THE NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC MAGAZINE 



173 



paper pattern, on 

 which every rivet hole 

 is marked, every curve 

 and twist designated. 

 With these templates 

 for guidance, the vari- 

 ous parts of the ship's 

 hull are laid off, 

 sheared, punched, 

 planed, and bent. 

 Upon the skill and 

 thoroughness of the 

 loftsmen depend in 

 very great measure the 

 speed with which a 

 ship is built, the 

 strength of its hull, 

 and the economy of 

 its construction. 



Working in collabo- 

 ration with the lofts- 

 men are the shipfltters, 

 who take the tem- 

 plates and mark off 

 upon the steel plates 

 the different parts of 

 the hull. In some spe- 

 cial instances the ship- 

 fitter works directly 

 from his blue-prints 

 without the aid of 

 templates. 



The: camoufXe;ur 



ARRIVES 



Once the ship is 

 completed, 60 per cent 

 of the labor being rep- 

 resented in the hull 

 and 40 per cent in the 

 installation of the 

 mechanical parts and 

 the motive power, there comes upon the 

 scene a corps of men whose profession 

 was unknown before the war and for 

 whom a name had to be invented by the 

 French — camoufleurs, men who prac- 

 tice the art of concealment by protective 

 coloration. 



In the use of camouflage it has been 

 found impossible so to blend a ship with 

 horizon or seascape as to make it invis- 

 ible ; a phase of the art had to be devel- 

 oped which would effect an optical illu- 

 sion confusing to the enemy observer. 



© Committee on Public Information 



building the: ste;rn OF A modkrn SHIP 



When America suddenly awoke to the necessity of having ships 

 in a hurry, it was the bridge-builders and those who had erected our 

 steel^ skyscrapers, who proved to be the "men of the hour." The 

 fabricated steel ship is an adaptation of the American bridge-build- 

 ers' method of construction. 



Marine camouflage, instead of being a 

 new art, is in reality the revival of a prac- 

 tice familiar to the Greeks and Romans 

 at the dawn of the Christian era. They 

 employed what today in modified and im- 

 proved form is known as the "baffle" 

 system of painting. It is the use of big 

 splotches of color and wide bands of 

 paint to distort the dimensions and shape 

 of vessels to such an extent that an enemy 

 at any considerable distance is unable to 

 determine their size, their armament, or 

 the direction in which they are going. 



