Evening star., 1941-10-12
Navy Conducts Tour
OF Base 10 Show What
Happens 10 Recruits
Service Is Proud
Of Transformation
1t Effects in s Weeks
BY CLAUDE A. MAHONEY,
Star staff Correspondent

NORFOLK, Va, Oct 1.-THE
Navy, realizing that great deal
of mystery exists about its activities,
has set out here to show what hap
pens TO youth who enlists as a
plain sailor.
1t set a detail of its snappiest
young officers yesterday to the not
unpleasant task of showing a group
of writers-mostly women reporters
what happens to the young man
who answers the patriotic call or
romantic urge of the sea and joins
our nautical forces.
Nobody was reticent about ad-
mitting that an attempt was made
to paint a Navy enlistment in its
rosiest colorS. The Navy has been
counting the amazingly large num-
ber of recruits with a glee that is
tinged a bit with the realization
that even the unusual influx is
scarcely keeping pace with the un-
expected speed of construction of
the two-ocean Navy.
Recruits as Missionaries.
SO the door was opened to Unit
X of the Naval Training Station
here, where several hundred more
or less nondescript young men from
hillside and city street are received
for induction and vaccination.
To jump a paragraph of details
for the moment, the doors of the
drill building were opened later in
the rainy day for an inspection of
the "break platoon" ceremony. Here
the visitors saw number of the
youths who were graduating from
the first six weeks of training. The
average one had gained 10 pounds,
carried himself we'll and appeared
to have taken on the responsibilities
of manhood, if not the exact aspect
of a national defender.
The Navy is proud of what it can
do to a rough country boy or pro-
vincially citified youth in those first
six weeks. 1t is so proud of the
usual transformation that it gives
the new sailors 10 days leave at
that time, before they come back to
join definite units of the Navy. 1t
wants the home folks to see the new
sparkle in the boys eyes. The
Navy's own publicity release says
the recruits bring back new candi-
dates with them-sometimes as
many as six.
Rigorous Physical Tests.
The men here come from recruit
ing stations in Virginia, West Vir-
ginia, Maryland and North Caro-
lima, where they have passed fairly
rigorous tests. Here they undergo
more tests to reveal any physical
disorder that would prevent their
being acceptable members of the
service. They receive vaccinations
for a variety of diseases and teey
are kept in detention-virtual quar-
antine-for three days longer than
the known life of the germ of any
communicable disease.
During this time they receive lee
tureS in many subjects, see movies,
have access to a library where a
volume of A. A. Milne was seen
yesterday beside wild West story, |
and attend compulsory church serv-
ices, either Catholic or Protestant. |
There is also recreation room and |
canteen where soft drinks, tobacco |
and such items may be bought and |
barber shop where they may get |
q four-minute haircut-free.
Gain About 400 in Strength.
At the end of the detention period |
they plunge into the remainder of |
the six weeks training period, which |
includes military drills, boat drills, |
swimming, Seamanship, hygiene and !
rife practice. The typical recruit |
not only gains weight in this period, |
but picks up as much as 40 per cent |
In strength and in intelligence
rating as much as II per cent.
If the applicant is 18 years of age |
or older he has been enlisted for a
six-year hitch, and if he is IT, he |
is enlisted for a minority period
that is, until he is 81. Eighty per
cent of the apprentice seamen ask |
to be sent to a trade school for |
the 12-Week period following the |
first six. The others go Immediately |
to sea or to shore stations. The
pay may jump from s21 the first |
four months to $50 to S36 a month, |
with keep. 1t is possible to become |
a petty officer in Is months.
The Navy sets great store by its
trade schools, too, suggesting that a
person trained there will come out .
L.
civilian life than he would have
been otherwise 1t maintains .
schools for machinists, electricians, |
ordnance men, musicians. hospital .
corps men. cooks and bakers. fire.
control men. gyrocompass electri-
clans. motion picture technicianS,
torpedomen, aviators, deep-Sea div
ers, parachute material men, pho |