School for Bakers and Cooks

School for Bakers and Cooks. Fort George G. Meade. In compliance with instructions contained in a letter from Adjutant General of the Army, dated March 17, 1924, a School for Bakers and Cooks was established at Camp Meade in April of that year. Throughout its existence at the post, the school's mission was to train soldiers in the proper handling of rations, baking and cooking. By the 1930s, approximately twenty bakers and seventy-five cooks graduated each year. The School also trained company grade officers as mess officers. In 1938 the army began construction of a permanent school (building 2234, directly behind this marker) which was completed in 1939. In addition to the instructional facilities, the building also contained barracks for the school's students., This two-and-one-half story, nineteen bay, brick building occupies a "U" shaped ground plan and is sheltered by a hipped roof. A raised concrete foundation supports the building's brick walls which rise two stories and terminate in a hipped roof. Five gables dormers are situated on the roof plane above the primary elevation. One shed-roofed dormer and a shed-roofed vent are situated on the rear slope of the roof. Square stone pilasters support a plain stone entablature that marks the primary entrance., The School for Bakers and Cooks attained great importance in World War II. Standard courses lasted months. An additional month of instruction qualified some students as mess sergeants. Special courses in such phases of Army cookery as the preparation of dehydrated foods, coffee roasting, and meat cutting were offered. Civilian consultants from some of the nation's most respected food handlers assisted in many of the courses. The school was often selected to test new rations. In all, over 200,000 cooks and bakers graduated from the school in World War II., The school was disbanded after the War., This plaque erected in 1997 by the Fort George G. Meade Museum