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"The Sound of Freedom"
"Naval Weapons Technology at Dahlgren, Virginia 1918-2006"
By James P. Rife & Rodney P. Carlisle

Reviewed By Steve Wolfe

For most of us who live in the Dahlgren area, the rumble of guns is a fact of everyday life whose greatest inconvenience is usually a need to re-straighten the pictures on our walls cast askew by a busy day of testing. Further up the Machodoc Creek, the occasional explosions at Pumpkin Neck stir the Bald Eagles and ospreys, who quickly resume their normal routines.

Eagles and ospreys aside, for many the roar of the guns and explosions means more than just a busy day at the base. They also signal that the Navy's mission at Dahlgren goes forward as it prepares to enter its tenth decade of service to our nation. In short, what we hear is "The sound of freedom".

"The Sound of Freedom" is also the title of a new comprehensive history of the Navy's presence at Dahlgren, authored by James P. Rife and Rodney P. Carlisle. Dr. Carlisle is a vice president and senior associate of History Associates Incorporated (HAI) of Rockville, Maryland and is a professor emeritus of history at Rutgers University. Mr. Rife is an historian with HAI and is a colleague of Dr. Carlisle. Both are experienced military and naval historians and researchers. This is the first history of Dahlgren to be published in 30 years, when the volume "Dahlgren", edited by Kenneth McCollum, was released in June, 1977.

"The Sound of Freedom" traces the origin of Dahlgren to the early 1840's, when the U.S. Navy began to seriously explore "technological innovation in ordnance and gunnery". The authors credit the February 1844 fatal explosion of the "Peacemaker" gun aboard the sloop USS Princeton as being the catalyst that spurred the Navy to adopt systematic methods of testing the range and power of naval weapons. It was to lead this effort that in 1847 then Lieutenant John A. B. Dahlgren was assigned to the Washington Navy Yard.

Although Rear Admiral Dahlgren died in 1870, his legacy of using systematic and scientific methods for weapons analysis had by then been firmly imprinted upon the Navy, who soon outgrew the "Experimental Battery" at the Navy Yard. The authors trace the Navy's growing embrace of scientific testing as it also outgrew subsequent testing facilities at Annapolis and Indian Head, Maryland as well.

Although testing at Indian Head began in 1890, it was soon apparent that it too was rapidly becoming inadequate to the mission as stray shots and other pieces of hardware began to fall onto both civilian and military residences. A request was made to the Congress in 1902 to fund "a more isolated location for proving and ranging" weapons, but the request sat on the shelf for more than a decade despite the repeated urgings of successive Bureau of Ordnance (BUORD) chiefs.

Two events separated by a few years finally pressed home the urgency for a new range. In the summer of 1913, the presidential yacht Mayflower, with President Wilson aboard, was nearly hit by a shot from a 14-inch gun fired from Indian Head, an event that received widespread publicity and prompted an investigation by Assistant Secretary of the Navy Franklin D. Roosevelt.

The second event was the onset of World War I and the arrival of a new BUORD chief, Rear Admiral Ralph Earle, who warned in October 1916 that the war was rapidly changing the nature of proof work and that the Navy would soon be forced to find an additional proving ground. His warnings, plus the entry of the United States into WW I in April 1917 led to the enactment of Public Law 140, which authorized the President to condemn land and provided limited funding for a new proving facility.

In late 1917, Admiral Earle ordered Indian Head Inspector of Ordnance in Charge Commander Henry Lackey to locate a 1,000 acre site with a long range capability. Knowing that Earle wanted a site reasonably close to the Indian Head "powder factory" he eventually settled on the current site at the Machodoc Creek and Potomac River. On June 10th, 1918 Presidential Proclamation #1458 formally appropriated the first 994 acres for the new proving ground with another 372 acres from the adjoining Arnold Farm added that November. In addition, in March 1919, 70-acre Blackstone Island, 17 miles downrange, was acquired as well.

A shot fired by the Marines on October 16th, 1918, from an Army 7-inch, 45-caliber tractor mounted gun signaled that the new "Lower Station" was "open for business". From this first shot to the aftermath of the 2005 BRAC, the authors trace the growing pains, bureaucratic battles, and the numerous scientific breakthroughs that Dahlgren has contributed to our nation's defense over the past nine decades.

While many of Dahlgren's contributions to the science of naval weaponry are well known to the "inside" community, perhaps the biggest contribution of "The Sound of Freedom" is the ease with which it brings Dahlgren's history to life in a manner easily accessible to those (like me) who have no grounding in the engineering or technology of the mission.

The challenge of presenting an accessible history of Dahlgren's work while staying faithful to its complex technological nature is readily acknowledged by the authors, who give ample credit to dozens of individuals that helped them navigate the involved technical language inherent in the work. It is a credit to the authors and their contributors that "The Sound of Freedom" is a richly detailed yet readable volume that even the most casual readers of military history will appreciate.

Seamlessly woven together are the stories that trace such breakthroughs as the Norden "Pickle Barrel" bombsight, advanced military computing applications, Dahlgren's key role in the POLARIS, TRIDENT, TOMAHAWK, and of course the pioneering AEGIS program, to name just a few. Of course no narrative of Dahlgren would be complete without the story of the first computer "bug" or of its innovative managerial methods collectively known as the "Dahlgren Way", detailed below.

The authors engagingly trace the evolution of Dahlgren as a simple adjunct facility to Indian Head to a fully independent entity, a journey marked by numerous turf wars and congressional battles. For a layman like me who sometimes feels the need for a scorecard to keep up with Dahlgren's name and organizational changes, the volume proved to be a valuable reference work in its own right.

"The Sound of Freedom" not only chronicles the known and not so well known contributions of Dahlgren, it also tells the stories of the powerful and colorful personalities, both civilian and military, who made it all possible. Chief among these personalities was Dr. Louis T. E. "Tommy" Thompson, who became Dahlgren's first Chief Physicist in 1923, a post that by 2003 would eventually morph into its current incarnation as Executive Director.

A key contribution to the mission was the innovative "Dahlgren Way" established by "Dr. Tommy" and his colleagues in the 1930's. The "Dahlgren Way" was a management style that freely delegated, fostered knowledge across disciplines, and placed great emphasis on an independent, self-starting approach to science and systems analysis: "The idea was to work fast, to make mistakes fast, and to learn fast in order to develop the best possible weapons and ordnance for the Navy without bureaucratic meddling or burdensome contract negotiations."

Civilian personalities such as Dr. Thompson, Russell Lyddane, Barney Smith, and the blunt-spoken Jim Colvard ("You can take that charter and dispose of it in the classical manner" he once told an "energetic researcher" from White Oak), bring the narrative to life, as do the many military men critical to Dahlgren over the years such as Lt. Commander (later Rear Admiral) William "Deak" Parsons, Captains David Hedrick, and Paul Anderson, among others.

It is difficult in a short review to properly accredit all of the significant contributions Dahlgren has made to America's defense over the past nine decades, but in their volume the authors acquit themselves well in a manner that the most technology-challenged among us can enjoy. Technological descriptions are provided in a straight forward manner, with a minimum of jargon.

Many who came to work at Dahlgren over the decades found a way of life so enjoyable that they made King George County their permanent home after retiring from active duty or from the corporate world. It is for this reason that I felt that the volume would have been a little better rounded had more attention been devoted to the nature of the community that grew up around it. Dahlgren, and the Navy, have obviously had a great impact upon the development of this part of King George County and will continue to do so far into the future. This is however, strictly a mild objection that in no way detracts from a fascinating story well told.

Steve Wolfe is a King George resident who represents the Dahlgren District on the King George County Board of Supervisors

"The Sound of Freedom, Naval Weapons Technology at Dahlgren, Virginia 1918-2006", by Rodney P. Carlisle and James P. Rife, 417 pages, Superintendent of Documents, U.S. Government Printing Office, 2007. (866) 512-1800

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