Photo By Jefferson Wolfe | Volunteers carry an M-1903 mess hall table into the Quartermaster Museum Jan. 5. The...... read more read more
Jefferson Wolfe
Deputy Public Affairs Officer
FORT LEE, Va. – Thanks to a volunteer’s keen eye and passion for historical restoration, there is a new exhibit at the Army Quartermaster Museum.
The items were discovered in a Museum workshop by Lee Holland, a long-time post employee who is now retired. “I dropped something that rolled underneath a piece of furniture, and I looked up and saw the ‘U.S.’ stamped on it,” he said of the M-1903 mess hall table built by Tammany Industries, Ind., in Oct. 1948.
Holland said the piece was in terrible condition, having been neglected since it was removed in 1998 from a World War II-era bachelor officer quarters building that was being torn down to make way for the Army Women’s Museum. Nobody realized the table had any historic value.
With a bit of research, Holland learned the table design was around for nearly 100 years, dating back to 1883. Recognizing it wasn’t just another piece of old furniture, he decided to refinish it so it could be put to use at the museum.
The legs and framing of the table are made of cast iron and the table surface is hardwood – a “combination of chestnut, hickory and oak,” according to Holland. “They didn’t care about the mix of materials. It just had to be hardwood.”
Further describing the condition of the table, Holland said its surface was marred by paint and glue and the legs were covered in floor wax. He guessed it was never moved when the mess hall floor was cleaned because of its colossal weight. Moving it required a team of six individuals.
It took about 100 hours to restore the table. Holland said he completely refinished the surface and legs to return them to their original condition.
A table of this vintage also would have come with ten M-1883 stools for Soldiers to sit on while they were eating. Holland found a couple of them at an estate sale.
“The stools accompanied the standard mess hall table with the most common configuration being five per side for enlisted men,” according to a display card Holland made for the exhibit. “At each end of the table were chairs, one for NCOs (without arms) and one for the officers (with arms).”
The stools were made at Jefferson Indiana Quartermaster Depot, and were used with the tables from the early 1880s until 1950.
“I can’t find in the literature anywhere that the Army made the table, but we know they made the stools,” Holland said.
The stools were assembled with several varieties of wood, including oak, maple, poplar, and occasionally walnut. Holland spent about six hours each restoring them to what they would have looked like when they were in use. Originally, they were finished in a natural oil rub.
“Sometime after 1900, the stools started to appear in a painted coal flat back,” the display card on the furniture reads. “Depending on the unit, stool seats appeared in the classic branch service colors: yellow for Cavalry, buff for Quartermaster, red for Artillery, blue for Infantry, etc.”
In the middle of the stool is a fire-plug shaped block that served as a place for a Soldier to put a uniform cap while eating.
The tables had ten hooks on the underside on which the stools were hung after the meal was complete.
Next to the mess hall table and the stools is a No. 1 Space Heater, manufactured for the Quartermaster Corps by the Locke Stove Co., Kansas City, Mo. in 1942. It was used to heat numerous kind of buildings, including mess halls, day rooms, orderly rooms and other structures. This type of heater was considered to be transportable because it was fairly light.
The space heater, table and stools are set up near the museum’s classroom, and the table will likely be used as a place to put food and refreshments during retirements, promotions and other events hosted at the museum. Presently, the facility is closed to the public as a safeguard against the spread of COVID-19. No reopening date has been set.
Holland’s historical restoration work can be seen in other areas of the QM Museum as well. His primary forte is military vehicles. He has rebuilt a 1942-era MB ¼-ton jeep and WC56 command car, a 1943 1-ton trailer and WC54 ambulance, a 1944 GMC CCKW353 truck and others. A six-wheel amphibious vehicle known as a “Duck” (its actual nomenclature is DUKW) is part of a permanent display here.
Other vehicles in the collection are kept in an out-building behind his home in Chester. He calls the structure his “motor pool,” and it too is a re-creation of military history, as it was built to the exact specifications of Army 700-314 Motor Pool plans, dated 1938, that were found at Fort Lee.
They were for a previous motor pool building that used to be located along Shop Road on post, according to Holland.
| Date Taken: | 01.14.2021 |
| Date Posted: | 01.19.2021 14:03 |
| Story ID: | 387164 |
| Location: | FORT LEE, VIRGINIA, US |
| Web Views: | 65 |
| Downloads: | 0 |
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