FORT DRUM, N.Y. (April 30, 2024) -- Dozens of community members took the first Around and About Fort Drum Tour on April 29, presented as both a glimpse into 10th Mountain Division (LI) and installation history and the modern era.
The five-hour bus tour covered sites across the cantonment such as Division Hill, the “Lost Village” of LeRaysville, the Command Sgt. Maj. Southern “Buddy” Hewitt Noncommissioned Officers Academy, and Memorial Park.
Inside the 10th Combat Aviation Brigade’s Holistic Health and Fitness (H2F) center, attendees learned how Soldiers receive professional athlete-level support from a staff of experts.
Ben Smith, H2F strength and conditioning coach, discussed how H2F focuses on human performance optimization – including injury prevention, nutrition, physical, mental, and spiritual readiness, and sleep management.
Smith said it began as a pilot program in 2018 with human performance teams working with special operators. This was the catalyst for a cultural shift in the way the Army trains, develops, and cares for Soldiers.
“As H2F gained more success, we started to see injury rates go down and improvements in overall health and fitness,” Smith said. “Going forward, now we’re starting to focus more on the education piece. We’re seeing H2F slowly integrate into schools.”
Smith said he recently participated in an H2F program at the School for Command Preparation’s Chief of Staff of the Army’s Core Course. Senior noncommissioned officers preparing to join battalion and brigade leadership teams as command sergeants major received an introduction to hands-on H2F curriculum.
“We worked with 335 students in a day, and they got the full gamut of H2F,” Smith said. “The goal with incorporating H2F into schools is that Soldiers are getting that education, and then they come back to their units and help the H2F teams get more Soldiers fit and healthy.”
After touring the Owl’s Den – the giant turf-covered performance center – attendees learned more about military training at the 1st Lt. John A. McCown Light Fighters School.
“We train Soldiers on light infantry tactics,” said 1st Sgt. Dan Fields, Mountain Training Group first sergeant. “That includes day and night operations, teaching them how to foot march while carrying heavy loads for long distances. We also teach the Air Assault Course where Soldiers essentially learn how to integrate those light infantry operations with helicopters.”
Soldiers enrolled in the Alpine Operations Course receive mountaineering and cold-weather training.
“This teaches Soldiers the skills they need to enhance mobility in their units,” Fields said. “Whether that requires scaling cliffs or even buildings in an urban setting, we’ll teach them those techniques. And then we also instruct how to properly wear cold-weather clothing to operate in snow-covered terrain.”
Field said that Mountain Training Group instructors teach anywhere from 2,000 to 5,000 Soldiers every year in these courses, as well as the Rappel Master Course and Pre-Ranger School Course.
Lt. Col. Marc Cleveland, information operations officer, welcomed the tour group to Hays Hall, the 10th Mountain Division (LI) headquarters building.
“I appreciate you all visiting us here and allowing me to share a little 10th Mountain Division history with you,” he said, “because you all have helped make me feel very much at home in the North Country.”
Cleveland guided them through the foyer and hallways that showcase 10th Mountain Division history-makers from World War II to the present day. Attendees peeked inside the Command Group entrance to see the 10th Mountain Division-inspired uniform that the West Point Football Team wore during the 2016 Army-Navy Game.
They also visited the Charles Bancroft McLane Conference Room, named after the first enlisted Soldier who reported for duty with the 10th Mountain Division during World War II.
Cleveland said it was a privilege to share this history with community members.
“We are proud of this division’s history, so I think it is important for us to share that with others when we have the opportunity,” he said. “When we invite our North Country neighbors to Fort Drum, it allows them to see what we do day-to-day, and we can show them that not only are we a part of their community, but they are a part of ours.”
Jill Van Hoesen described the tour as “a trip down memory lane.”
She worked on post for years with the Army & Air Force Exchange Service when her husband was assigned to the 10th Mountain Division (LI) in August 1987. The division had reactivated, and the post was undergoing the largest Army construction project since World War II.
“When I first got here, they weren’t really ready for us and I wasn’t sure if I was going to like being here,” Van Hoesen said. “Now I can’t imagine living anywhere else.”
She has visited post on several occasions for special events but never for an extensive tour.
“I’ve always been interested in the history of Fort Drum,” Van Hoesen said. “Not everybody remembers what it was first like to be in 801 housing and seeing if it would work sending children to schools in the community and not DoD (Department of Defense) schools. It was a whole different way of life.”
In addition to visiting sites she never saw before, Van Hoesen said this was also her first chance to see the 10th Mountain Division and Fort Drum Museum at its new location.
“This whole tour was special for me,” she said. “When I worked here, I don’t think I really appreciated it until I left. You kind of knew about things like Mount Belvedere and Riva Ridge, but I don’t think it had quite the same effect on me as it does now.”
Bob Kimball, a retired surgeon from Watertown, served in the Army during Operation Desert Storm and his father was a World War II veteran.
“I moved here in 1992 when I was getting out of the Army, and everybody I talked to at the time assumed I was stationed at Fort Drum,” he said. “But I didn’t have any attachment with Fort Drum.”
Except one.
“One of the reasons I enjoyed working in Watertown was because of Fort Drum,” he said. “As we often hear, it is one of the only bases that does not have its own hospital. So, I got to treat families and Soldiers for the 30 years I was working there, and it was a pleasure to do that.”
Social Sharing