Chapter 19: The Language of Supply
One of the important lessons of World War II, according to the Hoover Commission, was the need for a better means of identifying and classifying military stores.1 This conclusion was based to a large extent on Ordnance experience, for Ordnance failed to solve this problem satisfactorily during World War II. In spite of persistent efforts, Field Service did not work out an effective means of identification and communication, so that the soldier in the field, the storekeeper in the depot, and the official in Washington could all speak the same language.
The problem mainly concerned spare parts.2 A tank, a gun, or a truck could be identified at sight, even though its nomenclature might sometimes cause trouble. But its parts were a different matter. They were numerous, and many were hard to identify. In the critical months of preparation for the invasion of Europe, a report that there was a shortage of spare parts startled men who were familiar with the great flow of production after Pearl Harbor. The Chief of Ordnance found it “inconceivable that there can be an actual physical lack of spare parts per se”; he believed that “parts are available but they are not recognized and are not identified. They are, in other words, in effect, lost.3
In the late 1930s a British expert on logistics suggested that the art of war might be read in terms of the spare—human and material—and that in the warfare of the future the emphasis might conceivably be on the mechanical rather than the human reinforcement. A missing or faulty part, small, inexpensive, and ordinarily negligible, that immobilized a tank on the eve of battle assumed a value greater than even a replacement for the tank commander himself. A man could replace a man but nothing else a particular part. And the time, place, and occasion of the need for it was unpredictable. Nobody could say with certainty what part would break or fail, or when or where. Therefore spare parts control in the sense of seeing to it that the man in the field had the part when he needed it was “the essence of supply.”4
With each lot of one hundred tanks, guns, or other major products, it was Ordnance policy to order enough spare
parts to last a year. But what was “enough”? The best estimates were often wrong, because of differences in climate, terrain, and operations in a world-wide war; and for newly developed items there was no maintenance experience at all.5 Shortages developed in certain parts, though in general the tendency was to provide too much rather than too little. The spare parts required to maintain one hundred medium tanks for one year filled twenty boxcars. For one jeep, Ordnance undertook to stock and furnish 1,006 different spare parts, a total that seemed large, though actually it was less than half the 2,500 different parts, totaling 9,000 individual pieces, that were required to manufacture the jeep.6 The effort to provide machinery capable of keeping records on these huge stocks began in 1940. It involved a new spare parts organization within Field Service and the use of electrical accounting apparatus made by the International Business Machines (IBM) Corporation.
A New Spare Parts Organization
In the late summer of 1940 the Ordnance Department requested Lawrence Barroll, formerly a representative in Sweden of General Motors Overseas Operations, to make a study of Ordnance procedure for initial spare parts requirements and a survey of the spare parts organization of Field Service. Barroll spent two weeks in Washington, two weeks in the Detroit area consulting with General Motors parts specialists, and three days at Raritan Arsenal where Standard Nomenclature Lists were published. This short survey convinced him that the traditional Ordnance Provision System procedure for parts control by which major items and their spare parts were handled by the same persons, using the same form of stock record cards, was inefficient. He therefore recommended on 8 October 1940 that all spare parts, regardless of their nature, be segregated in one organization in Field Service, and that this organization manage not only parts distribution but also the determination of parts requirements.7
The Chief of Ordnance approved the recommendation for centralized control of spare parts distribution. He agreed to the separation of parts from their major items and on 16 December 1940 employed Barroll to build up a new Parts and Accessories Unit to assume responsibility for them.8 But from the beginning the new spare parts unit was plagued with troubles. It was, according to Barroll, unable to get enough experienced help, office space, or even supplies. Furthermore, it was hampered by the confusion resulting from the simultaneous installation of electrical accounting machines for stores reporting.9
The Use of IBM Machines
In the spring of 1940 the Office of the Assistant Secretary of War had proposed that IBM machines be installed in all
Army depots. Considered much more flexible than the bookkeeping machines, such as Elliott Fisher, which had been adopted by Ordnance in the mid-twenties, these electrical accounting machines (EAM) could prepare in hours reports that by manual procedures would take days or even weeks. The IBM Corporation tested its apparatus at several Quartermaster depots, pronounced it suitable for military record-keeping,10 and was given the job by the War Department. On a directive from the Assistant Secretary of War that the IBM Corporation be given all assistance in installing its machines, on a rental basis, the Chief of Ordnance ordered the machines to be used in all Ordnance stock control operations for spare parts. This involved the bulk of general supply articles, since major items, which were not included, represented only about eight hundred out of a total of about eighty thousand items. Some Ordnance officials had misgivings, not only as to the superiority of the IBM system over competitors like Remington-Rand, but also as to the wisdom of employing the machines on a rental rather than a sales basis.11 Col. Lawrence J. Meyns, who became chief of the General Supply Branch in July 1941, thought that the decision to use the machines was good, because he believed that stock cards on the spare parts that were coming off the production lines in an ever-mounting flood could not be kept posted on the old system.12
Whatever the ultimate merits of the new system, it soon became apparent, to Colonel Mcyns among others, that Ordnance had rushed it through too fast and had not planned the timing and installation with enough care and foresight.13 Decided upon in the fall of 1940, the installation of the machines was accomplished with the aid of the IBM Corporation the following spring and the changeover took place in July 1941.14
Almost at once there was a lag rather than a speed-up. In a tight manpower market there was the difficulty of obtaining, and keeping, trained machine operators. This could hardly have been avoided. Another obstacle to smooth operation grew out of the failure to foresee the necessity for converting a commercial system more fully to military operation before installing it. For example, the stock record card as originally drawn up had no provision for “demands,” a term not used in business, although essential in military supply. Such drawbacks to the new system, together with lack of understanding of it in the depots, or downright opposition to it, were not peculiar to Ordnance. The Quartermaster Corps had similar problems in some degree.15
The greatest problem presented to Ordnance by the machine system was that of adapting to it the numbers hitherto used for requisitioning, procurement, and distribution. Stores reports, which were actually carbon copies of depot stock ledgers, used the numbers found in Standard Nomenclature Lists—the Group letter, the number indicating the class of stores, and the piece mark. For example, in reporting a bayonet catch the depot officer used the SNL designation B8 plus the piece mark
B147058. In the spring of 1941 Field Service considered the possibility of adopting the piece mark as the universal means of identifying and reporting stores. But a study of stores reports revealed the fact that there were hundreds of items in stock that had no piece mark; furthermore, the Industrial Division was too busy with procurement to stop and assign them. In any case the IBM machine cards then available could not take “taxi” numbers such as BECX3G, because they fell in a field of the card that could not take letters of the alphabet. Some kind of coding was necessary.16
In this dilemma Field Service turned to a numbering system that had been devised in prewar years for a statistical report on parts usage by maintenance echelons. It was a code number consisting of three elements. The first four digits represented the SNL letter and number; the next two digits, the section of the SNL in which the item was listed; and the last five digits the item within the section of its particular SNL. Thus the item code number assigned to the bayonet catch was B008-01-00030, that for the item next below it in the same section was B008-01-00040.17
For the job of assigning item code numbers to all Ordnance parts the chief of the Equipment Division set up a coding section in the Machine Records Unit. After coding an item the Machine Records Unit punched a master card containing the piece mark or drawing number, the nomenclature, and the new code number, and sent copies of it to all reporting installations. The coding operation, which included items coming off production lines as well as those in stock, was gigantic, and the Coding Section was understaffed. It soon fell behind. By mid-June of 1941 coding was in “lamentable condition.”18
The Parts Control Division
After Pearl Harbor it became evident that something had to be done to improve spare parts supply. This was the greatest problem facing the Ordnance Department, according to a survey made in the spring of 1942 by General Motors Overseas Operations. This survey recommended that Ordnance create a Parts Control Division on the same administrative level as Industrial Service and Field Service. General Campbell acted on this recommendation after he became Chief of Ordnance in June 1942. But this attempt to solve the problem was short-lived, for several reasons. Floor space, equipment, and experienced people were lacking. There was disagreement, even among the GM officials who made the recommendation, as to whether the new organization should take over spare parts operations directly or merely set up controls over the people responsible for operations.19 The Parts Control Division was abolished in July 1942. In the reorganization that took place at that time the Field Service spare parts organization, which included the Machine Records Unit, was renamed the Parts and Supplies Section and placed under the General Supply Branch. It now had a staff of 267, but according to Mr. Barroll was “still comparatively green” and much remained to be accomplished in “future
development, training of personnel, and refinement of operating procedures.”20
Effects of the Motor Vehicle Transfer
At this critical stage in parts control planning, Army Service Forces directed that Ordnance take over motor transport vehicles, formerly supplied by the Quartermaster Motor Transport Service. It was a logical step, because combat vehicles and transport vehicles had parts in common; but it tremendously increased and complicated the problems of distribution, especially that of stock control. Before the merger, Ordnance handled a total of some 80,000 items. Estimates of the items handled by Motor Transport Service varied from 75,000 to 150,000. Accurate figures did not exist. There were some 400,000 item numbers, but thousands were duplicate names for the same item.21
As a result of the transfer of motor transport the Chief of Ordnance established the Tank-Automotive Center in Detroit on 1 September 1942. This step drastically affected the whole Ordnance distribution system. To Detroit went the Parts and Supplies Section of the General Supply Branch along with three other sections —Automotive, Tools and Equipment, and Storage and Issue.22 Stock control of major items for Groups A to F, small arms, artillery, and fire control, remained in Washington because their Group Chiefs, whose unique technical knowledge made them irreplaceable, refused to move, but stock control of spare parts for this matériel went to Detroit.23 The move centered in Detroit the direction of distribution for virtually all Ordnance installations except those handling ammunition. The planners intended that henceforth the Washington office would set forth policy, the Tank Automotive Center would carry it out.24
Colonel Raphael S. Chavin, Chief of the General Supply Branch, justified the decentralization to Detroit of stock control for all spare parts, for weapons as well as vehicles, on two grounds: first, it complied with the general directive to reduce the number of employees in Washington, and, second, it permitted the concentration of the IBM stock control installation in one central place.25 Another explanation was that in the planning stage the Ordnance Department had considered moving to Detroit the major item units handling weapons; at that time the pattern of the T-AC as a product center had not fully crystallized.26
But this further separation of spare parts from major items caused forebodings. To Colonel Meyns, the movement of weapons parts from Washington to Detroit was “a terrible setback.”27 Major Hynds of the General Supply Branch, who doubted the wisdom of setting up the Parts and Accessories Unit in the first place, believed that the real reason for moving all spare parts to Detroit, parts for small arms and artillery as well as vehicles,
was that “spare parts have been placed in such a rigid, inflexible grouping that we now find it is impossible to separate them, regardless of how advisable such a division might be.”28 He pointed out that if parts had remained with their major items, as provided in the Ordnance Provision System Regulations, the move of Group G, the automotive items, to Detroit “could have been accomplished with scarcely a ripple to disturb the effective operations of the other groups.”29
As it was, the disturbance to Field Service supply operations approached the proportions of a tidal wave. Detroit, now the stock control center for Ordnance, the place to which depots and district offices sent their stores reports and the place where these reports were combined into the Consolidated Stores Report that was the heart of the supply system, became an impossible bottleneck. By December 1942 the posting of Consolidated Stores Report data on parts distribution and other card records in Detroit was seriously in arrears—as much as one month behind on distribution cards and several months behind on order cards. These delays made the data misleading, since the figures did not reflect the situation as it was at the moment.
Moreover, the records were not accurate because depots frequently reported parts under wrong code numbers.30 The Coding Unit was handicapped by lack of the tools essential for its job. The engineering drawings for small arms, artillery, and fire control instruments were not available in Detroit; parts lists and reference data from manufacturers were still far from complete. The engineers of the Parts and Supplies Section, who had formerly supplied the necessary technical information, worked in a separate building. Because of continual engineering changes and undependable records, knowledge of the product was at a premium.31
In the move to Detroit, Field Service lost a number of trained people who were badly needed. The Parts and Supplies Section lost 50 percent of its engineers. When the move was announced some of the engineers accepted commissions in the Army and others transferred to other government agencies in Washington. Some who went to Detroit soon left government service to take jobs in the automobile industry at increased salaries.32 The manpower situation grew worse in February 1943 when the Chief of Ordnance directed personnel cuts throughout the Tank-Automotive Center. The Parts and Supplies Section protested that it could not operate on the ceiling then existing, much less on a lower ceiling.33
Parts supply required manpower, in quantity and in quality.34 A sympathetic understanding of this fact in the War Department and the Army Service Forces would have helped solve Ordnance’s problems. But as late as the fall of 1944 the Mead Committee found that neither the Army nor the Navy recognized “the extent of the paper work and bookkeeping work required in order to maintain the flow of
Brig. Gen. Julian S. Hatcher (seated at desk), Chief of Field Service, in his office at the Pentagon, 1943. From left, Col. James L. Hatcher and Brig. Gen. Raphael S. Chavin.
materials.35 The Chief of the Parts and Supplies Section complained that he was “constantly criticized and harassed by higher authority for not doing an efficient job and at the same time this same higher authority was reducing the personnel available to do the job.”36
The Crisis Early in 1943
By the beginning of 1943 it was evident that mistakes had been made in the hasty revamping of traditional Ordnance supply procedures to meet the exigencies of war and that the stock control situation was critical. Late in 1942 General Somervell had stated that “distribution is rapidly becoming our number one consideration.”37 An avalanche of supplies was coming from the factories, and some more efficient way had to be found to get them to the users. Big-scale troop movements were just getting under way. Complaints about Ordnance spare parts provision and distribution began to come from the using arms, The Inspector General, and the Army Service Forces.38 Disability reports from the Inspector General’s Office, surveys by ASF, and special studies and analyses by the Ordnance Department all stressed the seriousness of the situation.39 At ASF depots in England preparing for TORCH
in 1942, the changeover to a different parts identification scheme had necessitated retraining thousands of workers and created “an almost hopeless confusion.”40 In a nationwide radio broadcast on March 1943, the anniversary of ASF, General Somervell said, “Stock or inventory control requires immediate attention.”41
General Campbell in February 1943 replaced Brig. Gen. Harry R. Kutz, whose health had not been good, with Brig. Gen. (later Maj. Gen.) Julian S. Hatcher as Chief of Field Service. He also had Field Service operations reviewed by his personal advisory staff, Messrs. Baruch, Lewis H. Brown, Benjamin F. Fairless, and Keller, to which had been added Mr. Fowler McCormick, president of International Harvester, General Robert E. Wood, president of Sears Roebuck and Company, and B. Edwin Hutchinson of Chrysler Corporation. These eminent industrialists did not propose any radical changes in operations; they confined themselves to a few helpful suggestions. But their visit to OCO and their belief that hard and detailed work would bring Field Service out of its difficulties were a boost to morale.42
In the field the General Supply Branch made an intensive effort to find out why unfilled requisitions, or back orders, were piling up at the depots. Investigators surveyed two typical depots, Atlanta for automotive parts and Augusta for weapons parts. Analysis of some seventeen thousand back-order items showed that poor records were responsible and that the depots and the Tank-Automotive Center shared the blame equally. Most of the trouble in the depots was caused by failure of the storekeepers to identify items in stock. The greatest percentage of errors by the Tank-Automotive Center was failure to correct a shortage in one depot by transfer from another, a failure that might have been prevented by accurate and timely Consolidated Stores Reports.43
To purify records and improve the reporting system became matters of great urgency. The first step was to find a single workable system of parts numbering to replace the many systems in use, because the fact that identical parts could have different numbers made it difficult to locate the parts and impossible to reflect true stock levels. The second step was to decentralize stock control on a product basis, relieving the bottleneck at Detroit and placing control in the hands of people who had technical knowledge of the particular item. These two objectives occupied some of the best brains in the Ordnance Department from 1943 on.
Parts Numbering
“The Numbers Racket,” as Ordnance men called it, was clearly in need of reform even before the end of 1942. No less than seven different parts numbering systems were being used. In addition to Ordnance drawing numbers, taxi numbers, and Federal Stock Catalog numbers, there was still another number that might be stamped on the part—the manufacturer’s number, brought into the picture by the transfer of
motor vehicles to the Ordnance Department, and by the fact that more and more automobile companies were manufacturing parts for tanks.
The manufacturer’s number opened a Pandora’s box of troubles. It might be either that of the end-item manufacturer or that of the component-item manufacturer; that is, it might be either the number assigned by the Ford Company making the car, or the Timken Company making the axle. Most likely it would be that of the automobile manufacturer, and this fact caused incalculable confusion, because several automobile manufacturers would buy components from a single source and put their own numbers on them. A bearing that appeared in a Packard, a Ford, a Chrysler, a Dodge, and a Plymouth could have five different numbers—but it was the same bearing.
Four types of numbers—Ordnance drawing, Ordnance standard parts (taxi system), Federal Standard Stock Catalog, and manufacturer’s—were primarily for procurement purposes. They were also used to some extent in requisitions, especially the manufacturer’s number, because of the many manufacturers’ catalogs in the hands of troops. For stock-keeping, there was the item stock number that had been designed by Field Service as a basis for the depot and Detroit records under the IBM system.44 This item stock number was not physically applied to parts but was marked on tags and containers, in most cases along with the drawing numbers. The item stock numbers were a change-over from the SNL system, but the coding had proceeded so slowly that some SNL’s were still being used. Also, in the interim before the change-over could be accomplished, depots had been forced to assign temporary item stock numbers for stores reporting. There were, therefore, three possible stock-keeping numbers in addition to four procurement numbers, and the fact that parts were procured under one number and stored under another—and might be requisitioned under a third—contributed immeasurably to the confusion.45
Interchangeability of Parts
Another aspect of the parts numbering problem was the need for information on what parts were interchangeable between truck and truck, or truck and tank. The desirability of being able to substitute one part for another could hardly be overemphasized, from the standpoint of reducing the number of individual parts or part numbers in the stock control system, and of maintaining in operation equipment that would otherwise be deadlined for lack of parts.
The necessity for compiling and disseminating interchangeability information on automotive parts had long been obvious. In 1940 The Quartermaster General had begun such a project. But at that time the size and urgency of the wartime task could hardly have been foreseen. The emphasis then was on procurement, rather than on distribution; further, it was difficult to find, and keep, personnel with sufficient technical knowledge for the work. The job was far from complete
when the Motor Transport Service was transferred to the Ordnance Department. There now arose the problem of relating the parts of trucks to parts of tanks and other Ordnance items. The Ordnance Department had for years maintained at Raritan Arsenal a file of data that showed by SNL number all the major items on which each part was used, and thus provided complete interchangeability for each part number. But with the added load imposed by the incorporation of the Motor Transport Service, these records could not be kept current. The Special Parts and Interchangeability Group was overloaded with work even on general purpose vehicles. The task was made more difficult by the proprietary interests of some manufacturers who refused to make their interchangeability data available. Ordnance did not undertake a definite program to compile interchangeability data until the spring of 1943 when the whole parts numbering system became so critically obstructive that it had to be completely revamped.46
Early in 1943 a breakdown in the effort to convert manufacturers’ numbers to the Ordnance taxi system resulted in the formation at Detroit of a committee to study the whole numbers problem. But reports by this and other committees accomplished little, and in April the Supply Branch, T-AC, called a conference of depot commanders from Ordnance and Motor Transport installations to map out a plan of action. These men recommended that, except for standard commercial parts common to other services, which would continue to be carried under the Federal Stock Catalog Number, every part be given one number, to serve in place of the drawing number, piece mark, manufacturer’s number, or any other, and that this number be the item stock number, plus a classification code, if an item stock number had been assigned. They further recommended that new items, or items to which no item stock number had been assigned, be given a simple numerical number starting with 5,000,001. To study this plan and various suggested modifications of it, the Chief of Ordnance appointed an Ordnance Numbering Board consisting of Brig. Gen. Gordon M. Wells, Artillery Branch, Industrial Division; Col. Graeme K. Howard, Director of Spare Parts, T-AC; and Mr. Lawrence S. Barroll, Supply Branch, Field Service. Representatives of the Board held meetings with the Detroit committee at Detroit and examined witnesses there and at Washington between 7 and 22 June 1943.47
The Wells Beard decided to throw out the item stock numbers and concentrate on a system using seven digits, between 5,000,000 and 9,999,999, for all Ordnance matériel except Federal Stock Catalog items. But it also decided that the seven digit number would have some relation to the piece mark that was stamped, embossed, or otherwise marked on Ordnance components and recommended an ingenious method that would permit incorporating the piece mark, which consisted of six digits plus a letter, in the seven digit number. To A drawing numbers were assigned the block of numbers from 5,000,000 to 5,499,999, to C numbers, 5,500,000 to
5,999,999, to B numbers 6,000,000 to 6,499,999, to D numbers, 6,500,000 to 6,899,999 and to E numbers, 6,900,000 to 6,999,999.48 Thus, the new number for a part stamped with A-277276 would be 5,277,276. One drawback to this system was the fact that the sizes of the engineering drawings, which the letters A to E represented, were sometimes changed. Therefore, the numbers from 7,000,000 to 9,999,999 were reserved to be assigned consecutively to all new Ordnance parts prepared after the system went into effect, without regard to drawing size.
The next consideration was the administration of the new system. The Board found strong evidence that the existing confusion stemmed partly from the fact that the assignment of numbers and the making of rules for their use had been left to a subordinate agency in the Artillery Branch that did not have sufficient prestige or authority to enforce a uniform system, and recommended that a new agency be set up immediately. Accepting the findings of the Wells Board, the Chief of Ordnance directed the change-over to the new numbers and placed responsibility for it with an Engineering and Administrative Section headed by Col. Harry B. Hambleton.49
Colonel Hambleton and his staff began immediately an exhaustive study of the whole parts numbering problem, visiting depots, ports, product centers, and the Tank-Automotive Center. As the investigation proceeded it became clear that the problem was one of stock control rather than engineering. Since stock numbers were being assigned at Detroit, a suboffice was established there under the direction of Major Charles M. Buhl to administer the new system. Further study by Major Buhl and members of his staff made it increasingly evident that the engineering or part number phase was a relatively minor factor when compared with the confused stock number situation and that the provision of Ordnance Department Order 69 for identifying all Ordnance standard parts by Federal Stock Numbers was impractical. Consequently on 14 September 1943 the Chief of Ordnance issued a revision of Ordnance Department Order No. 69. It scrapped existing Ordnance numbering systems and provided for the assignment of one Official Ordnance Part Number to almost every new part. The revised order became the Bible of the parts numbering and interchangeability program.50
Implementation of the New Numbers Program
From the new system the Engineering Administrative Branch evolved an Official Stock Number that became the key to the whole numbering and interchangeability program. It was made up of the Official Ordnance Part Number, when one existed, prefixed by a classification code that might be either the SNL Group prefix or the manufacturer’s code. The problem now was to bring under the Official Stock Number all the other numbers that an identical or interchangeable part might carry, such as that of the part manufacturer, unit manufacturer, or the old taxi number. The Branch began the preparation of a cross reference list of Ordnance
part and stock numbers in two sections, one listing serially the number stamped on the part, with the corresponding stock number or numbers opposite. This information was progressively turned over to Field Service, which sent to depots that had IBM equipment a master stock card carrying the new number and showing all other reference numbers and a corresponding number card for each corresponding or “alias” number on the master card. This theoretically enabled the depot to put into one bin all interchangeable items, no matter what number they bore.51
The implementation of the new numbers program took time. Concurrently with the interchangeability project, designers both in Ordnance and industry had to be given blocks of the new official part numbers to apply to new parts. New drafting-room regulations had to be developed. The cross referencing job (except for Federal Stock Catalog numbers, which were handled in Washington); the assignment of numbers; the screening of parts; and the elimination of duplicate numbers were assigned to the Parts Number Control Section, OCO-D, under the direction of the Engineering Administrative Branch. But it was woefully short of personnel. Strenuous efforts by Colonel Hambleton and Major Buhl resulted in the employment by contract of employees of a commercial firm, Smith-Hinchman and Grylls. From this source there were added to the Section a day shift averaging forty-four persons and a night shift of about forty-eight. These made possible a round-the-clock operation from October 1943 to May 1944. For the cutting of master cards to send to the depots, Field Service’s Machine Records Section also had to rely on a contractor, the R. L. Polk Company.52
In June 1944 the Cross Reference List of Ordnance Part and Stock Numbers, known as ORD 15, appeared in two parts of ten volumes each. ORD 15-1 was based on part numbers, ORD 15-2 on stock numbers. Twenty-two thousand sets were printed and distributed to users such as bases, depots, and stock control points. Revisions in the spring of 1945 increased the total of the numbers listed from 600,000 to 750,000, and so great had the demand become that 32,000 sets had to be distributed. The realization that a similar cross reference list was needed for tools and tool equipment resulted in the publication of ORD-5, Stock List of Items, and ORD 5-1, Numerical Index of Manufacturer’s Part Numbers and Drawing Numbers. ORD 5, listing the official nomenclature, was made necessary by the fact that one element of the Federal Stock Number was the initial letter of the principal noun; for example, 11—Poo was the number for an oil barrel pump. Also published during the latter part of 1944 and early 1945 were interchangeability lists for tanks and vehicles of related chassis and for general purpose and wheeled combat vehicles, known respectively as ORD 14-1 and ORD 14-2.53
Nobody claimed that the new numbering system was perfect. The Ordnance
Department admitted that it was a compromise. Obviously, in the midst of war, all supply functions could not be stopped pending the ideal solution to the numbering problem; nor could all past mistakes be rectified at once and all future situations foreseen. Controversies arose over such matters as the correct components for the Official Stock Number; the proper method of marking packaged matériel at the facility in the absence of identification information; and the fixing of responsibility for the determination of the right SNL or Stock Class Code for each item.54
The greatest impediment to smooth operation of the new plan was the inauguration early in 1944 of the Master Depot system for storing at one depot all parts pertaining to a single vehicle or group of closely related vehicles. The new Official Stock Number incorporating the SNL number connected the part with the end item in which it was most frequently used; on the other hand the master depots stocked items on the car-line system followed by the automobile industry, in which all parts for a particular make of vehicle, Ford, Dodge, Chevrolet, and so on, were stored at one depot.55
Because of unavoidable delay in getting cross reference lists disseminated and in use at all levels, no really fair trial of the Official Stock Number system was possible during the war. On the credit side, by June 1945, parts formerly identified by 862,000 numbers were for stock purposes and review identified by 315,880. Control of the assignment of numbers had been effectively centralized, and the basic compilation of interchangeability and cross reference data had been completed.56 Shortly after the issuance of ORD 15, the Cross Reference List of Ordnance Part and Stock Numbers, an ASF report noted that the publication had “met with enthusiastic response and ... led to many requests for its extension and the furnishing of similar information by other services.”57
Unfortunately it was not entirely successful. Users found that it was “rife with errors.”58 This was perhaps inevitable because in the rush of the war years the compilers had not had time to give to every spare part the painstaking analysis that was essential to produce ideal interchangeability data.59 But ORD 15 was at least a step in the right direction, and in the opinion of General Hatcher, Chief of Field Service, “accomplished more to simplify parts supply, as well as eliminate apparent shortages than all previous attempts to arrive at an answer to this complicated problem.”60
A Common Language of Supply
The complexity of Ordnance matériel, the vastness of the organization required to produce and use it, and the lack of experience among wartime employees, brought to the forefront another problem of identification—the correct name for the individual weapon or vehicle. It was exceedingly difficult to solve. There were changes in model, disagreement as to the characteristic to be emphasized, and
numerous other opportunities for misunderstanding. Sometimes an item had no more accurate name than just device. The preparation of a major item Standard Nomenclature List could not begin until a model had been constructed, tested, modified, and adopted. Then followed disassembly and the examination and cataloging of every part. Publication might take months or even years.61
In the middle of the war the time required for publishing SNL’s was shortened, and major item lists were brought up to date, but confusion in nomenclature seemed inherent in a system that divided the function between the procurement and the distribution services.62 A promising solution was the assignment of responsibility for standardizing nomenclature and matériel identification to a single agency. In June 1943 the Chief of Ordnance gave the job to Industrial’s Engineering Administrative Section.63 The new unit made a study of such matters as proper nomenclature for major combinations as well as major items; the crying need for a simple and uniform system of model numbers, that is, the T and M numbers that appeared in OCM’s; and the advisability of setting up an organization that would control nomenclature and model numbering and coordinate the work of design offices, stock control offices, and the Ordnance Technical Committee.
The need for devising a common language of supply for the use of the Army as a whole was recognized in early 1943 by Army Service Forces.64 After some preliminary investigation of the problem, ASF employed a commercial firm of management consultants, Griffenhagen and Associates, to make a study of item identification. Reporting 31 August 1944, the firm recommended a uniform system of article description and numbering for all the technical services;65 but ASF felt that no new system or even any major revision of the old systems should be attempted during the war.66 The only cooperative venture was the preparation of the ASF Tool and Tool Equipment Catalog, in which the Federal Standard Stock Catalog nomenclature and stock number for every tool were indicated, together with the stock number of each of the technical services. The Ordnance Department, which had major interest, was given responsibility, with the assistance of the other technical services.67
This was but a small step toward the solution of a problem that was increasing in importance and size by 1945. During World War II the Federal Standard Stock Catalog had failed to be readily expansible to meet the needs of the armed services, and the Treasury’s cataloging staff was inadequate to develop a uniform system. Each service, bureau, and command had to establish its own system, resulting in duplication that was costly in manpower and money. According to one
estimate, the lack of a uniform system of cataloging in World War II cost the government five billion dollars in unneeded matériel.68
On 18 January 1945 President Roosevelt instructed the Director of the Bureau of the Budget to prepare a United States Standard Commodity Catalog employing all systems then in use by the Government insofar as they conformed to a central plan. The Board established for the purpose submitted a plan for a uniform Federal Catalog system; but an effective start toward implementing any plan in the postwar years required action by President Truman, the military departments, and Congress. After May 1948 the catalog program became the responsibility of the Munitions Board Cataloging Agency.69