IV 
111TH CONGRESS 
2D SESSION 
H. RES. 1590 
Recognizing the 150th anniversary of the Army Signal Corps. 
IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES 
JULY 30, 2010 
Ms. GIFFORDS (for herself, Mr. LAMBORN, Mr. BISHOP of Georgia, Mr. 
BONNER, Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ, Mr. BARROW, Mrs. DAVIS of Cali-
fornia, Mr. JONES, Mr. SABLAN, Mr. THORNBERRY, Mr. OWENS, Mrs. 
MYRICK, Mr. KISSELL, Mr. MICHAUD, Mr. GARAMENDI, Mr. ADERHOLT, 
Ms. KILPATRICK of Michigan, Mr. SPRATT, Mr. DUNCAN, Mr. WITTMAN, 
Mr. TURNER, Ms. SHEA-PORTER, and Mr. HEINRICH) submitted the fol-
lowing resolution; which was referred to the Committee on Armed Serv-
ices 
RESOLUTION 
Recognizing the 150th anniversary of the Army Signal Corps. 
Whereas the Army Signal Corps consists of more than 
65,000 officers and enlisted soldiers; 
Whereas the Army Signal Corps is responsible for all systems 
of communication for the Army; 
Whereas Major Albert James Myer first conceived the idea of 
a separate, trained professional military signal service in 
1860; 
Whereas, on June 21, 1860, the Army adopted Major Myer’s 
‘‘wigwag’’ communications system to form the Army Sig-
nal Corps; 
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•HRES 1590 IH 
Whereas the first Army Signal Corps methods were tested 
and proven during Civil War combat by using a single 
flag and a two-element code in daylight and torches at 
night; 
Whereas in March 1863, Congress authorized a regular Army 
Signal Corps for the duration of the Civil War, and ap-
proximately 2,900 officers and enlisted soldiers served in 
the Signal Corps during the Civil War; 
Whereas by 1867, the electric telegraph, along with visual 
signaling, became the responsibility of the Army Signal 
Corps; 
Whereas during the Spanish-American War of 1898, the 
Army Signal Corps played an integral role in victory with 
the employment of visual signaling, telephone and tele-
graph communications, combat photography, and bal-
loons for intelligence gathering; 
Whereas the Army Signal Corps introduced the first wireless 
telegraph in the Western Hemisphere shortly after the 
Spanish-American War, constructing the Washington- 
Alaska Military Cable and Telegraph System; 
Whereas, on August 1, 1907, an Aeronautical Division was 
established within the office of the Chief Signal Officer, 
which lead to the Wright Brothers conducting test flights 
of the Army’s first airplane build to Army Signal Corps 
specifications in 1908; 
Whereas Chief Signal Officer George Owen Squier worked 
closely with private industry to perfect radio tubes while 
creating a major Signal Laboratory at Camp Alfred Vail, 
New Jersey; 
Whereas during World War I, women switchboard operators 
were sworn into the Army Signal Corps; 
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•HRES 1590 IH 
Whereas Colonel William Blair, a pioneer in radar and direc-
tor of the Army Signal Corps laboratories at Fort Mon-
mouth, patented the first Army radar, demonstrated in 
1937; 
Whereas innovations by the Army Signal Corps in tactical 
frequency modulation radio radar became the most sig-
nificant communications development of World War II; 
Whereas in 1941, the Army Signal Corps developed the first 
FM backpack radio, the SCR-300, providing front-line 
troops with reliable, static-free communications for the 
first time; 
Whereas the Army Signal Corps played a crucial role in docu-
menting evidence of Nazi atrocities and the Holocaust, 
with a number of these images later transmitted to news 
agencies in America, helping to inform the world about 
the horrors of Nazism and the plight of concentration 
camp prisoners; 
Whereas in Project Diana in 1946, the Army Signal Corps 
successfully bounced radar signals off the moon, helping 
pave the way for space communications; 
Whereas during the Korean War, the very-high frequency 
radio of the Army Signal Corps became the tactical com-
munications backbone throughout the combat zone; 
Whereas during the Korean War and Vietnam War, the 
Army Signal Corps operated Officer Candidate Schools, 
initially at Fort Monmouth in 1950–1953, which grad-
uated 1,234 officers, and at Fort Gordon in 1965–1968, 
which produced 2,213 signal officers; 
Whereas, on December 18, 1958, the Army Signal Corps, 
with Air Force assistance, launched its first communica-
tions satellite, Project SCORE, demonstrating the feasi-
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