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Show UNCLE SAMS PREMIER GUNMAN COL. JOHN T. THOMPSON : ' In r: ; jtigf Get out of the path of this modified Enfield, officially known as the United States rifle, model 1917. It ehoots with an initial velocity of 2700 feet per second. Th bullet leaves the gun traveling at a rate of more than half a mile a second, and for several hundred yards hums along at something like 1500 miles an hour. Hie powder pow-der pressure in its chamber is 51,000 pounds per square inch, and your Yankee boy can shoot twenty times a minute. belt' and bandoleers at the rate of from twelve to twenty shots per minute, the quality of steel in his. rifle means something definite In his life. He may have "cussed and crabbed," as we say, or "gTOUsed," as our English Eng-lish cousins say, at the ten pounds and Ave ounces weight of his gun with its oiler, thong case and bayonet when on march. In action, his effectiveness depends upon his gun, and he blesses it and gives it an endearing nickname. It's his sweetheart, a loyal and true American sweetheart. I like to think of the rifle in terms . of the 1000 persons who make each weapon 1000 loyal Americans shooting shoot-ing at every shot at the Hun and in terms of the porsonality of Colonel Thompson, the man who devised it and who organized its production on such a stupendous scale. Family of Army Men I chatted with the colonel and his wife In their cozy apartment on Sixteenth Six-teenth ' street near the French em- Ford is the exponent of standardization standardiza-tion in the manufacture of automobiles. automo-biles. For the first time in its history, thanks to Colonel Thompson, a single rifle and a single pistol cartridge are being used for all troops in the army and for the navy. In the Civil War sixty-nine different types of small arms, almost every type requiring its special ammunition, were used by (the Union forces. How, I asked the colonel, had he tackled the tremendous task of small-arms small-arms production that the War Department Depart-ment had given him when, at the entry of America in the war, he had been called into active service from the Eddystone rifle plant, of which he had made such a success, and the little farm near the Spring Haven Country Club at Wallingford, in Delaware County, where he was living. "All great things are simple," the colonel answered, puffing thoughtfully thought-fully at his cigar. "First, study the work of successful men in similar lines sturdy and sound, an incisive officer of the old school, yet the most modern of business men, there was a certain idealism about him that made understanding under-standing easy of his action in giving up many thousands of dollars a year at Eddystone and coming back to do his bit for his country for no more pay than goes with a colonel's eagles. What Mr. Vauclain, who is chairman chair-man of the committee on production of the war industries board, thinks of Colonel Thompson is stated as follows in a letter I have been privileged privi-leged to see: "Colonel Thompson," wrote Mr. Vauclain, "is a very modest man, one of the most modest men of ability that I have ever come in contact with. I regard him one of the greatest great-est authorities on small arms in the world. He was in my employ before he went into the army. It is true that he designed and built the Bridgeport plant. It is also true he was my con- . suiting engineer at the Remington Arms Company, which is now manu- I find that when Colonel Thompson, in his thirty-seventh year of service, retired from -the army Brigadier General Gen-eral Crozier, ' then chief of ordnance, wrote to the adjutant general as follows: fol-lows: "Colonel Thompson is one of . the most valuable officers in the ordnance ord-nance department. Throughout his service he has brought to' bear faithful faith-ful and successful application to every . duty which has fallen under his attention." at-tention." And I note with interest that, on the floor of the Senate oh Thursday, June 27, Colonel Thompson's Thomp-son's work was lauded as "a brilliant record of achievement" by Senator Thomas, of Colorado. The colonel, I do believe, is not much concerned with rewards. He came back into the game fifty-eight years old, to cIq his bit, and he has done it. He sits in his office, acting as advisory engineer to the chief of ordnance, and regards with satisfaction satisfac-tion the production figures mounting and mounting for the greatest army many and intricate operations necessary neces-sary to its production as a first-class fighting weapon. They lecture to classes of officers on the new arm. They see that repairs are promptly and properly made to all rifles. They aid on the ranges. They teach the green man how to care for his gun. They shoot it and show him, to his own satisfaction no matter how poor the scores he may have made that It is a weapon absolutely to be relied upon., "Comrades 'Well Done!" General Pershing, realizing that the rifle in the hands of an American is a mighty dangerous and efficient weapon, has said that he wants men who can shoot. It is safe to say that he Is getting such men. The development and immense quantity production of the 1917 rifle has been Colonel Thompson's great work, but it is by no means all that he has done. He was responsible more than anv other man for thA served at Rock Island and at Springfield. Spring-field. He was lieutenant colonel of volunteers in the Spanish-American War and chief ordnance officer at Tampa. He prepared the first war plans of the ordnance. On numerous occasions he has acted as chief of ordnance. : Thompson is America's premier gunman. History will record that fact. History will tell how he was given by ids country one of the biggest big-gest orders ever given a human being, and of how he made good. There were only 4000 gunmakors in this country before the great plants started to produce for the Allies. There was an immediate demand for 30,000 gunmakers. These men Thompson Thomp-son has developed and many, many more. At the height of production of Enfield rifles for tho British, one man finally assembled fifty weapons in a day and the average assembler did, forty. Thompson's standardization tn responsible for an average final as- BPmhlv nnr man npr Hnv of 9llfl rml jaagef . r ' ,, s(iK s m i nT W Here is tho famous Colt automatic .45 " VNVJ WV that tlie American soldier uses so effee , if ,""' W 1 1 tively when it comes to the lo-,e-up fight- f J V , Jf in? in t!le Hun trenche. Thompson was ' ' jt asssss5'' instrumental in its adoption The figure jsA A to the right is that of the 4'5- , -s , . , v ,' I 43K. " caliber of 1911 model, winle ' f he 'VAp'V'X ifte at to the. left is the Colt 'I tVH V ' ' IT-L 'l M fifi douhle-action .45.calibci 1917 f 4l IjJ t l jjl bassy. There wasn't a rifle in sight anywhere. Only lazy chairs, a very interesting army gentleman and his wife, and a wonderful view out over tho city of Washington with its gray monument, beyond which over the Potomac the stars played their eternal eter-nal game of hide-and-seek, as they play it over No Man's Land. There were three pictures on the table at my elbow a picture of Colonel Colo-nel James Thompson, West Point, '51; Colonel John T. Thompson, West Poiht, '82, and Major Marcellus H. Thompson, West Point, '06. Grandfather, father and son, all United States army men. America's small-arms expert does not live for his rifles alone. His boy is fighting in France, just as his grandfather fought in the Civil War as chief of artillery under Kearny, Franklin and Gordon Granger. While the present colonel speeds up rifle, pistol and ammunition .production and pauses now and then to write to his boy over there, the grandfather, sleeping in another and warless land, hears the bugles calling at Chickamaugua and the Peninsula. "Give the Americans anything that 1s to be made by machinery," said the colonel, "and they will beat any one in the world. "Standardization means quick production." pro-duction." There, In two crisp sentences. Is Colonel Thompson's creed, the creed that built the great Remington plant at Bridgeport, Conn., and the greater plant at Eddystone, Pa.; tho creed that Is responsible for arming with the most efficient arm in tho world more than 10,000 men a day. Colonel Thompson is the exponent of standardization in the manufacture of small arms for this war, as Henry and put your plan down in writing. Then submit it to the men working with you. Develop team work. Modify Mod-ify your plan as occasion demands. "I believe that 66 per cent of success suc-cess in manufacturing depends upon the human factor rather than upon the mechanical factor. My principle has been to select big, broad and efficient effi-cient men, and to put them to work at something they know how to do or at some similar lino of work. "Say to them: 'There's your job. Go to it. Go to it in your 'Own way. Stand on your head if you want to in getting it done, but get it done!' What Vauclain Wrote "Give the men you have selected your entire confidence and then don't He down in a furrow and go to sleep. Chart your organization every inch of it and follow the work up "Never dismiss one of your principal men if you can avoid it. Shift him. Treat all- your men with courtesy and firmness. Team work is what counts and team work is not developed by dropping men. "A man is valuable only in so far as he can energize men. "I think that success In rifle production pro-duction came in getting the men so worked up that they wanted to bite the Germans. Among the men that I selected to assist me in the production produc-tion of rifles were at least three $25,000 a year men, who in life outside out-side the army would not have cooperated. co-operated. Working to beat the Germans Ger-mans energized with that one idea they worked together in perfect harmony har-mony and produced results." Colonel Thompson leaned back in his chair, smiling at the picture of Major Marcellus, his son. Gray, S " i" " " ' y ' COLONEL JOHN T. THOMPSON Builder of tlic Remington and Eddystone Ed-dystone plants, an international ex-' ex-' pert, he now is Uncle Sam's small anna chieftain, directing the manufacture manu-facture of rifles, revolvers, etc. ! By A. R. Stanley HMHIS is the story of the man behind 'jf J- the guns the story of Colonel John Taliaferro Thompson, of the United States army, the small arms expert of the country, y Every eager young American who ! climbs a gangplank and takes a trip r to France to "hit a Heinie" owes a great deal to the rather plump and r stocky colonel who smiles and cracks jokes with you across his desk in his arsenal of an office In the army ordnance ord-nance building at Sixth and B streets in Washington. Colonel Thompson is the man who produced the new army rifle, the modi-1 modi-1 fted Enfield, officially known as tho United States rifle, model 1.017. That weapon Is the Yanks' chief reliance on offense and defense. Upon its effectiveness effec-tiveness hangs victory or defeat, life ur death. The model 1917 is conceded to be the most efficient Hun-getter invented. Its bullets fly straight to the mark. They do not miss fire and they do not Jam, and they strike to kill. America may well be proud of its i 'riile record.-- The-War Department has ' announced that more than 1,250,000 of the model 1917 have been produced. They are coming along now steadily at the rate' of 43,000 a week with spare , parts counted, at the rate of do.ooo: Only last week Cahill, a workman at Eddystone, Pa., finally assembled "81 of the rides In ton hours. It is somewhat to the credit of America, and incidentally to the credit of Colo-i- nel Thompson, to note that the rifle department de-partment of the Midvale Steel and Ordnance Company, at Eddystone, is producing approximately 5000 rifles per day. Shoots Three-Miles The Philadelphia section, in other words, is producing one-half of all the rifles for America's great army. It Isn't so many months ago that the kind on which the Eddystone rifle mill stands was an inconspicuous and swampy meadow meandering, as meadows have a habit of meandering, down to the Delaware. Tliat meadow has played its part in the establishment of the world'u rifle production record. The War of 1S12 cost les:; than America has spent or obligated on rifles and cartridges in one year. I mention cartridges because Colonel Thompson ''haturally is interested in cartridges, of which. It Is permitted to state, we have produced close to 2,000.000,000 of various calibers since the war began for us. The United States model 1917 rifle, which all of our National Army boys lr, are toting over here and over there, hi-nd in which all (rue Americans .should be interested until they read T of the sunlight glinting uloug the barrels bar-rels of a million Yanks marching through Berlin, will shoot 5200 yards, or about three miles. Iv , More than 90.000 persons men and ;.v ' women are making the rifle and Its hie cartridges. There are more than 100 ' ur ' parts in each weapon, bayonet in- fin eluded. 4 v J Every rifle that goes into the hands f of a Yankee is the product of 1000 'f1' pairs of hands. That is. 1000 different "v" operations, performed by 1000 different ','1 persons, are required to produce one ,.-r of the weapons. I The rifle shoots with an initial vc- locity of 2700 feet per second, the bullet traveling when it leaves the gun, in other words, at more than a half mile a secondhand for several hundred yards it plugs straight ahead at some-x some-x thir.g like 1500 miles per hour. I When your National Army lad pulls the trigger of his model 1917 he pro-J pro-J duces a powder pressure In Its cham-i cham-i her of 31,000 pounds per square Inch oA more than twenty-five tons which is. ;v Colonel Thompson remarks, "some ..Jet-sure." Correct. The steel that Xiust withstand twenty-rive tons pre ' sure to the square inch is also some - tteel. , J . When your National Army 'ad is '-'-y , - "1- t it and is shooting tho : he carries in his wob facturing 50 per cent of all the rifles being received by our Government. "It is due to his engineering skill and advice that we were successful. I regard his remodeling of the English Eng-lish Enfield rifle a masterpiece of scientific sci-entific work. We seldom are able to put together more than forty rifles of the English pattern per man per day, whereas with the modern rifles we have men who have assembled 200 rifles per day's work and who have made correspondingly higher wages." Since Mr. Vauclain wrote this letter the average final assembly of rifles per day per man has become 200, and one man. Cahill has assembled 281 rifles. Mr. Vauclain is not the only man who has recognized Colonel Thompson's Thomp-son's work. Delving into the records, adoption by the United States army of the Colt automatic .43, a weapon far superior to the Luger, or "Para-bellum," "Para-bellum," pistol of the Germans. He was largely interested in the development de-velopment of the new cavalry saber and the new infantry and cavalry equipment. Colonel Thompson was "born In the army" on December 31, 1860, at Newport, New-port, Kentucky. The Civil War was on and his father was stationed at Fort Brown. Texas, a second lieutenant lieu-tenant in tho Second United States Artillery. Young Thompson as is frequently the case with army babies did a good deal of traveling before his father became professor of civil engineering at Indiana University. The young man 6pent part of a year as a freshman at Indiana and entered West Point, from which he was graduated grad-uated in 1S82. It Is a coincidence that he was assigned to his father's old regiment and attached to his father's old battery. He has served as chief of ordnance officer of the Departments of the Platte and of Missouri. He has been assistant inspector of ordnance and gunnery at West Point. He has 1917 rifles, every part of every wenpon interchangeable with like parts of another weapon, and every wejpon shooting America's splendid ammunition ammuni-tion the rimless caliber .30; i weapon that does not Jam, a weapon on which every American who cracks away at Heinio can absolutely rely. Colonel Thompson and his ,-. workers were "on the Job" night mid day while the rifle was developing and production was organizim; and gathering momentum. "People don't fitrlko things by luck," comments tho colonel. When his job was done, the colonel dictated a good-by message to his staff of big men, the men ho had told to "stand on your he.-irln If you want to in getting it done, but get It done." "Comrades," dictated the colonel, "well done." Three words only. Tyrlrat of tho 'colonel. No (hanks necessary or expected. ex-pected. A soldier's job tuck led and completed. Satisfaction enough (o know that tho American soldier has the best rifle In the world ;hk a many of them as he m;iy need jn hl business of getting the Hun. ''Russian 'Caviar From U. 8. A. the world has ever known of rifles, pistols and small arms ammunition. He is satisfied that the . boys who tackle the Hun are armed with rifles 50 per cent more efficient than the guns of the Germans and that the Yanks can shoot three shots to the enemy's two. He can be satisfied that. In his life, he has been largely responsible for the building and development of the great rifle plants at Bridgeport and at Eddystone, plants that should hold the rifle trado of the world after the war, taking awa., the trade that Germany boasted in feeding Its Mausers Mau-sers to China. Chile, Argentina, Holland, Hol-land, Spain, Rumania in fact, to all nations except the United States, ' England Russia, Italy and Japan. . "The combined product of our plants is now the largest in the world," says Colonel Thompson. "Eddystone has a capacity of 6000 model 1917 rifles per day: Illon. N. Y., 3000: Remington, at Bridgeport, 2000. The Springfield Armory produces 1200 Springfields; the Rock Island Arsenal, 500. Not even Germany approaches such production." 'Follow-Ups" in Camps "This has been a great mechanical experience for the country. Men who never knew what accuracy meant are now working on operations on the rifle that require accuracy to the one one-thousandth part of an inch." Not satisfied with having made the rifle and speeded up lis production, Colonel Thompson is following his weapons into the camps and canton ments of the country. He is following them with a score of expert riflemen who have been commissioned as officers offi-cers in the ordnance department of the United States army. This corps Includes such men ils Major William I.ibbey, of Princeton, N. J., president of- the National Rifle Association; Major Smith W. Erookhart, of Iowa, who has captained many teams that have won many national match honors; Major Stuart V. Wh:e, of Massachusetts, a rifleman of International Inter-national repute, and others of equal skill. The duty of these mn Is to acquaint ac-quaint the "raw rookie" with tho new weapon. It was realized that the green drafted man who had never fired a rifle could not he blamed if he failed to make good as a m3rksman. The demonstrators as soon as commissioned commis-sioned were sent to the plants where the 1917 rifln is belr.g made. There they followed th9 rifle through the FEED BAO -AfiD EfHG- 7 PUM no. r-o raw coat ok ovei?eoAY t cartridge belt POMMEL PceKt-T ik , BLT -STOCK CXrvtri. ..v A j I CARRIER. STRAP I ' ' " '" ; I 1 r " . " N " ' ' - ' a This cavalryman is togsed out uitli complete arcoule rrnenls for active service. Colonel Xliompsaii vas largely retponsible for its development and adoption TNDtTSTRIALi paralynls in Russia has not affected seriously the caviar supply, for the upper Mississippi is on the job producing rnor Russian caviar than ever. When It Is shipped from the upper Mississippi towns and cities a mass of tiny, shiny eggs It i3 marked "sturgeon roe." When It is served at un-Hooverized prices in fashionable dining places in the East, London and Paris it Is as "Russian caviar" that It tickles the palate of the epicurean. Tho roe of the Mississippi sturgeon la quite equal In quality and flavor to the roe obtained from the sturgeons of the great Russian rivers, the Don and Dnieper. Russian fithermen have made caviar a fruitful source of Income In-come for many years, but it was not until recently that Mississippi River fishermen began gathering the roe of the sturgeons that live In enormous numbers in the northern (stretches of the Father of Waters. They have found a ready market and the business exceedingly profitable. On how larg a scale the business Is conducted is shown by the shipment of 3000 pounds of roe in one season by one fish dealer in a small up-rlvcr town. There xire hundreds of dealers handling roe on the upper river, and if statistics could be given It would I.e. shown probably that tens of thousands of pounds are shipped annually. Most t,f the supply is sent to liuropo, where caviar is more favored an u food than in the United States. The sturgeon JE amazingly prolific. Three million eggs Is considered only an average summer production for one female. Sometimes unc-thlid die weight of the fish Is found to bo roe. This was tho c.-iKe in u lifl y-pouiid sturgeon caught near I'ralrie du Chien. Wis., which yielded seventoen pounds of eggs. The caviar told fur 514. ;,0. Sturgeons of tremendous r.t.r. nre now and then taken from the river. One caught at Mcfirr-gor, la., measured meas-ured fi feet 3 Inches and weighed lUi pounds. The sturgeon upa-.vns in Juno. The roe-gathering s'ason thus clones at that time. It op"n.r. ai-ain in September Septem-ber to Inst through until tho following June. The sturgeon ere caught in nets out in tho deeper waters, where they live with the other big fish, the buffalo, Cerman carp and red horse. The roe when taken from tho fish era enmeshed In a wob. They are free by pressing through a sieve. |