University of New Mexico. Naval Reserve Officers Training Corps

On May 10, 1941, UNM President J.F. Zimmerman was notified by Frank Knox, then secretary of the Navy, that the University of New Mexico would house a unit of the Naval Reserve Officers Training Corps. Chief Gunner's Mate Raymond Clark, Captain J.B. Will and Lt. Commander Brown were the first military representatives to arrive on campus. The first class of recruits comprised 93 students, and instruction began on Aug. 27, 1941. In the 1950s, the unit produced more Rhodes Scholars than any other organization on campus.

The 1960s and '70s saw women begin to influence the NROTC unit at UNM. In the Fall of 1961, Terry Berkshire and Phyllis Forgan founded the UNM NROTC Women's Auxiliary, also known as the Clippers. In 1966, Ilene Mitchell became the first woman to join the NROTC. But it wasn't until 1971 when Marjorie Litchfield became the first female NROTC student to be commissioned.

As people in the United States changed their attitude toward Vietnam, members of UNM's NROTC faced protest and open harassment. Though the first protest of the unit, Dec. 5, 1967, was peaceful, cadets were beaten in later incidents. Other rivalries with the Sigma Chi fraternity and the Air Force ROTC unit were more genial.

In January of 1991, Assistant Secretary of the Navy Barbara S. Pope sent a letter to then-President Richard Peck informing him of the Navy's decision to close UNM's NROTC unit. Later that year, at a 50th anniversary celebration of the unit, Bill Cunningham of the class of '46 moved that a history be written, and the motion passed unanimously. The history began July 28, 1992.

UNM's NROTC unit was to be disestablished Aug. 1, 1995, despite appeals made by members of New Mexico's Congressional delegation and members of the unit's alumni association. The doors never closed, however, as ruled by a congressional subcommittee in August 1993 to be effective that December.

Although Air Force ROTC has been on the University campus since July 1, 1949, the unit was formally established at UNM in an agreement signed in 1951 by UNM President Thomas L. Popejoy and Assistant Secretary of the Air Force James T. Bill Jr. Its first commanding officer was Major Harold B. Frazier, who led the unit from 1949-1951, followed by Lieutenant Colonel John L. Parker, 1951-1953.

Like NROTC, the AFROTC unit on UNM campus was targeted by anti-Vietnam War student protesters during the 1960s and 1970s. During these turbulent years, the AFROTC building was occupied by protesters and subjected to bomb threats.

From the guide to the Reserve Officer Training Corps Collection, 1919-2010, (University of New Mexico Center for Southwest Research)