On Laundry

[Lady Rainbow]

Well I would guess that they have laundry staff of enlisted personel kind of like the stewerds who serve dinner only for house keeping.

A Quatermaster is the person responible for all the creature comforts, uniforms, and other clothing on bases or ships. Ciggerates (BAD), booze, (which technically isn't allowed on a ship) cards, uniforms, undies, socks, condoms (sometimes). Think of it as a whole convenience store. You can't get anything to write home about. But everyday mundane little necessities and a few luxuries that you don't need but will keep from going nuts. In theory at least.

Uhh, nope. A quartermaster on a ship is an enlisted member of the navigation team. A QM does navigation fixes, maintains charts and nav equipment, etc. Serves as helmsman during special evolutions, such as entering port, underway replenishment and general quarters. On smaller ships will also be responsible for visual communications (flashing light and signal flags).

Storekeepers (SK) (being renamed logistics specialists) are responsible for all supplies, repair parts, etc. Ships servicemen (SH) run the ship's store and barbershop and laundry. On the newer ships there are now a lot of self service laundry machines. Go watch Carrier on PBS.

I don't know how the Army splits out the support duties between quartermaster, food service, etc. The Air Force just goes to Target and Starbucks.

Sorry to entering this so late, have gotten behind the power curve.

QMs do what Navigator describes on a ship, but for some reason people just call the head of the SK dept. "Quartermaster". Tradition, maybe?

My dad used to be a steward to the captain of an aircraft carrier and considered part of the Captain's Flag Staff. His designation was actually MMS (Mess Management Specialist, which they're also renaming. God knows what.). Eventually, he was in charge of the galley on another carrier, kinda like what Chef does, but on a much bigger scale.

Funny enough, in the Enterprise RPG on Twitter, the crew asked the QMs department for appropriate clothing for an away mission, then again very soon after for shore leave. The QMs dept. struck a deal w/the senior staff...for doing all that, the senior crew ended up doing laundry detail for a week. And for some reason, Trip ended up with sticking a lot of the female crew's, um...delicate items in the wash. Hoshi had to remind him to use the delicate cycle.

[WarpGirl]

So are you saying we're both right?????????

[Lady Rainbow]

Just saying that I've heard people call the Head Supply Officer the "Quartermaster", before.

[WarpGirl]

So have I on JAG, NCIS, and other military dramas. Sometimes things in life are too confusing.

[Aquarius]

Since Starfleet is a fictitious organization, I don't see anything wrong with calling it whatever you want to. While "quartermaster" may not necessarily be the "correct" name any more, I'd think that as writers we need to think about what the average reader would think, and I think the average person would equate quartermaster to a supply-type job versus a navigation kind of thing.

[WarpGirl]

Well it can't be wrong to use quartermaster in fanfic because that's what it is in THE SHOW. But you've got to admit, some shows don't do proper research, and that's pretty stupid considering how much money it takes to make a TV show.

[Aikiweezie]

I'm yanking this one out of the mothballs! I met a woman while I working at the USO yesterday. She told me that she was on her way home on a two week leave from her duty station on a base outside Kandahar where she worked as an assistant to the quartermaster. Soooooo, I asked her what that meant exactly. She said the quartermaster (this is Air Force) was responsible for supplies, uniforms, uniform repair and mail. She was currently running the post office on the base. Just and FYI.

[WarpGirl]

Oh good I'm not crazy. That's all I was worried about.