Private: Army Service Forces

     A studio portrait of an enlisted man with the rank of private following his graduation from basic training at Fort Monmouth in 1943. Fort Monmouth, once located in Monmouth County, New Jersey, was home to the U.S. Army's Eastern Signal Corps Training Center. The center contained the Eastern Signal Corps Schools for enlisted, officer candidate, and officer personnel as well as the Replacement Training Center. The latter was housed in Camp Charles Wood which, along with Camp Coles and Camp Evans, were encompassed within Fort Monmouth's boundaries. The officer candidate Signal Corps school was the “bread and butter” of the facility, graduating a little over 21,000 men as newly commissioned second lieutenants between 1941 and 1946. Also housed at Fort Monmouth during World War Two was the U.S. Army's Film Training Lab.

     The private excelled at marksmanship during his training as evidenced by the Marksmanship Qualification Badge worn on the left coat pocket. He achieved the lowest grade, that of Marksman, as evidenced by the plain award. Beneath it are three clasps, denoting what he earned the badge in. The top clasp is Rifle, the clasp below it is Machine Gun, and the third clasp is Carbine. To receive the clasps in each weapon class, he had to meet a specific number of target hits at various ranges and in different positions. Other common wartime clasps included Pistol, Bayonet, Grenade, BAR (Browning Automatic Rifle), and Submachine Gun among others. As a note, the next highest grade of the badge was Sharpshooter which included a round target on the badge while the highest grade was Expert and that badge consisted of a Sharpshooter Badge encompassed by laurels. The patch on his shoulder is that of the Army Service Forces and a part of that organization included the six technical services of the Army: Corps of Engineers, Ordnance Department, Quartermaster Corps, Chemical Corps, Medical Corps, and the Signal Corps. The private is a part of the Signal Corps as evidenced by the branch insignia of the Signal Corps on the coat's lapels. The insignia is that of two key components of a wigwag kit that consisted of two wigwag flags and a torch (the rest of the kit contained kerosene for the torch and a signal flare). Wigwag, more properly known as aerial telegraphy, was a method of flag signaling developed by U.S. Army surgeon Albert J. Myer who would become the very first commanding officer of the Signal Corps which was established on June 21, 1860. Thus, the significance of using the flags and torch as the branch insignia.

     As for Fort Monmouth, following World War Two, the Pigeon Breeding and Training Center was added to the campus though it was closed in 1957. The Signal Corps itself left Fort Monmouth in the 1970s, making its new home at Fort Gordon, Georgia. What remained was the Communications-Electronics Command Life Cycle Management Command (CECOM LCMC), the 754th. Explosive Ordnance Disposal Unit, Joint Interoperability Test Command, United States Military Academy Preparatory School (USMAPS), and the Patterson Army Health Clinic. Unfortunately, Fort Monmouth fell to the ax of the Base Realignment and Closure (BRAC) process and after all of the entities on the fort were relocated, Fort Monmouth was officially closed on September 15, 2011. Given the length of time the BRAC process took, then New Jersey Governor Jon Corzine signed the Fort Monmouth Economic Revitalization Act on April 28, 2006 that established the Fort Monmouth Revitalization Planning Authority in order to guide the redevelopment of Fort Monmouth and the land it sits on following its closure.