 During the wartime years , Savage was also the home of Camp Savage , a school designed to improve the foreign language skills of Japanese @-@ American soldiers and to train them in military intelligence gathering . The school was originally established in San Francisco , but moved to Minnesota after the bombing of Pearl Harbor . Eventually , the school outgrew its facilities in Savage and was moved to Fort Snelling . Fort Snelling itself served a major role as a reception center for newly drafted recruits after the Selective Service Act was passed in 1940 . New recruits were given a physical exam and the Army General Qualification Test to determine their fitness for service in a particular branch . The most intelligent recruits , about 37 % of Minnesotans going through Fort Snelling , were assigned to the Army Air Corps . Recruits were also issued uniforms and sent from the fort to other training centers . Over 300 @,@ 000 recruits were processed through Fort Snelling during the World War II years . 
