The Pensacola journal. (Pensacola, Fla.) 1898-1985, 1922-04-25
CAMPS
TO MAKE COOKS
Attendants at Military Camps
Will All % Kitchen
Duty.

There's 8, ray of hope for those
ladies of the land who do not seem
able to initiate their growing sons In
to the subtle mysteries OF dish wash :
ing, fire-building and other unsl5illed
domestic pursuits, necessary to the
notrishment of the nation and to the
preparation of the well-kIiown three
square meals q day.
The War Department has tust come
to bat with the pronouncement that
every young man who attends one Of
the Citizens Military Training Camps
to be held throughout the country this
summer will be required to do his bit
80 q Kitchen police, mess attendant
and walter.
This deeisionP may not be the most
cheerful news in the world to the pro-
spective candidates for the camps but
letters received by recruiting officers
Indicate that mothers will derive much
comfort from the thought that their
hopefuls will have a chance to acquire
some Of the rtidiments of domestic
scfencs.or, at least, a ISeener apprecia-
ton OF the daily household tasks that
confront majority OF the feminine
population.
That this leaven Of Democracy will
be widely sOwfl 10 assured by the War
Department order which provides that
Kitchen and mess hall duties will fall
alike upon the just and the unjust,
and viii be apporitoned by q roster
from which none may escape.
These" says an order, ARE mill
tary duties and constitute features OF
practical instruction that properly be-
long to camp training. Camp COM
1nanders may. at their discretion, pro-
vide for the use OF individual mess
kits so as to reduce the kitchen police
and dining room duties to a minimum"
1t was different last year. The
youthful soldiers frolicked to the mess
table, were waited upon by paid at
tendaf1ts and departed to their after
dinner relaxatfons without d thought
as to how their meal was prepared
and with d certainty that supper
would be steaming when the bugle
blew.
This year they will do everything
except the cooking--and Everything
is large order, as any graduate of
the Army Kitchen Spolice school can
tell them. But as the War Department
says, 1t Is a necessary part OF military
training and a lack of knowledge of
this essential renders a soldier almost
useless to his command either in the
field or barracks.
Major General James s. Harbord,
now assistant to General Pershing In
Washington, was, as an enlisted man,
one OF the most expert kitchen police
in his company, SO that there is dis
tinguished precedent to rbe followed by
this summers student soldiers.
"My boy" writes a mother to Major
II. H. Fletcher, Recruiting Adjutant
at Governors Island, ''is very punctual
at the table but he loses interest in all
domestic affairs as soon as the desert
is finished. / do not expect him to
join a dish -drying period with any
degree of enthusiasm, but I do wish
he wouldn't regard my household
duties with such a casual air of de-
tachment as if some genii set his food
before him and whfsked away the rem
-nants when the meal is over. I hope
he will have good session with soap
suds while he is in your camp. I am
confident he will learn a lot besides
how to fire gun and hold himself
straight"