The Desert Training Center

In March 1942, Maj. Gen. George S. Patton Jr. selected Camp Young as the headquarters of the Desert Training Center, the administrative center for a simulated theater of operations that eventually extended from Pomona, California, to Phoenix, Arizona, and from Yuma, Arizona, to Boulder City, Nevada, with a network of training facilities at Camps Clipper, Coxcomb, Granite, Ibis, Iron Mountain, and Pilot Knob in California and Camps Bouse, Horn, Hyder, and Laguna in Arizona. Between 1942 and 1944, over one million men trained on the surrounding desert and took part in highly realistic war games under extremely harsh conditions, and in an important sense many battles of World War II were won on these desert lands during these maneuvers. The headquarters was named Camp Young on May 12, 1942, in honor of Lt. Gen. Samuel B. M. Young, who had served with distinction as a captain in the Army of the Potomac, later with the 8th Calvary along the Mojave Road in California and Arizona, commanded a brigade during the Spanish-American War in Cuba and later in the Philippine Islands where he became Military Governor of Northwest Luzon, was named president of the War College Board in 1901 and became the first president of the War College, and in 1903 was appointed the first Chief of Staff of the Army, serving until his retirement in 1904.

California · United States