness Program: A Statement by the Board of Directors,” Journal of Health and Physical Education 12, no. 10 (1941): 547–548; Executive Office of the Committee on Physical Fitness, “Civilian Physical Fitness,” Journal of Health and Physical Education 14, no. 10 (1943): 518. Several grassroots efforts also tapped into the groundswell of interest in prehabilitation. The authors of several new books advised boys on how to condition themselves for military service. Full “community physical fitness programs” crafted by physical educators aimed to improve citizenry’s health generally. See Francois D’Eliscu, How to Prepare for Military Fitness (New York: W. W. Norton, 1943); Charles Ward Crampton, Fighting Fitness: A Premilitary Training Guide (New York: McGraw-Hill Book, 1944); Arthur H. Steinhaus et al., How to Keep Fit and Like It: A Manual for Civilians and a Plan for a Community Approach to Physical Fitness (Chicago: Consolidated Book Publishers, 1943). See also Physical Fitness Can Make the Difference in the Shops, Homes, Offices, Classrooms, Stores, Armed Forces, Just Living: A Community Plan for Physical Education, 8 October 1941; Com. On Physical Fitness, 1941, file 848; Records of the Physical Fitness Committee, General Records, 1942–45, box 1; Records of the Community War Services, RG 215, NACP.

137. Ethel Percy Andrus, “High School Victory Corps,” Journal of Educational Sociology 16, no. 4 (1942): 231.

138. Richard M. Ugland, “‘Education for Victory’: The High School Victory Corps and Curricular Adaptation during World War II,” History of Education Quarterly 19, no. 4 (1979): 435, 438.

139. The five included the Air Service, Land Service, Sea Service, Production Service, and Community Service divisions.

140. High-School Victory Corps, Pamphlet Number 1 (Washington, DC: US Government Printing Office, 1942), 7.

141. The manual was produced by the Federal Security Agency and US Office of Education, with considerable input from the armed forces.

142. “More Tarzans, Fewer Softies Needed for War,” Chicago Daily Tribune, November 17, 1942; Bank regularly delivered this message in other forums too. For instance, see Theodore P. Bank, “The Army Physical Conditioning Program,” Journal of Health and Physical Education 14, no. 4 (1943).

143. Physical Fitness through Physical Education (Washington, DC: US Government Printing Office, 1942), 4.

144. Of secondary interest were those destined for industrial work and girls responsible for maintaining the homefront. Physical Fitness through Physical Education, 25.

145. Physical Fitness through Physical Education, 26.

146. Physical Fitness through Physical Education, 30–46; Bank, “The Army Physical Conditioning Program,” 197.

147. US Office of Education Committee on Wartime Physical Fitness for Colleges and Universities, Handbook on Physical Fitness for Students in Colleges and Universities (Washington, DC: US Government Printing Office, 1943).

148. Deobald B. Van Dalen and Bruce L. Bennett, A World History of Physical Education: Cultural, Philosophical, Comparative, 2nd ed. (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall, 1971), 481–82; Rosalind Cassidy and Hilda Clute Kozman, “Trends in State Wartime Physical Fitness Programs,” Journal of Health and Physical Education 14, no. 7 (1943): 357, 92–93.

149. Ugland, “‘Education for Victory,’” 439.

150. Ugland, 441.

151. Stewart Atkinson, “What Holds Back the Victory Corps?,” Clearing House 18, no. 3 (1943): 137–139.

152. E. B. White, “Victory Corps,” Bulletin of the American Association of University Professors (1915–1955) 29, no. 2 (1943): 300.

153. Michael J. Hogan, A Cross of Iron: Harry S. Truman and the Origins of the National Security State, 1945–1954 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998), 122.

154. John Sager, “Universal Military Training and the Struggle to Define American Identity during the Cold War,” Federal History Journal, no. 5 (2013): 57.

155. Hogan, A Cross of Iron, 125.

156. Lewis B. Hershey, “We Must Improve Our Youth,” New York Times, February 10, 1946.

157. William A. Taylor, Every Citizen a Soldier: The Campaign for Universal Military Training after World War II (College Station: Texas A & M University Press, 2014), 99–100.

158. Harry S. Truman, “Remarks at the National Health Assembly Dinner,” www.trumanlibrary.org/publicpapers/index.php?pid=1612.

159. Quotation from President Truman’s guidance to his Advisory Commission on Universal Training in 1947 located in Taylor, Every Citizen a Soldier, 121.

160. Beyond generating some positive publicity, the experimental units did not generate much popular demand for the program, motivated too few attendees to enlist, and failed to “produce moral paragons.” Linn, Elvis’s Army, 31.

161. Sager, “Universal Military Training,” 58–59, 73.

162. Sager, 64.

163. See, for instance, Charles F. Mourin, “Postwar Physical Education or Military Training?,” Journal of Health and Physical Education 16, no. 4 (1945): 180, 220, 22; Harold K. Jack, “A Suggested Plan for Military Service,” Journal of Health and Physical Education 19, no. 4 (1945): 181.

164. Jay B. Nash, “Is Compulsory Military Training the Answer? No!,” Journal of Health and Physical Education 16, no. 2 (1945): 65.

165. Montez de Oca, “‘As Our Muscles Get Softer,’” 147–148.

166. McKenzie, Getting Physical, 2–3, 41; Montez de Oca, “‘As Our Muscles Get Softer,’” 149; Marc Richards, “The Cold War’s ‘Soft’ Recruits,” Peace Review 10, no. 3 (1998): 435. For a critique of this argument that suggests that a “general male panic” may not have been as universal as public intellectuals claimed, see James Gilbert, Men in the Middle: Searching for Masculinity in the 1950s (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2005), 3–9.

167. Kelly, “Are We Becoming a Nation of Weaklings?,” 28.

168. Moran, Governing Bodies, 87; Richards, “The Cold War’s ‘Soft’ Recruits,” 437–438; Montez de Oca, “‘As Our Muscles Get Softer,’” 150.

169. Quoted in Richards, “The Cold War’s ‘Soft’ Recruits,” 436.

170. James Gilbert, A Cycle of Outrage: America’s Reaction to the Juvenile Delinquent in the 1950s (New York: Oxford University Press, 1986), 42. See also Leerom Medovoi, Rebels: Youth and the Cold War Origins of Identity (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2005), 26.

171. Gilbert, Cycle of Outrage, 66; Grace Palladino, Teenagers: An American History (New York: Basic, 1996), 81, 158.

172. Linn, Elvis’s Army, 268–269.

173. McKenzie, Getting Physical, 44.

174. United States Army Infantry School, Infantry Instructors’ Conference Report, 16–21 June 1952, 36.

175. McKenzie, Getting Physical, 44–45.

176. Richards, “The Cold War’s ‘Soft’ Recruits,” 437.

177. Moran, Governing Bodies, 88–89.

178. Robert H. Boyle, “The Report That Shocked the President,” Sports Illustrated, 1955, 30.

179. Boyle, 73.

180. Moran, Governing Bodies, 90–94.

181. McKenzie, Getting Physical, 24; Moran, Governing Bodies, 87.

182. McKenzie, Getting Physical, 23.

183. For a more comprehensive overview of the PCYF’s activities, see McKenzie, 24–40; Moran, Governing Bodies, 90–98.

184. Physical Fitness Seminar Report, 6–7.

185. Physical Fitness Seminar Report, 6.

186. Physical Fitness Seminar Report, 8.

187. For more on Kennedy’s Council on Physical Fitness and Lyndon Johnson’s Council on Physical Fitness and Sports, during which the greatest changes to this program occurred, see Moran, Governing Bodies, 98–111.

188. Physical Fitness Seminar Report, 20.

189. Reilly and Garrison, “Our Physical Unfitness,” 21.

190. On the “advisory state,” see Reilly and Garrison, 2–9.

CONCLUSION: FASHIONING THAT “CERTAIN STRENGTH OF BODY AND SOUL,” 1885–1957

1. The ACFT comprises six events: a three-repetition maximum deadlift, a standing power throw, a hand release push-up, a “spring-drag-carry” shuttle run, a hanging leg tuck, and a two-mile run. In contrast, the APFT was comprised of three events: push-ups, sit-ups, and a two-mile run. The APFT also used an age- and gender-based scoring system, whereas the ACFT’s scoring is neutral, but with three different performance thresholds aligned with duty positions.

2. Meghann Myers, “A New Army PT Test Is on Its Way: This Is Not a Drill,” July 9, 2018, www.armytimes.com/news/your-army/2018/07/09/a-new-army-pt-test-is-on-its-way-this-is-not-a-drill/.

3. David Barno and Nora Bensahel, “Dumb and Dumber: The Army’s New PT Test,” October 16, 2018, https://warontherocks.com/2018/10/dumb-and-dumber-the-armys-new-pt-test/; Emma Moore, “The ACFT and the Problems with the Military’s Cult of Physical Fitness,” December 16, 2019, www.military.com/daily-news/2019/12/16/acft-and-problems-militarys-cult-physical-fitness.html.

4. Scott McDonald, “U.S. Army Aims for Tougher Fitness Standards Despite Amount of Overweight Recruits,” December 4, 2018, www.newsweek.com/us-army-aims-tougher-fitness-standards-despite-amount-overweight-recruits-1244644.

5. Miranda Summers Lowe, “‘Swat the Kaiser’ and Stork Stands: The History of Army Physical Fitness,” New York Times, March 28, 2019, www.nytimes.com/2019/03/28/magazine/army-physical-fitness-test.html.

6. Herman J. Koehler, “Letter from Captain Herman J. Koehler,” American Physical Education Review 21, no. 3 (1916): 148.

7. Koehler, 150.

8. Lewis shows that this deep-rooted cultural belief has been at odds since World War II with another trend—the substitution of technology for manpower. Adrian R. Lewis, The American Culture of War: The History of U.S. Military Force from World War II to Operation Enduring Freedom, 2nd ed. (New York: Routledge, 2012), 41.

9. Historian Shelly McKenzie arrives at a similar conclusion in her study of American fitness culture since the 1950s. See Shelly McKenzie, Getting Physical: The Rise of Fitness Culture in America (Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 2013), 178.

10. For an entry to this literature, see Anthony Kellett, Combat Motivation: The Behavior of Soldiers in Battle (Boston: Kluwer, Nijhoff, 1982); John Ellis, Sharp End: The Fighting Man in World War II (New York: Scribner’s, 1980); Samuel A. Stouffer et al., The American Soldier: Combat and Its Aftermath, vol. 2 (New York: John Wiley & Sons, 1949); J. Glenn Gray, The Warriors: Reflections on Men in Battle (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1998); Gerald F. Linderman, The World within War: America’s Combat Experience in World War II (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1999); Richard Holmes, Acts of War: The Behavior of Men in Battle (London: Weidenfeld & Nicholson, 2003); S. L. A. Marshall, Men against Fire: The Problem of Battle Command (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 2000); Rune Henrikson, “Warriors in Combat—What Makes People Actively Fight in Combat?,” Journal of Strategic Studies 30, no. 2 (2007).

11. Lewis, The American Culture of War, 35.

12. For an overview of doctrinal and policy developments since 1958, see Whitfield B. East, A Historical Review and Analysis of Army Physical Readiness Training and Assessment (Fort Leavenworth, KS: Combat Studies Institute Press, 2013).

13. “Soldier Athlete Initiative,” US Army, August 16, 2010, www.army.mil/article/43820/soldier_athlete_initiative.

14. As an example, a twenty-two-year-old male soldier needs to complete forty pushups in two minutes and run two miles in less than 16:36 to achieve a passing score. A twenty-two-year-old female soldier needs to complete seventeen pushups in two minutes and run two miles in less than 19:36.

15. Early ACFT trials as of 2019 showed an overall 84 percent fail rate for women and a 30 percent fail rate for men, chiefly due to the leg tuck exercise. Men and women passed the other events at similar rates. Moore, “The ACFT and the Problems with the Military’s Cult of Physical Fitness,” www.military.com/daily-news/2019/12/16/acft-and-problems-militarys-cult-physical-fitness.html.

16. Mission: Readiness, Council for a Strong America, www.strongnation.org/missionreadiness; and “Citadel-Led Study Reveals Threat to U.S. Military Readiness Due to Unfit Recruits,” January 11, 2018, https://today.citadel.edu/citadel-led-study-reveals-threat-to-u-s-military-readiness-due-to-unfit-recruits/. One of the three leading disqualifiers for service is obesity. See “Unfit to Serve: Obesity is Impacting National Security,” March 2019, www.cdc.gov/physicalactivity/downloads/unfit-to-serve.pdf.

17. James E. Pilcher, “The Building of the Soldier,” United Service 7, no. 4 (1892): 323.