Here is some information on the Commanding officer at the time & the Arsenal
John Boursiquot Rose
Date of birth: January 4, 1885
Date of death: January 13, 1966
John Rose graduated from the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, Class of 1907. He retired as a U.S. Army Brigadier General.
AWARDS AND CITATIONS
Legion of Merit
SYNOPSIS: Colonel John Boursiquot Rose, United States Army, was awarded the Legion of Merit for exceptionally meritorious conduct in the performance of outstanding services to the Government of the United States as Commanding Officer, Frankford Arsenal, from 1942 to 1945.
Action Date: 1942 - 1945
Service: Army
Rank: Colonel
History of the Arsenal
Opened in 1816 on 20 acres (8.1 ha) of land purchased by President James Madison, it was the center of U.S. military small-arms ammunition design and development until its closure in 1977. Among the many other products manufactured at the arsenal were fire-control and range-finding instruments, and gauges for these components.[3]
With the outbreak of the Civil War, the arsenal's commander, Josiah Gorgas, resigned and joined the Confederate States Army in deference to the wishes of his Alabama-born wife and reporting to the Confederate capital in Richmond with a large supply of U.S. Army guns and ammunition. By the end of the war, the arsenal employed over 1,000 workers. It served as a major site for the storage of weapons and artillery pieces, a depot for the repair of artillery, cavalry and infantry equipment, repair and cleaning of small arms and harnesses, the manufacture of percussion powder and Minié balls, and the testing of new forms of gunpowder and time fuses. During the Gettysburg Campaign, the arsenal provided tens of thousands of muskets and vast supplies of ammunition for Pennsylvania's "Emergency Militia" regiments. Among the innovations extensively tested at the Arsenal was the Gatling Gun, an early form of machine gun that saw extensive service in the Indian Wars.
During World War I and World War II, the arsenal was again busy with supplying the war efforts, providing a major source of jobs and income for the region. At times, employment reached 22,000.
The Frankford Arsenal was an entity unto itself, a virtual city within a city, and contained everything from its own police and fire departments, Buildings and Grounds, dining halls, as well as everything from maintenance and motor pool, to a complete medical facility. The Arsenal was part of the U.S. Arsenal System-dedicated military establishments spread throughout the country to perform specific military missions for the Government.
From the beginning, the Frankford Arsenal was involved in the design and manufacture of munitions. As military weapons became more complex, the Center's role expanded to cover the development of a whole range of the Army's more advanced weapon systems. The Arsenal contained the world-famous Pitman-Dunn Laboratories along with a number of other R&D departments. Arsenal scientists and engineers designed and developed everything from basic materials to LASER guided ballistics, all produced entirely in-house from the concept phase to the fielding of the equipment. New portable and imbedded computer applications saw the development of the LASER rangefinder, fielded artillery computational machines (FADAC) and radar systems. During the Vietnam War, experiments in caseless ammunition, far-infrared low-light-level technologies, and advanced LASER applications were under development.
The labs were supported by a full range of first-class drafting and machine shops scattered throughout the many buildings of the Center. Everything from milling, to electroplating, to multi-layer printed circuit board fabrication could be accomplished by “The Shops”. The Optical Lens Design Facility was one of the finest in the country. The Optical Assembly shop also refurbished field binoculars.
Source Wikipedia
Ray
