Page:This side the trenches, with the American Red cross (IA thissidetrenches00desc).pdf/40



Service in the American army and navy is for many men an educational opportunity. All the ingenuity of modern science is focused upon the battlefront. There is not a form of technical skill that is not useful there. The man in uniform is not merely a soldier or a sailor; he may be also an electrician; a telegrapher; a wireless operator; an aeronautical expert; a mathematician; and so on through all the trades, professions, and businesses in the world.

Men who before the war were unskilled laborers are now apprenticed in occupations requiring knowledge and experience. They will leave the army and the navy as trained artisans. At the great camps where the soldiers are receiving military instruction, and at the naval reserve stations, classes are being conducted in everything from arithmetic to English and French. Entertainments of various kinds are being held and the men are being educated even through their recreation. Then there is the trip to Europe and the many things which, aside from the life in the trenches, the men are seeing and experiencing. Before the war, travel abroad was the privilege only of those who were wealthy enough, or were willing to make sacrifices enough, to obtain the money needed for such a journey. Now this is the opportunity of more than a million American men. Let