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The Jamesway hut is a portable and easy-to-assemble hut, [1] designed for polar weather conditions. This version of the Quonset hut was created by James Manufacturing Company of Fort Atkinson, Wisconsin. A Jamesway hut had wooden ribs and a type of insulated fabric covering then used by the Army Air Corps. Insulated blankets in 1.2 m (3 ft 11 in)-wide lengths were made with glass fiber insulation faced with flame-proof muslin and enclosed in plastic-treated cotton that was water-, vermin-, and fire-proof. The hardware (nails, fasteners, and connecting bars) was the only metal component. The whole package weighed 540 kg (1,190 lb) for a 5 metres (16 ft)-square hut. Its wooden packing crates were designed for reuse as the hut floor.
The storage/floor sections, each 1.2 by 2.4 m (3 ft 11 in by 7 ft 10 in) were made from plywood and insulated with R-7 fiberglass insulation, which provided a portable, warm and cleanable floor. The wooden arches holding up the roof were attached to the floor sections with steel fittings and wing nuts, and were strong enough to hold a winter's snow. The arches, the key to the design, were curved, glue-laminated wooden 15 cm (6 in) beams on 1.2 m (3 ft 11 in) centers that folded in quarters on steel hinges and removable pins. [2]
The hut became famous for providing portable warmth and shelter for the U.S. Armed Forces when the Japanese invaded the far Aleutian Islands in Alaska during World War II. [3] More huts were manufactured in the late 1940s for use in the Korean War; many of these have been used by the U.S. Antarctic Program (USAP) [4] from the initial Operation Deep Freeze operation from 1956 to 1961 in support of the International Geophysical Year (IGY), up to the present time.
