Great Lakes Naval Station is Navy’s largest training installation

Through the decades, Illinois has been home to several military installations, including Naval Station Great Lakes, the largest training center of the U.S. Navy.

Located along Lake Michigan near North Chicago in Lake County, NSGL covers about 1,600 acres with 1,153 buildings, including 39 that are on the National Register of Historic Places.

A hallmark of the base is Building 1, commonly known as the Clocktower Building. It is a striking red brick structure with a tall clock tower. The buildings and facilities inside the base are connected by 69 miles of roads.

Like many large American military installations, NSGL is often referred to as a “small city.” The base supports more than 50 tenant commands and elements, housing more than 20,000 sailors, Marines, soldiers and Department of Defense civilian workers.

That’s actually fewer than have been assigned to NSGL in the past, particularly in wartime. During America’s brief entry into World War I, more than 125,000 sailors received training at the base, with about 45,000 personnel onsite at the time of the armistice in November 1918.

Of the roughly 16 million Americans who served on active duty during World War II, about 4 million were in the Navy. One million sailors received training at NSGL during the war.

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When President Theodore Roosevelt approved the construction of the base in 1904, the decision raised some eyebrows. According to the U.S. Navy website, “It was unheard of – and many people were astounded – to have Naval training be done more than a thousand miles away from any ocean.”

However, the location was selected, in part, because of the number of sailors who hailed from the region. According to the website, “Many of [the] best sailors came from the American Midwest. Why not train sailors in the same part of the country?”

The facility was built on 172 acres described as “pretty much wilderness.” The process was supervised by Navy Capt. Albert Ross, while the original 39 buildings were designed by prominent Chicago architect Jarvis Hunt.

NSGL opened on July 1, 1911. Two days later, the first recruit, Joseph Gregg of Terre Haute, Indiana. arrived. Gregg died on June 30, 1966 – almost 55 years later, to the day – and was buried in the cemetery at NSGL.

By the end of World War I, the base had 776 buildings. During the influenza pandemic of 1918, a group of sailor-musicians, many of them from NSGL, embarked on a national tour of the U.S. led by John Philip Sousa. Sousa eventually went on become Bandmaster of Great Lakes, and his musicians spearheaded a Liberty Bond drive that began in New York before crisscrossing the nation.

A Naval Reserve Air Base was commissioned in 1923. However, NSGL was placed on maintenance status in 1933, only to be reopened two years later after lobbying by local businessmen and Congressional representatives.

Aviation training was shifted to Glenview in 1936, mainly because of the need for better and longer runways. The original commanding officer at Glenview was Cmdr. Richard Byrd, the first man to fly the North Pole.

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NSGL underwent a sweeping transformation in World War II with the foresight of Capt. Ralph Spalding, who was in public works. Two hours he received news of the Pearl Harbor attack, Spalding was in the office of the commandant outlining plans to grow the base to meet the global threat.

In the next 10 months, the base expanded to about 1,600 acres, with more than 100,000 sailors in training throughout 17 camps.

In 1945, 13 galleys at NSGL were serving about 300,000 meals a day, consisting of an estimated 17,000 pounds of fresh fruit, 7,000 gallons of milk, 108,000 eggs, 11,000 loaves of bread, 7,000 pies, 8 tons of cold cuts and cheese and 2,000 gallons of ice cream.

During wartime, NSGL sports teams shone on a national level. When military teams took the place of many college squads at the time, the NSGL team won the 1919 Rose Bowl with standout figures such as George Halas, Jim Conzelman and Paddy Driscoll. Each went on to be indicted in the Pro Football Hall of Fame, among 15 Great Lakes players who chose to advance to the NFL.

From 1942 to 1945, the NSGL football team rolled to a 33-11-3 record, including a 19-14 win over top-ranked Notre Dame in a game played Nov. 27, 1943, on the the Navy’s home base. It was the only defeat of the season for the Irish, who were named national champions.

The NSGL baseball team racked up an 188-32 record during World War II. In an exhibition game in July 1945 against the Chicago Cubs on the NSGL base, Chief Petty Officer Bob Feller, a future member of the Baseball Hall of Fame, struck out 10 in a 1-0 win in front of 12,000 sailors. The Cubs won the National League pennant that season.

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In World War II, the Navy chose NSGL to house the first African-American trainees in the branch’s history. On June 5, 1942, the first Black recruit, 19-year-old Doreston Luke Carmen, reported for training at Camp Robert Smalls. The camp was named for a Civil War hero, and it was one of the segregated camps on base. Three months later, “Negro Service Schools” were created for graduates. More than 7,000 students were trained in the Camp Smalls Service Schools.

In 1944, some of the training was integrated, and by the next year, integration was ordered for all training at NSGL.

One of many unique chapters in the history of NSGL was the so-called Golden 13, the first African-American naval officers of the modern era who were commissioned in March 1944 after a rigorous – and racially biased – testing process.

The men were honored in 1987 with the opening of the Golden 13 Recruit Inprocessing Center, now used for every new recruit who joins the Navy. Eight surviving members of the Golden 13 were in attendance for the ceremony.

Women at NSGL also took steps forward in the era. Although some few “yeomanettes” served in World War I, female recruits – then called WAVES – played a part in the base in October 1942 after the arrival of Ensign Marion Knight.

By the end of World War II, about 1,400 WAVES served as yeomen, storekeepers, pharmacists’ mates and gunnery instructors at NSGL.

A WAVES boot camp opened in 1948 at NSGL, and the initial contingent consisted of 320 women. Training for WAVES continued at NSGL until late 1951.

That same year, hostilities escalated in the Korean War. NSGL graduated 98 companies of recruits in just one week, matching numbers from World War II. During the conflict, sailors at NSGL donated more than 50,000 pints of blood for their wounded Americans on the front.

In 1954, construction began on a new Gunnery School, which was designed by architect Bruce Graham. Graham also was the co-designer of the Sears Tower and John Hancock Center. The Gunnery School was defined by its massive glass-front façade and was used until its demolition in 2012.

In December 1960, the Navy dedicated the opening of an 825-bed Great Lakes Naval Hospital for more than 11,000 patients during the Vietnam War. Fifty years later, the hospital’s operations were transferred to the Capt. James A. Lovell Federal Health Care Center.

Throughout the 1980s and 1990s, the base underwent a massive upgrade in facilities, as many older buildings, some of them wooden structures intended for temporary service in World War II, were demolished in favor of state-of-the-art buildings that meet the modern needs of the military. Several popular restaurants now dot the base, including a McDonald’s location which opened in 1984.

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Until 1993, the U.S. Navy had three training facilities: Great Lakes, Orlando and San Diego. That year, the Base Realignment and Closure Commission recommended the closure of Orlando and San Diego, leaving Great Lakes as the sole training facility for sailors.

Beginning in 1997, the RTC Recapitalization Program oversaw a comprehensive $770 million building program that was completed in 2010. Thirteen huge barracks were constructed as part of the program, each with 120,000 square feet of space for 12 recruit divisions of 88 recruits each.

By then, many sailors trained at Great Lakes had participated in Operation Iraqi Freedom and other initiatives in the Middle East.

NSGL celebrated its 100th anniversary on July 1, 2011, with a celebration attended by more than 6,000 base personnel, family members of recruits, elected officials and current and retired military members.

• Tom Emery is a freelance writer and historical researcher from Carlinville. He may be reached at 217-710-8392 or ilcivilwar@yahoo.com.