E think of the astounding feat of landing a million trained fighting men in France almost within a year after our entry into the Great War as an unparalleled accomplishment of military organization, and we take pride in the quality that is in us that made it all possible. As a military enterprise it was undoubtedly a world's record, and we like to emphasize it by contrasting it with our total unpreparedness of a year ago and our general abhorrence of war.

We are so fond of emphasizing our unpreparedness that the assertion that, in certain respects, we were well prepared comes somewhat as a shock, and is apt to be resented, first because it suggests diminishing the contrast, and further because, as an abstract assertion, it seems to bring into question our most cherished tenet-that war-making was a thing entirely new to our national existence. The latter was undeniably true, and with clear conscience we righteously assert our abhorrence of this terrible business, but, in the admission that in certain respects we were prepared, we in no way detract from the wonder of the accomplishment. Indeed, it would be a reflection upon our genius if we stuck blindly to the assertion that we were wholly unprepared simply to emphasize a contrast. In forging the vast implements of war, yes, but in the resourcefulness that has been our abiding pride for nearly a century we were and are prepared. Conversion of industry is really our problem. Simply because our resourcefulness had for years been turned in the direction of peaceful industry did our seeming lack of preparedness stand

As Head of the Emergency Construction Section of the War Industries Board, the author has had, during the period of the government's great building programme, special insight into the problems involved, and writes from authoritative knowledge of the subject.

out, and yet with what pride we observe its transition under the grim necessity of war. The buoyant ingenuity that is in us turns the great machinery of peace into the channel of war, and within a year we are so far along on our new enterprise that an astounded world looks on with awe or admiration, according to the side from which the observation is made.

As a peaceful nation, building was, perhaps, our most spectacular achievement. Our cities were the wonder and admiration of the world on account of their great buildings, and our railroads and waterpowers, perhaps less spectacular but no less marvellous, were unparalleled feats of construction and engineering.

As a nation totally unprepared for war, perhaps our most conspicuous deficiency was in suitable buildings and structures to house and train the armies. Beyond that we lacked warehouses and terminals, hospitals, specialized factories, flyingfields and aerodromes, but we were not unprepared to produce them. All of these things were a necessary precedent to our preparation for war. The lack of buildings stood squarely across the path of the whole programme of war-making, and American genius was not only equal to but, in a measure, prepared for the demand that was to be made upon it.

The cantonments will always stand out as the spectacular building achievement of the war, and, indeed, as a marvellous first accomplishment, it is entitled to first place.

In the early days of the war when Congress was still occupied with the question of the draft law, and the provost general was working out the methods of its application, the government was quietly assembling the great constructional forces of the country, ready to undertake the huge task of building in three months' time the vast cantonment cities to receive

the army to be drafted. A hundred and fifty million dollars to be spent in three to four months, and the problem was not to be solved by the mere construction of buildings to shelter men! Sites had to be found-vast sites comprising in nearly every case from eight to twelve thousand acres. Their adaptability had to be quickly and accurately determined. Proper drainage and available water-supply were factors in the problem and the adaptation of the cantonment to the diverse and irregular terrain; a question that might easily have demanded months of study in other times had to be decided almost overnight. And in addition there were the questions of railroad construction, roads, sewers, water-supply, drainage, sewage disposal, heat, and light-to say nothing of hygiene and general sanitation. Between the middle of June, when the first contract for these cities was let, till September, when the first contingent of the army was called, practically all of these things were accomplished.

American building genius did it; a short phrase with which to compass an undertaking so vast, so unparalleled, and seemingly so impossible. And yet an allproviding Providence seemed to have pre

pared us, for even as we were essentially a nation of builders, so was our constructive ingenuity so developed that the thing was possible from the first. All the government had to do was to marshal the constructive resources, and the result was assured. Nothing here said should be construed as indicating that it was easily done, or done without a frightful strain upon our economic structure. That it was done at all is the tribute to our ability. The greatest. minds in the industry lent themselves to the task. They marshalled, they organized, they planned, they brought to the government all their ingenious schemes; their expediters and traffic men swarmed over the railroads of the country mobilizing and assembling materials, their important executives conferred with government officials and advised as to the use of railroads in the distribution of the necessary commodities. And as contractors they took up the work on the terms that the government laid down, cheerfully and uncomplainingly, although those terms were ridiculously low compared with peacetime practice.

Then there was the difficult and delicate situation regarding labor. Building

labor had long been high priced and highly organized. It had to be mobilized hastily and in vast quantities at these cantonment sites, which were necessarily isolated, and generally distant from the large cities, the reservoirs of labor. Having gotten labor out there, it was necessary that it be kept at work, which meant planning ahead both as to things to be done and things with which to do. Commissaries and barracks had to be established, and pure water and proper sanitary measures immediately provided. It was like lifting oneself by one's boot-straps, this business of mobilizing material and labor, and getting started all at once; yet it was all accomplished all together, not only in sixteen cantonments and sixteen National Guard camps, but in twenty or more flying-fields, and innumerable extensions to existing military posts; and, while the great struggle to get these mobilization centres ready was still in its early stages, the great storage and terminal programmes, and the new gas-making and powder-making programmes had to be started to say nothing of the innumerable demands for construction materials abroad. The thing is so vast, so complex, so diverse that the mind is apt to take it as a matter of course and view it much as one views national existence, or evolu

tion, or the cosmic universe, and pass on to more comprehensible subjects; but if one has the interest to look into the question it will be found to teem with intense interest, with joys and sorrows and romance, and like many other activities of life is susceptible of interesting explanation.

The builder is unlike any other organization that undertakes government work, for while the manufacturer of clothing, or shoes, or arms, operates from a factory with fixed machinery and plant, with sheltering roofs and stock-bins to draw from, and storehouses in which the surplus of his product may be stored, thus giving him fixed conditions and a measure of elasticity, the builder operates in the open under stress of weather and constantly changing conditions. No two operations are alike. His highly specialized labor is coming and going. Now the excavator, now the mason, now the carpenter, now the plumber, and then every varying combination of all of them. His plant may be large or small, according to the work he is undertaking, but his resourcefulness and ingenuity must be with him at all times. What he brings to the work is organization, traditional business experience, alertness, and enterprise, all expertly co-ordinated. He is, therefore, in