Military Review English Edition May-June 2016 | Page 108

then Army chief of
staff Gen. Leonard
Wood introduced
experimental summer
camps to train potential Army officers,
starting at Pacific
Grove, California,
and Gettysburg,
Pennsylvania. Wood
and other American
leaders formed what
would become known
as the Preparedness
Movement to advocate a strong national
defense. The movement recognized the
(Photo courtesy of Cushing Memorial Library)
standing U.S. Army
Texas A&M University cadets conduct field artillery training, circa 1941.
was too small to be
Vermont Rep. Justin S. Morrill and signed by President immediately effective if America entered World War I.
Abraham Lincoln, the act granted each state thousands In 1915, Wood added a larger camp at Plattsburg, New
of acres of public land for establishing institutions that
York, which became a model for training. Over sevenwould teach subjects in support of agriculture and
teen thousand men had received training at these camps
industry. To receive this valuable offer of land, colleges
by the end of 1915.14
were required to include military tactics courses in
their curricula.11
The National Defense Act of 1916
Citizen-soldiers from these land-grant institutions
The signing of the National Defense Act of 1916
joined those already educated in the Partridge model
brought into existence Army ROTC units that
serving in the Confederate and Un