US Navy Quonset Hut: Planning for an Imminent War

President Franklin D. Roosevelt [1]

             In 1937, President Franklin D. Roosevelt began to prepare the United States for war, and on May 17th, 1938 US Congress passed the Naval Expansion Act, dedicating 1 billion dollars to enlarge the US Navy.  The Naval board then built 25 new bases in the US and overseas.  Included in this list of new air bases, was the shore-based aviation facility at Quonset Point Rhode Island.  Construction commenced at Quonset Point on July 16th, 1940, with the project being awarded to two organizations on contract - the George A. Fuller and Company (one of the largest construction companies in North America at the time) and the Meritt-Chapman and Scott Corporation (a merger organization of three small salvage operations).   

Pamphlet from Quonset Point Naval Air Station (1945)

              During March of 1941, the Allies entered financial crisis. By June, England would no longer be able to purchase US arms and supplies. Due to the Neutrality Act of 1939, the US could not release arms to any warring country (such was Britain at the time) unless under “cash and carry” terms.  Seeing the necessity to sustain US allies, President Roosevelt's Lend Lease Act was passed by Congress on March 11, which allowed the US to “sell, transfer title to, lend, lease or otherwise dispose of [articles of defense to] the government of any country whose defense the President deems vital to the defense of the United States”[2].  In response, Britain transferred ownership of properties at Gareloch and Stanraer, in Scotland, and Londonderry and Enniskillen, in Northern Ireland, to be used by the US as Forward Operating Bases (FOBs). As labour and material resources were quickly being drained by the war effort, the US military had to quickly supply buildings to house their troops.

Early Quonset Huts being erected in Northern Ireland (March 25, 1942)

                 Around the same time, George A. Fuller and Co. and  Meritt-Chapman and Scott Corp. were just completing the Quonset Point base.  The Navy then extended their contract with George A. Fuller and Co. in order for them to develop and mass-produce a new prefabricated hut system to shelter troops abroad that would be portable, quickly and easily assembled and dissembled, adaptable to any climate and geography, and provide the highest possible level of comfort and protection.  Quonset Point was selected as the assembly port for all supplies and materials required for the construction of these bases, and the actual factory production work was to take place on 85 acres of land purchased in West Davisville.  A railroad spur linked these two sites, and this allowed raw materials to arrive at the factory site (not interrupting the base activities), and then the completed units were shipped by rail to the pier, and via barge overseas.  The Temporary Aviation Facilities (TAF) project, now estimated at $20.5 million, was officially set in motion, with the first shipment of huts and supplies to be ready by June 1[3].

Factory at West Davisville (1942)

              
                While the factory was being completed, George A. Fuller and Co. began working on the hut design.  The only licensed architect on the team, Otto Brandenberger, was selected to be the project manager. A final set of construction drawings was submitted by Brandenberger’s team on May 15, 1941.  On June 11, 1941, a total of 450,000 cubic yards of materials and supplies, worth approximately $1.2 million[4], was prepared for loading. In less than one month, George A. Fuller and Co. had created a fully operational, mass-production facility generating huts on a scale that represented an annual output of $22 million per year.  All of this was up and running, long before the US officially entered WWII on January 8, 1942, and at the war's end, an estimated 150 000 Quonset Huts had been built throughout the United States, and around the world.

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[1] Wikipedia, s.v. "FDR," accessed December 5, 2012. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:FDR_in_1933.jpg.
[2] Julie Decker and Chris Chiei, Metal Living for a Modern Age. New York: Princeton Architectural Press, 
                  2005.
[3] Decker and Chiei.
[4] Decker and Chiei.

US Navy Quonset Hut: Origin of Design

 T-Rib Quonset (1941) [3]

             Simple to manufacture and easy to assemble, the US Navy Quonset hut is an easily recognizable architectural form, synonymous with American ingenuity and industry.  The building was designed in 1941, as President Franklin D. Roosevelt had the United States preparing for the possibility of war.  The Navy had approached the George A. Fuller Company to design a prefabricated, portable structure that could be easily and economically produced and shipped to military outposts.

              The Navy had instructed Brandenberger, and his team of engineers, to comply with only two conditions.  First, the new huts had to be arch-shaped, for strength and deflection of shell fragments, and second, the structure must be of simple form (open to serve a variety of purposes), with the ability to for it to be quickly assembled by untrained personnel.

[1]

Nissen Hut's corrugated metal panelling system (air cavity insulation only)  [2]

              Brandenberger's team was directed to use, as precedent, the Nissen Hut (which itself was loosely based on the Iroquois longhouse), developed by British Major Peter Nissen during WWI.  The open interior was meant to provide optimal flexibility, being used for offices, barracks and sleeping quarters.  The original T-Rib Quonset Hut followed Nissen's designs very closely, both having 16 ft diameters with identical steel arched frames.  The principle difference was within the wall systems, as when the team of engineers first analyzed the Nissen Hut, a common complaint was the lack of proper insulation which left the huts too cold in the winter and too hot in the summer. To overcome this design flaw, Brandenberger's team proposed a thin, lightweight pressed-wood lining of 3/16-inch Masonite held to the rib flange with a attachment clip, and then covered with a one-inch-thick layer of paper insulation.  This insulating system was then covered with an exterior of corrugated metal panels mounted on wood purlins.  The Nissen had a more complicated corrugated metal paneling system (both interior and exterior), which relied solely on the air cavity between panels for its thermal barrier [3].  Thus, the T-Rib Quonset Huts provided the US troops with a greater level of comfort.

More effectively insulated Quonset huts being used at Cold Bay, Alaska (1942)[4]

              3 months after initiating the design, the US Military now possessed a new demountable structure that could be shipped in 12 crates and put up in one day by ten labourers who required no special training or skills. At the end of 1941, the Quonset Huts were given a field test that proved their success in winter use, as 8 200 T-Rib Quonset huts were shipped to Iceland.  According to George A. Fuller Co.: "A night gale of hurricane proportion that wrecked shipping in the harbour.... ripped the covering off of many British Nissen huts, left the Quonset huts practically undamaged"[3].

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[1] Group 2, "The Castrum and the Quonset Hut." Blogger.com, accessed November 1, 2012. http://castrumandquo   
           nset.blogspot.ca/
[2] "World In Conflict: WWII Memories." East Riding of Yorkshire Council, accessed December 5, 2012. 
           http://www.eriding.net/worldinconflict/glossary.shtml.
[3] "The Huts." Quonset.org, accessed December 1, 2012. http://www.quonsethuts.org/huts/index.htm.
[4] Julie Decker and Chris Chiei, Metal Living for a Modern Age. New York: Princeton Architectural Press, 
           2005.