Album Documenting ROTC in the Very First Year of It's Introduction at Iowa State University, 1919 Just Shortly After the Birth of the ROTC Program

[ROTC], [ALBUM]

Photo Album

Student’s Photo Album featuring ROTC activities and associated Fraternity at Iowa State College in the very first year of ROTC's Inception on campus, 1919, and only shortly after the creation of ROTC nationwide in 1916. Album includes 311 photos from Iowa State College (now named Iowa State University) including its ROTC program. Album is 11.25” x 14.25”. Strong-tied cardboard brown cardboard boards. The cover features the title and insignia of the student’s fraternity “Tau Kappa Epsilon.”

Since its creation by the National Defense Act of 1916, ROTC has become the largest producer of U.S. military officers, producing more than one million officers for the Army, Marine Corps, Navy, and Air Force. The concept promotes the idea of a "citizen soldier"—a man trained to act in a military capacity when his nation required, but capable of fulfilling standard civilian functions in peacetime.Army ROTC has been a part of Iowa State University’s history since the college’s first classes were held in 1869. Although a student could not obtain a commission under the program in the early years, he could obtain a degree by completing the four-year course in "Military Tactics and Engineering," in which all male students of the college (except those excused by proper authority) were required to complete to become members of the College Battalion. The ROTC program was formally introduced at Iowa State in 1919, it became voluntary in 1962, and women were accepted into the program in 1972. In World War II, 1,200 Iowa State College ROTC graduates served as officers, proof of the program’s success and importance. Photos show the school gym turned into a barracks, boys in uniform shooting guns, and the close fraternity of the ROTC students. The album highlights the program’s importance as necessary training for citizens to be prepared for war, and as a bonding experience for those in the program. Even the Fraternity photos show how much patriotism and desire to serve country pervaded the youth culture. The opening pages of the album include a large photo of the fraternity living room with a guitar and a piano on which is set the music to "We're Going Over" and "Over There." Another photo shows the young men gathered into this living room with what amounts to their own orchestra, playing these songs. The young men are also pictured during hazing rituals, and playing jazz in the bathtub. Only just on the tail of World War I, several photos show young men still in military or Navy dress, adn a photograph shows "When the gym was a barracks." A page devoted to "Some of the Boys in Uniform" shows 18 individual photos cut together of students in various military dress, some with bayonets. Cover in very good condition with some nicks and tears on edges of boards. Pages and photos inside are in near fine condition. An excellent photo album demonstrating the importance of the ROTC program in the very first years of its inception.

Item #15952

Price: $980.00