Draft:George Burling Jarrett
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George Burling Jarrett, an innovator who helped the Allies win the War, was known to his friends and family as Burling, he was born on October 14, 1901, in West Haddonfield, Camden County, New Jersey. He was the son of Joseph Robert Jarrett and Laura Burling Jarrett, and the grandson of Colonel George C. Burling and Jane Reckless Burling. As a young boy he attended The Haddonfield Friends School, graduating in 1916. He graduated from LaSalle College High School in 1920. The 1921 edition of the LaSalle College High School yearbook lists Burling as attending LaSalle College as a Civil Engineering major, and he enrolled in Lehigh College, now Lehigh University, beginning sometime during the 1922-1923 academic year. He married Marguerite Workman, daughter of Samuel and Mary O’Brien Workman on April 21, 1930, at Our Lady of Good Counsel Church in Moorestown, Camden County, New Jersey. During World War II, George Burling Jarrett was instrumental in developing advances in military arms and artillery for the United Staes and Allied forces. For Jarrett, what began as a hobby, collecting vintage military weapons, developed into a lifelong passion that would prove to make a significant contribution to the American and Allied forces war effort.
George Burling Jarrett began his interest in guns and military arms at a very young age. but his fascination with weapons and ordnance did not end as a young boy. As he became older, Jarrett re-created famous battles with toy soldiers made of lead that his father purchased for him. Not being satisfied with recreating battle scenes, Jarrett built “toy weapons” from items such as old flag poles and buggy wheels. shortly after the conclusion of World War One, Jarrett turned his attention to accumulating relics from that conflict. Jarrett lived near Fort Dix in New Jersey, and he added memorabilia from that war by purchasing items from returning soldiers. Not satisfied with this, on June 22, 1922, Jarrett sailed from the Port of Philadelphia on the SS Pittsburgh. His passport application was for a three-month trip which included touring battlefields to find or purchase weapons from World War One. His passport application listed that he would be visiting Britain, France, Germany, Switzerland, Belgium, and Italy. This trip would become a turning point in his life.
Jarrett scoured the European battlefields and surrounding countryside for weaponry of every sort and arranged to have a wide array of firearms and military equipment sent back to New Jersey. By 1928, Jarrett’s collection grew to an estimated 4,000 items, weighing three tons. That same year he used his exhibit to provide fund raisers for veteran organizations and toured with it through the eastern United States. He soon realized that members of the public were interested in his collection. In 1930, Jarrett reached out to the owner of the Steel Pier in Atlantic City, Frank Gravatt. Gravatt paid Jarrett to display his collection in one of the empty buildings on the pier. In 1931, Gravatt sent Jarrett to Europe to acquire more materials. Between 1936 and 1938, Jarrett’s collection outgrew the Steel Pier Museum location. He needed to use his father-in-law’s farm, as it gave Jarrett a unique opportunity to demonstrate and display his vast array of weapons.
On September 8,1939, President Franklin D. Roosevelt issued a proclamation of a “limited” national emergency”. Roosevelt’s call for preparedness included the activation of the Army Reserve forces. The commander of the Ordnance School at Aberdeen, Colonel Julian Hatcher, contacted Jarrett. Hatcher asked Jarrett if he would be interested in teaching at the school. He accepted the position. Jarrett reported to Aberdeen on November 28, 1939, where he created ground-breaking training programs and hands-on exercises for an exploding trainee population. In January 1941, Jarrett was promoted to the rank of Captain.
As early as May 1941, there was a lend lease agreement for arms and munitions between the Allied forces. Consequently, the British were receiving American weapons as part of this agreement. They needed an ammunition expert. Captain Jarrett was ordered to Egypt to act as ammunition advisor to British General Headquarters. His orders were to establish a school to train the British Army on American ordnance. Once in Cairo, however, he discovered that the entire campaign was at risk because of the incompatibility of captured ordinance with British weaponry. Because of his familiarity with all manner of 20th Century firearms, he was able to solve the critical, dangerous, and complex problem of modifying old French fuses from 1918 and captured German artillery shells for use in Allied weapons. His work in North Africa was recognized as a turning point and would eventually result in his being awarded the Order of the British Empire and the Legion of Merit for his role in defeating Germany’s General Erwin Rommel, “The Desert Fox”.
By December 8, 1942, he was relieved of his duties in Cairo and ordered to return to the Aberdeen Proving Ground in Maryland. Upon his return, the Foreign Materials Branch (which he would eventually head) was already up and running. Aberdeen had received shipments of shells and fuses from Africa, Italy, and the Far East. Jarrett and his team got to work evaluating and cataloging the materials and training crews to go to distant fronts to retrieve more materials in order to keep ahead of any advances that the enemy had made. Jarrett himself took the occasional opportunity to travel to active war zones to maintain the Allied edge in weaponry.
Immediately after the War ended in 1945, Jarrett was promoted to the rank of colonel and assigned to the position of Museum Officer and Chief of the Foreign Materials Branch. He was separated from active duty in 1946 and retired from the Army in 1961. Eventually, he became the Curator of the Ordnance Museum and Chief of the Aberdeen Proving Ground Technical Library. Jarrett held this position until his retirement in 1966. Shortly after his separation from active duty, he joined, then later became President of, the Ordnance Center of Technology Foundation, a US Military sponsored organization dedicated to training in the use, safe handling, and proper disposal of live ordnance.
Colonel George Burling Jarrett died in 1974. He is buried in Arlington Cemetery. In 1981, he was inducted in the US Army Ordnance Hall of Fame. In 2021, his work was further recognized when the Army Ordinance Museum and Training Facility at Fort Gregg-Adams, Va., was named after him.
References
[edit]- ^ Lehigh Course Catalog (1922-1923) https://preserve.lehigh.edu/digital-special-collections/university-publications/course-catalogs/lehigh-course-catalog-1922-1923?search_api_fulltext=jarrett
- ^ Epitome: Yearbook 1924 (Vols. 48). (1924). (Vols. 48). https://preserve.lehigh.edu/digital-special-collections/university-publications/epitome-yearbooks/epitome-yearbook-1924 Epitome: Yearbook 1924 (Lehigh University) Jarrett entries on pages 182, 312, 345, and 353 Please note: the yearbooks are dated according to the class that publishes it not but the class graduating that year. George Burling Jarrett was a sophomore in 1923.
- ^ LaSalle Alumni Magazine Vol. 18 no. 1 Winter 1974 https://archive.org/details/lasalle181974unse/mode/2up?q=%22George+Burling+Jarrett%22 Please note, George Burling Jarrett graduated from the LaSalle College High School Division.
- ^ Lehigh Alumni Bulletin 1952-1953 (volume 40, no. 09) https://preserve.lehigh.edu/digital-special-collections/university-publications/alumni-bulletins/lehigh-alumni-bulletin-1952-3?search_api_fulltext=%22Burling%2BJarrett%22
- ^ Lehigh Alumni Bulletin 1974-1975 (volume 62, no. 01) https://preserve.lehigh.edu/digital-special-collections/university-publications/alumni-bulletins/lehigh-alumni-bulletin-1974-2?search_api_fulltext=jarrett
- ^ Lehigh Alumni Bulletin 1974-1975 (volume 62, no. 02) https://preserve.lehigh.edu/digital-special-collections/university-publications/alumni-bulletins/lehigh-alumni-bulletin-1974-0?search_api_fulltext=%22Burling%2BJarrett%22
- ^ Lehigh University Alumni Directory, 1937 Lehigh University publication; v.11 no.6 (June, 1937) https://archive.org/details/lehigh-alumni-directory-1937/page/n3/mode/2up?q=jarrett
- ^ Lehigh University Alumni Directory, 1947 https://preserve.lehigh.edu/digital-special-collections/university-publications/lehigh-university-alumni-directory-1947?search_api_fulltext=jarrett Military
- ^ Army Research and Development v.7:no.6(1966:June) https://archive.org/details/armyresearchdeve7619alex/page/34/mode/2up?q=%22George+Burling+Jarrett%22&view=theater
- ^ Army Navy Journal December 2, 1939 https://ia804504.us.archive.org/14/items/sim_armed-forces-journal_1939-12-02_77_14/sim_armed-forces-journal_1939-12-02_77_14.pdf
- ^ Army Navy Journal 1940-06-15: Vol 77 Iss 42 https://archive.org/details/sim_armed-forces-journal_1940-06 15_77_42/mode/2up?q=%22George+Burling+Jarrett%22
- ^ Popular Science vol 144 no. 5 “Weapons Are His Hobby and It’s Helping Us Win This War” https://archive.org/details/1940-to-1944-popular-science/1944-05%20Popular%20Science/mode/2up?q=%22George+Burling+Jarrett%22