George Washington Goethals

The United States took control of the French property—after the bankruptcy of the French Compagnie Universelle du Canal Interocéanique de Panama that started constructions on The Panama Canal under Ferdinand de Lesseps— on May 4, 1904. The new Panama Canal Zone Control was overseen by the Isthmian Canal Commission (ICC) during construction.

The US inherited a small workforce and an assortment of buildings, infrastructure and equipment, much of which had been neglected for fifteen years in the humid jungle environment. There were no facilities in place for a large workforce, and the infrastructure was crumbling.[9]

Although chief engineer John Findley Wallace was pressured to resume construction, red tape from Washington stifled his efforts to obtain heavy equipment and caused friction between Wallace and the ICC. He and chief sanitary officer William C. Gorgas were frustrated by delay, and Wallace resigned in 1905. He was replaced by John Frank Stevens, who arrived on July 26, 1905. Stevens' approach was to press ahead first and obtain approval later. He improved drilling and dirt-removal equipment at the Culebra Cut for greater efficiency, revising the inadequate provisions in place for soil disposal. In November 1906 Roosevelt visited Panama to inspect the canal's progress, the first trip outside the United States by a sitting president.

Panama Canal under construction, 1907

Whether contract employees or government workers would build the canal was controversial. Bids for the canal's construction were opened in January 1907, and Knoxville, Tennessee-based contractor William J. Oliver was the low bidder. Stevens disliked Oliver, and vehemently opposed his choice. Although Roosevelt initially favoured the use of a contractor, he eventually decided that army engineers should carry out the work.[10] According to the book The Panama Canal: An Army's Enterprise, Goethals made such an impression on William Howard Taft, then Secretary of War, that Taft recommended him as an engineer for the Panama Canal.[4] Stevens, frustrated by government inaction and the army involvement, resigned from his position.[11]

In February 1907 US President Theodore Roosevelt appointed Colonel George Washington Goethals chief engineer of the Panama Canal.[12][13] The building of the Canal was completed in 1914, two years ahead of the target date of June 10, 1916.[14]

Colonel Goethals received unstinted praise from visiting engineers and from the technical press of the world. In 1913 the degree of LL.D. was conferred on him by the University of Pennsylvania, and in the spring of 1914 he was awarded medals by the National Geographic Society, the Civic Forum (New York), and the National Institute of Social Sciences. In 1914, Goethals and William Crawford Gorgas were awarded the inaugural Public Welfare Medal from the National Academy of Sciences.[15] Also, Congress awarded Goethals their thanks and a promotion to major general. President Wilson appointed Goethals as the first Civil Governor of the Panama Canal Zone.[4]

A World War I poster for the US Shipping Board, c. 1917–18

Uncle Sam pointing his finger at the viewer in order to recruit soldiers for the U.S. Army during World War I, 1917-1918

In April 1917 George W. Goethals was serving at President Woodrow Wilson's request, as General Manager and Director of the Emergency Fleet Corporation— charged with creating improvised ships, to carry the American army and its supplies to France, in the shortest possible time.[17]

Transfer of ammunition from standard-gauge railway to trench railway during the Battle of Passchendaele

The United States as late as 1917 maintained only a small army, smaller than thirteen of the nations and empires already active in the war. After the passage of the Selective Service Act of May 1917, the U.S. drafted 4 million men into military service, the logistics demands were unprecedented.[18] By the summer of 1918, about 2 million US soldiers had arrived in France and approximately 10,000 fresh soldiers were arriving in Europe each day.[19]

Mainly as a result of supply blunders during the bitter winter of 1917, a Congressional investigation was under way, when General Goethals was recalled to active service, and was asked on December 19, 1917 to accept appointment as Acting Quartermaster General. Goethals did so only after Secretary of War Newton D. Baker had assured him full authority and that he would not be interfered with, nine days later he was appointed Director of the Storage & Traffic Service. Reaction to his appointment at home and overseas is illustrated by a message he is said to have received from former President Theodore Roosevelt: "I congratulate you, and thrice over I congratulate the country."[20]

The Army's supply chain suffered from three main problems—a shortage of specialized personnel, decentralized organization and diverse uncoordinated functions. When the United States entered the war, the Quartermaster Corps had suffered a loss of personnel—most officers were sent to the front—this was the first problem demanding attention. Believing the Army's business could be best organized along civilian lines, he hired military men who could get along with industrialists and built with and around a number of highly trained executives and businessmen (among the new recruits were Hugh S. Johnson and Robert J. Thorne). Some of these men were commissioned and some were dollar-a-year-men, most of whom never collected the dollar.[17] From General Goethals down, practically everyone was on the job from early morning to late at night, seven days a week.[17]

Goethals reorganized the corps along functional lines and by January 26, purchasing had been taken away from outside agencies, and placed under his control. The functions of each division and branch were specifically set forth and the personnel in charge was officially designated.[21]

Major General George W. Goethals and members of his staff, December 7, 1918. Front row, left to right: Mr. Gerard Swope, Major General George W. Goethals, Brigadier General Herbert Lord, Brigadier General William H. Rose. Back row, left to right: Edwin W. Fullam, Brigadier General Frank T. Hines, Brigadier General Robert E. Wood, Colonel F. B. Wells.

The Overman Act, a result of the Congressional investigations started in December 1917, authorized what became known as the "interbureau procurement system," and was to make the Quartermaster Corps the most important War Department purchasing agency. Goethals established a system of standardization of bureau record keeping and supply chain planning. He also worked on installing uniform procurement policies, with the goal of presenting consolidated estimates to congress.[22]

In April 1918 a further reorganization of the General Staff led to the creation of the Purchase, Storage, & Traffic Division, with General Goethals as Director and Assistant Chief of Staff of the Army. Its creation was the result of protests by General Goethals, to the effect that, though coordination in the handling of Army logistics problems had been a major objective when the General Staff was created in 1903, coordination was practically nonexistent.[23] In the months to come, his division took control of purchasing and storage by the Army as a whole and of transportation over land and water. Now one person coordinated all supply bureaus, which had previously competed for the nation's resources, in a system that had inevitably slowed down input of war supplies.

At a meeting of quartermaster personnel in Washington, on August 8, 1918, Secretary of War Baker said:[20]

How fortunate this great army is to have so good and able a provider. Indeed, when the history of this war comes to be written, there will be chapters which have, up to now, almost escaped .... Today, I had a letter from General John J. Pershing in which he was commenting upon the perfection of supplies on the other side....

France and England were not the only overseas destinations for quartermaster supplies. Among others were Italy, Hawaii, the Philippines, Puerto Rico, China, Russia, and Siberia. In a talk General Wood made at this meeting he mentioned that:

... to handle this task, there are now in the Quartermaster Corps over eight thousand officers, one hundred and fifty-five thousand enlisted men, and sixty-five thousand civilian employees, and that number is being increased all the time to keep pace with the wants of our constantly increasing Army.

In 1919, Goethals requested his release from active service.

For his World War I service General Goethals, who retired March 1, 1919—and whom General Peyton C. March, the Army Chief of Staff, called "a great engineer, a great soldier, and the greatest Chief of Supply produced by any nation in the World War "—was awarded the Army Distinguished Service Medal; was named Commander of the Legion of Honor by France and Honorary Knight Commander, by Great Britain; and was awarded the British Order of St. Michael & St. George and the Grand Cordon of the Order of Wen Hu by China. Previously he had been awarded many medals by scientific and geographic societies and some fifteen honorary degrees by universities and colleges.[20] The citation for his Army DSM reads:

The President of the United States of America, authorized by Act of Congress, July 9, 1918, takes pleasure in presenting the Army Distinguished Service Medal to Major General George Washington Goethals, United States Army, for exceptionally meritorious and distinguished services to the Government of the United States, in a duty of great responsibility during World War I, in reorganizing the Quartermaster Department and in organizing and administering the Division of Purchase, Storage, and Traffic during the war.[24]