"In the spring of 1918 - at the height of U.S. involvement in World War I - the U.S. War Department established the National Army Training Detachments program. By that fall, over 500 institutions joined the effort, including the State University of Iowa, whose unit consisted of over 1,700 enlistees in October 1918. The NATD's student training program became known as the Students' Army Training Corps.

During World War II, the U. S. Army established Army Specialized Training Programs at colleges and universities to train soldiers in needed skills such as engineering, languages, and medicine, and to prevent campus enrollment declines. In addition, flight training was provided by the U.S. Navy; records from the U.S. Navy Pre-flight School form part of Series II.