NDRC OF OSRD — THE COMMITTEE 6l 



a subcommittee will review the situation and report to the full committee; 

 (8) that the Director of OSRD modify existing administrative machinery 

 to conform with the new organization. 



Appended to the resolution was a tentatively proposed new divisional 

 organization calling for fifteen divisions designated by name with indica- 

 tions of the assignment of specific parts of the current program to each of 

 the proposed divisions. In submitting the recommendation, Conant sug- 

 gested that after the reorganization the Committee should meet at weekly 

 intervals to consider proposals for contract and to function actively in re- 

 viewing the activities of the several divisions. 



Following the Committee meeting Jewett wrote Conant on October 21 

 at some length about the difficulty of organizing NDRC for more efficient 

 operations. He described NDRC responsibilities in the following language: 



We must realize that the thing we are charged to administer is the greatest in- 

 dustrial research and development project man has ever attempted; that it is the 

 most diffuse in the variety of its interests; has the largest funds; is the most dif- 

 ficult to operate because of the necessarily wide scattering of its units and projects, 

 and is something in which time is more the essense of the job than anywhere else. 



In Jewett's opinion, effective organization required that the Chairman or 

 the chief operating officer of NDRC should have a sufficient stafl to super- 

 vise all the work adequately. The members of that staff should be intimately 

 familiar with the sectors of the work for which they were responsible and 

 should be in a position to present matters in their fields for consideration 

 by the Committee. 



On October 28, 1942, Bush gave his approval to the general lines upon 

 which reorganization was proceeding. The subcommittee appointed by the 

 Committee on October 15 made its report on November 6. Upon the basis 

 of that report, the full Committee, with Jewett dissenting, recommended 

 the establishment of eighteen named divisions and two named panels with 

 designated persons as their respective chiefs. The Committee indicated that 

 it would report at a later date with reference to the method of handling 

 matters relating to physiology and psychology. 



This was one of the few times when the Committee did not act unani- 

 mously, and Jewett's dissent was concerned solely with the question of the 

 adequacy of provisions for administrative work in the proposed new divi- 

 sions and in the office of the Chairman. He believed that more adequate 

 provision for the staffs of the divisions and of the Chairman should have 

 preceded the establishment of new divisions. 



Moreland, on November 10, 1942, wrote the persons who had been rec- 

 ommended as Division Chiefs to tell them of the recommendation and to 

 state that when the reorganization had been approved and the Chiefs of 

 the new divisions formally appointed, they would be asked to make recom- 



