Today is Labor Day, a national holiday in the United States. It’s supposed to be a day when we celebrate the contributions workers have made to the strength and prosperity of our country. The gallery below is a collection of images from the exhibit at the Connecticut Historical Society Museum I visited in August. Most of the images have a (sometimes lengthy) caption that explains it. That’s my post, just the gallery. And, since the Editor cannot view the captions without encountering the Block Editor, I’m giving her the holiday off. Any typos you find are my fault.
If you are in the US (or anywhere that celebrates this day) I hope you enjoy the holiday. And, if you’re in Connecticut, please consider visiting, joining or supporting the Connecticut Historical Society.
Weapon and ammunition assembly in the Cold Firearms Company in Hartford, CT.
President Roosevelt acted to gear up production of military equipment, initially to supply England and other allies in the war against Germany. He invited William Knudsen
William Knudsen accepted President Roosevelt’s request that he manage military production. He gave up a $300,000-a-yeas job to join the Defense Advisory Council – service for which he was paid a dollar a year by the US government.
Fred Geier, president of the Cincinnati Milling Machine company visited Germany during the 1930s and saw that war was coming. He stepped up production at his company. During the war, Geier’s company produced a new machine tool (the tools required to build everything else) every 17 minutes. Total American machine tool production nearly doubled by the end of 1941 and continued to grow after that.
Boeing manufactured the two most heavily used bombers during the war. The B-17 Flying Fortress working the European theater and the B-29 Super Fortress used in the Pacific. Boeing built almost 13,000 B-17s and almost 4,000 B-29s. Each B-29 contained more than 165,000 individual parts. Meanwhile Pratt ad Whitney, here in Connecticut, manufactures over 170,000 Twin Wasp engines which powered B-24s, C-47s, F4F Wildcats, F6F Hellcats and the P-47 Thunderbolt.
The Arsenal of Democracy was the production effort that supplied the US military and our allies with the equipment necessary to win the second world war.
Harley Davidson, founded in nearby Springfield, MA continued building motorcycles for the war effort. They produced over 90,000 motorcycles during the war. Caterpillar Tractor build diesel equipment used by Navy “Seabees” and combat engineers to produce power and build landing strips. Caterpillar doubled its workforce during the war and produced more than 51,000 vehicles for the military and in use building the 1,600 mile long ALCAN Highway to Alaska.
Connecticut was a center of precision manufacturing before the war and continued to supply critical components during the war, including propellers built by Hamilton Standard in my adopted home town of Windsor Locks, CT.
Connecticuts awesome manufacturing capacity was put to work supplying bearings, munitions, ball bearings, parachutes, 74 submarines and hundreds of surface ships.
On June 25, 1941, President Roosevelt signed an executive order prohibiting racial discrimination in hiring for national defense work. The military remained segregated but industrial assembly lines were integrated. This was not without conflict. Racial tensions were common and a race riot in Detroit caused over $2 million in property damage and resulted in 34 deaths. This poster mentions that “racial inequalities would have to be confronted in the postwar era.” That continues to be necessary today. However, the Arsenal of Democracy transformed the industrial heartland and economic geography of the nation.
By the end of the war, over 6 million women had been drawn into the wartime industrial effort.
Not Rosie the Riveter. She wasn’t a single woman but millions of women across the country.
Chance Vought Aircraft promotional poster praising the women among their essential workforce.
Cutting and assembling parachutes at Cheney Manufacturing in Manchester, Connecticut.
Fuel oil and refined products delivered around the world and manufactured goods delivered (by rail) from manufacturing site across the country to ports on every coast.
Andrew Higgens designed, developed and build over 20,000 Higgens boats (many of them built in my home town of Pittsburgh, PA). For more about the Higgens Boat, see – https://pacificparatrooper.wordpress.com/2019/09/19/higgins-boats/
Assembling the Twin Wasp engine at Pratt and Whitney in East Hartford, CT.
No Facilities 
This is one year I am very happy not to be part of the work force. (With the virus and all.)
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Me too, GP. This is the first year this holiday doesn’t mean a day off for me. It feels good.
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Wonderful history lesson Dan. This country always comes through for the war effort. Working side by side for one common goal. Hats off to all those in the work force today, and a huge thank you to those in times gone by,
How sad though, that we can’t make that same effort in race relations and the war against Covid-19.
Enjoy the holiday.
Ginger
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Thanks Ginger. It is sad to read s poster talking about 1942 and realize it still applies in many ways almost 80 years later. For now, I toast the folks who made this country an Arsenal of Democracy. Those people worked very hard to bring their lived ones home.
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Interesting info Dan. And I agree with Ginger. Just imagine what we could accomplished if we all worked together.
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It’s a very good reminder of what we can do, when we work toward a common goal.
Thanks Pam.
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Happy Labor Day, Dan. It doesn’t feel like a holiday this year, but I am still grateful for our workforce, past and present. So many hard-working and dedicated people!
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This is my first Labor Day in retirement, Mary. It feels a little weird, but this year, more than most, I am grateful to the many essential workers who are out there in this mess.
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This was such an interesting post today, Dan! I had watched a history of the automobile this weekend and did not know that Edsel ever produced airplanes, or that Harley Davidson manufactored motorcycles for the war. I had to share this one, I hope they found it as interesting as I did! I was also surprised to see women credited for their war efforts.
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Women stepped up, big time, Kim. Without their effort, we would not have eon the war when we did. We may not have won it at all. Germany introduced missiles and jet planes near the end of the war. If they had had another year to perfect those weapons, things might have ended differently. As for the manufacturing sector, they learned how to make everything.
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I love museums that share information that isn’t widely known. Thanks for the tour. Congrats on all your days being holidays now, for the hard work you’ve in for many years. Hitler. Why don’t humans learn? 😞
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Thanks Cheryl. This is why I love going to museums. I’m so glad they are starting to open. I have hopes for this winter. I’d love to get to one a week. As for why humans never seem to learn, I wish I knew. Enjoy the weekend – stay safe.
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You too.
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For most it’s just another long weekend… thanks for the reminder it means so much more.
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My pleasure.
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Good post Dan. History that should not be ignored or forgotten. Now if I can just figure out what WP is up to. It is looking for me to sign in again before commenting. Technology is our feind and our friend…
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Thanks John. WordPress and technology, lately, don’t make a good team.
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Leaving a $300,000 a year job to work for no pay…..That is amazing. My first Labor Day since retiring, also. It feels weird. Last week I kept thinking of how we would be having discussions at work on who could take of last Friday to make it an even longer weekend. With the way things are now, I doubt that subject is even broached.
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$300,000 in 1941 ! Yeah, I don’t see that happening today. They used to close at noon the Friday’s before holiday weekends. That was always nice.
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Wow. For such a small state, Connecticut seems to have produced a lot–it was definitely punching above its weight class. Thanks, Dan, for the reminder of the “labor” in Labor Day. For many people nowadays, “work” does not involve any physical labor, though the distinction between “labor” and “work” is definitely a blurry one.
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We still make airplane engines and submarines here, Mike. But not so many and not so fast. CT had several large manufacturing centers back then. Most of those cities are centers of poverty today. It’s very sad.
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It’s a little strange but the only manufacturing thing I associate with Connecticut is Colt weapons. I tend to think of Connecticut as the center of insurance rather than industry. In so many parts of the US, unfortunately, locations that depended on manufacturing have suffered greatly with many, many factories shut down.
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In not sure if Colt is still making guns here. They’ve been in and out of bankruptcy so many times, it’s hard to keep track.
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Excellent Labor Day post, Dan. I loved your gallery.
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I’m glad, John. We owe a lot to those people.
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Wonderful tribute and images/articles of the workforce from days gone by.
Today is the last Labor Day He-Man is going to enjoy as an employee. He’s retiring next month. I wonder if he’s thought about that while he’s out on his bike right now? I’ve certainly been grateful for all the years he’s worked to provide for our little family and his contributions to his employer.
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This is my first as a retiree. I like being retired now, especially. This would be the start of budgeting and planning and tons of year-end prep activity. I don’t miss that at all.
I’m glad you enjoyed the gallery.
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The captions make for a nice post, Dan. The museum seems like a nice place. Happy Labor Day hugs.
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It’s a nice compact museum, Teagan. They put a lot of work into these exhibits. It was hard not to be proud of the people portrayed in this one.
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Just perfect for Labor Day, Dan. I hope you and the Editor are enjoying her time off. :-) Now that you’re retired, I know you’re not laboring anymore, right? :-)
janet
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Just work around the house, Janet, and that’s a labor of love.
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I know it is, Dan. Isn’t that a blessing?
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It truly is.
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Very nice post, Dan. The workers of America certainly deserve to be celebrated for their many contributions throughout our history. Hope you had a nice day off. I know I did! Beautiful weather today.
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It was a nice cool day here, Paul. I think we finally have those heat waves behind us. I really enjoyed this exhibit.
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Lest we forget, it began as a rather controversial Communist holiday and a lot of y’all weren’t that happy about celebrating it, hence moving it to September (which, presumably, is a less commie month than May, when it was originally celebrated) to make it more your own.
We still have a bank holiday on the nearest Monday to May 2nd over here because nobody cares. ;~}
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There was more than enough controversy when this holiday began. Still, the labor force highlighted today is not controversial at all. These people were as important as the soldiers on the front.
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The Labor Heritage Foundation has a great film called The Inheritance. https://www.laborheritage.org/product/inheritance/ I highly recommend it.
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Thanks for adding that!
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We didn’t do too much because of the heat and smoke but we did eat a hot dog in honor of our working class ancestors.
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Hahaha – I’m proud of you.
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I really enjoyed this post, Dan. My dad used to grumble and call this a ‘union holiday’. It was controversial, yet it has come to mark the end of summer and the beginning of school. It has also become somewhat patriotic, which is nice. The museum looks wonderful.
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When you stop to consider the conditions the original labor movement was trying to improve, I think their methods were understandable and I think they had a right to celebrate. I saw a few posts this year celebrating essential workers. All of the workers during WWII were essential to the war effort.
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I absolutely agree! I find it interesting that it was controversial when you consider how deplorable conditions often were. Yes, all workers during WWII were essential.
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Great Labor Day post, Dan! Very informative and educational. Love it! Thanks for sharing!
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