The latest editions of "Tactical Employment of Mortars" and "Graves Registration Handbook" will never be best-sellers.
But for three decades the Army has employed hundreds of people in Middle River to distribute these and and thousands of other tomes to privates and generals around the world.
Now, they're in a war for survival. In a fit of downsizing, officials want to close the sprawling, state-of-the-art publications warehouse in Baltimore County, eliminate 137 jobs and turn the work over to a similar facility in St. Louis.
Lawmakers from both states have joined in a battle of political clout, studies and statistics, while longtime employees wonder if their world will be turned upside down.
"Our wheel here works quite well," said George Washington, 61, a manager at the publications center for 30 years. "We're a family here, and until you are threatened with somebody ending your job, it's difficult to relate to."
The center, which opened in 1962, occupies 2.3 million square feet of space in a converted Eastern Boulevard factory where Glenn L. Martin built B-26 bombers during World War II.
As far as the eye can see, boxes of booklets, manuals and paper forms bearing more than 7,000 titles are stacked on pallets that reach nearly to the lofty ceiling.
An Automatic Guided Vehicle directed by a wire beneath the floor prowls the aisles and plucks out whatever titles the Army needs today -- whether it's "Field Hygiene and Sanitation" or "Tactics, Techniques and Procedures for Garrison Food Preparation."
Other high-tech touches include SpaceTrak 80, a computer-driven, tilt-tray package sorter, and the Videojet Addressing System, which can do the work of a dozen clerks.
That equipment could rust its way into military history like an old tank, along with $9 million worth of remodeling done over the last decade, if the center is closed, officials said.
Lt. Col. Brad Beasley, commander of the publications center, said the warehouse services more than 30,000 "customers," ranging from from the 82nd Airborne Division at Fort Bragg, N.C., to the U.S. Embassy in Islamabad, Pakistan. In fiscal 1994, the center received more than 10,000 tons of books, manuals and forms delivered by 240 trailer trucks and shipped out 9,000 tons of material.
Maryland's senators and a congressman are lobbying the Pentagon to keep the center going. Even Bea Gaddy, champion of the homeless in Baltimore, has asked President Clinton to choose the Middle River site over St. Louis because the center's employees have worked actively with the needy.
Missouri officials, including House Minority Leader Richard A. Gephardt, are conducting a full-court press to keep the Army publications center in St. Louis.
"Congressman Gephardt has been working hard lobbying the Department of Defense to keep the center in Missouri," said spokesman Daniel Sallick. "He has spoken with the secretary of defense and Army, has written letters and helped create opportunities at the center for DOD officials to be briefed." Mr. Sallick said a decision on which center is closed might come as soon as tomorrow.
Lt. Col. Linda Christ, commander of the St. Louis location, conceded that nobody likes what's going on. "In this," she said, "we're trying to do something distasteful."
In addition to the 137 Army employees, some 70 other logistics workers for the Air Force, General Services Administration and National Security Agency based at the same Middle River depot eventually could be moved or fall victim to budget cuts if the center closes, officials said.
Army officials justify their push to consolidate the publications centers in St. Louis with a study that says the service could save $7 million a year by eliminating duplicated effort and streamlining the global movement of millions of manuals and forms.
But workers and union leaders in Middle River argue that the study is flawed and slanted toward St. Louis.
"It sounds to me like they made the decision before they conducted the study," said Vernon Carter, president of Local 1409 of American Federal Government Employees, which represents the center's workers.
Mr. Carter and other officials say that if the center is closed, the eastern Baltimore County area would lose a work force that earns $4.2 million a year and has a long history of community involvement.
Maryland's Democratic senators, Paul S. Sarbanes and Barbara A. Mikulski, and 2nd District Republican Rep. Robert L. Ehrlich Jr. have lobbied Pentagon leaders to keep the center open. They wrote letters this month to Secretary of Defense William J. Perry and Army Secretary Togo D. West requesting an immediate review of the two publications centers. Until another study is completed, they asked for an "immediate halt" to realignment plans.
Col. Michael Mayer-Kielmann, commander of the Army Publications and Printing Command, said that before any moves are made "there has to be further study. No conclusion has been reached."
While that study proceeds, workers at the Middle River depot say their future hangs not so much on their work record -- which has earned awards -- but on political power in Congress.
Bill Weiman has driven a forklift at the Middle River center since 1979, and his wife, Bonnie, works there as a packer. Together, they make about $50,000 a year. He said rumors of the closing have been circulating for a decade, but the latest flurry of activity has the couple really worried.
"Last year, when they announced the consolidation, I had to take my house off the market," said Mr. Weiman, a city resident. "I pay $200 a month on my mortgage -- we live in a dangerous area -- and we just didn't want to risk going to the suburbs, have a higher housing cost, and then lose my job."