Chapter 2 

Historic Overview 
The story of the World War

II home front is a significant

chapter in America’s history;

the changes to society and

industry that occurred

during the war had sweeping

and lasting impacts on the

nation. The cooperation of

government, private industry,

and labor unions to mobilize

the work force, and the

creation of innovative plans

and production methods

designed to rapidly produce

quantities of munitions and

other essential supplies

thrust the United States into

the role of “arsenal of

democracy.” Fully engaged in

winning World War II,

American citizens of all ethnic and economic backgrounds

worked together toward a common goal, in a manner that has

been unequaled since. In significant ways, World War II was a

period of large and lasting change for America, causing many

historians to see it as a watershed event that made postwar

America profoundly different from prewar America.

WARTIME MOBILIZATION

Mobilizing the United States for World War II involved an

enormous effort with huge consequences for the American home

front. The task was immense: ensure that the nation had the

material, munitions, manpower, and money to wage a global war,

all the while managing the domestic civilian economy. Meeting

that challenge entailed giving the federal government

responsibilities and authority that went well beyond the New

Deal state of the 1930s. The process began haltingly in the late

1930s, particularly after the beginning of World War II in Europe

in September 1939, and gained momentum in 1940-41 as the

United States edged closer to war. After the attack on Pearl

Harbor and American entry into the war in December 1941,

American mobilization efforts expanded rapidly and grew more

efficient until, by 1944, the United States provided some 40% of

all war goods produced worldwide.

23

The American World

War II Home Front

Recuiting poster, 1943, National

Archives.
24

Although mobilization got off to a slow and

stumbling start and never resolved all of its

difficulties or disputes, the American production

effort found its stride by 1943 and ultimately turned

out enormous quantities of munitions and other

essential supplies, while also providing essential

goods to Great Britain and the Soviet Union. Not

only the sheer quantity but also the quality of

American production helped win the war; and not

just through traditional manufacturing processes—

new departures in science, technology, and

fabrication were a key. 

ENDING THE GREAT DEPRESSION

Wartime mobilization brought a successful end to

the war abroad and brought economic policy change

to America; it ended the Great Depression at home

and returned prosperity to the American home

front. In 1939, unemployment stood at a depression

level of 17.2%, but as mobilization geared up,

unemployment went down sharply to 4.7% by 1942,

and to 1.2% by 1944.

Mobilization brought more jobs and higher

incomes; it brought new opportunities and rising

living standards. As production demands grew and

some 10 million people entered active military

service, employers had to find new workers to

replace those going to war. They increasingly turned

to groups which had filled only limited roles in the

pre-war economy: women, African Americans,

minority groups, and the elderly. People who had

once been marginalized now found jobs that often

had high status and pay associated with them. 

The armed forces also provided new opportunities,

training, and experience, while the “GI Bill of

Rights” provided veterans with educations, home

ownership, and other benefits. 

POPULATION ON THE MOVE

For more than a decade, industry and people had

already been moving toward what would become

known as the “Sunbelt”—areas of the South and

West, particularly along the Pacific, Gulf, and South

Atlantic coasts. Mobilization for war accelerated

these geographic and demographic changes. While

war contracts went to established industries in the

Northeast and Midwest, they also went to newer

aircraft, shipbuilding, and other defense-related

industries in these Sunbelt areas. Nearly 10% of all

federal government expenditures during the war was

spent in California alone. 

Military bases also were located in Sunbelt states,

and millions of war workers, GIs, and their families

moved there during the war. Many, who relocated

from poor, rural areas and marginal jobs, were

determined to stay on after World War II. Thus,

rapid industrialization and the resulting mass

migration of millions of Americans who relocated

around burgeoning military and civilian defense

centers laid the economic and social foundations of

the Sunbelt. The region grew in population and

economic power in comparison with other sections

of the country.

California received more interstate migrants than

any other state, absorbing more than 1.5 million

newcomers between 1940 and 1944. Between 1940

and 1943, migration for defense industry jobs helped

expand the population of California by 72% and of

the Pacific Coast states as a whole by 39%. This vast

reshuffling of the population was one of the most

dramatic episodes in the history of American

migration, rivaling the great waves of European

immigration of the late 19th and early 20th

centuries.

CHANGING COMMUNITIES

The cities where the World War II industries

mobilized were confronted with overwhelming

demands on housing, transportation, community

services, shopping, and infrastructure. Responding

to these needs required the cooperative efforts of

the private sector and all levels of government.

CHAPTER 2: HISTORIC OVERVIEW
Consumer spending increased during the war, despite shortages,

rationing, inflation, and higher taxes. With the United States

devoting only about 40% of its Gross National Product to war

production, civilians were able to purchase a range of consumer

goods and foodstuffs, enjoy rising living standards, and find

entertainment through the various manifestations of American

popular culture. Home front Americans also found common

cause in aiding the war effort with bond drives, scrap collections,

recycling endeavors, “victory gardens,” and other efforts to

support American troops.

Nevertheless, there were less salutary aspects of the home front

experience during the war. Although most Americans understood

the need for price controls and rationing, they were never happy

about limits on their own income, and many bought at least some

goods on the wartime black market. The tides of migration that

sent millions of people to new destinations helped to create a

more homogeneous national culture, but also produced tensions

and sometimes conflict. Older residents feared that newcomers

would erode community standards and would cause taxes to be

raised to pay for additional community services and

infrastructure. Racial tensions and even violence sometimes

flared, as did anti-Semitism.

25

Rosie the Riveter/World War II Home Front National Historical Park

Grease recycling for war effort, 1942. Library of Congress.
26

DIVERSIFYING THE WORKFORCE

Industry initially resisted the integration of

minorities in the nation’s workforce. However,

African American leaders called for a protest march

on Washington, D.C., during the summer of 1941;

this resulted in the issuance of an executive order by

President Franklin D. Roosevelt prohibiting

workplace discrimination and setting up the Fair

Employment Practices Committee. This government

initiative, along with wartime necessity, eventually

forced the integration of the workforce that had not

been otherwise achieved. Overall some 340,000

African Americans relocated to California during

World War II to take advantage of defense industry

employment opportunities. In addition,

approximately 40,000 American Indians worked in

West Coast defense plants along with many

Hispanics and Asian Americans.

The contributions of women during World War II

provide especially useful insights into the impact of

the war and the combination of change and

continuity on the home front. The phrase “Rosie the

Riveter” was a term that was coined to help recruit

female civilian workers and came to symbolize a

workforce that was mobilized to meet the nation’s

wartime needs. After some initial resistance from 

employers, wartime necessity resulted in women

replacing men in many traditionally male jobs as

men enlisted in active military service. Nationwide,

6 million women entered the home front workforce.

Employment opportunities for women of color were

unprecedented, and for the first time, African

Americans, Asians, Hispanics, and Native Americans

were employed.

“Rosie the Riveter” has survived as the most

remembered icon of the civilian workforce that

helped win the war. The image of “Rosie the

Riveter” has come to symbolize women’s

empowerment. World War II established the

foundations for dramatic change in women’s roles

and opportunities by bringing far more women into

the work force in a much greater array of jobs. The

wartime experience of women in the United States,

together with rising educational levels, the ability of

married women to enter the workforce, a changing

post-industrial world with more white-collar jobs,

the demands and enticements of the consumer

culture, and changing societal values, contributed to

major gender role changes in postwar America.

ORGANIZED LABOR

The war years represented a significant chapter in

the development of the nation’s labor unions. 

CHAPTER 2: HISTORIC OVERVIEW

Integrated work crew, Richmond, California, ca. 1943. Richmond Museum of History.
Unions experienced rapid growth, schisms over newcomers’

rights and the incorporation of minority members, dissent and

leadership challenges, segregated affiliates, and concerns over

prefabrication and “de-skilling” of trades. Unions and locals

varied in their accommodation of women and minorities, with

the Congress of Industrial Organizations being the most

supportive. A rising tide of African American activism emerged in

the formation of some labor organizations.

Ultimately, management and organized labor cooperated to

support the war effort, although many of the worker rights and

privileges obtained by women and African Americans would be

forfeited when the war industries shut down at the end of World

War II.

CIVIL RIGHTS AND LIBERTIES

With the exception of Japanese Americans who were relocated to

internment camps and imprisoned during the war, World War II

challenged the color line on many fronts for most minority

groups in the United States. The hypocrisy of a country fighting

for freedom abroad while denying it to minorities at home

became increasingly abhorrent. African American groups and

institutions, growing in size and militancy, consciously used the

war effort to extract concessions and gains. These forces played a

part in altering the status of African Americans and quickening

the pace of their struggle for equal rights.

World War II may not be the watershed of “the Negro

Revolution” that some have claimed it to be. Some wartime gains

were quickly lost after the war, and some of the seeds of change

planted during the war did not flower for another decade or so

(not until the Civil Rights Movement of the 1950s and 1960s).

Nevertheless, the war years remain a key era in what was, and is,

an ongoing struggle for civil rights in the United States.

27

Rosie the Riveter/World War II Home Front National Historical Park
28

The Richmond World War II

Home Front

If there is any city that could be called America’s

home front city, it is probably Richmond, California.

The city was home to over 50 war-related industries,

and as thousands of war workers streamed into the

city to support these industries, both public and

private entities struggled to keep the city’s

burgeoning population housed, healthy, and highly

productive. They generally succeeded, but the cost

to the city was enormous.

Rosie the Riveter/World War II Home Front

National Historical Park in Richmond, California

commemorates the efforts of all Americans serving

on the home front, but also acknowledges

Richmond’s role in the victorious war effort and the

high price the community paid for that role. The

surviving historic buildings and sites in Richmond

represent an unusually rich collection of related

industrial and community-based resources that were

built for the short duration of the World War II

effort and remain surprisingly intact over a half

century later. The traumas and hardships

Richmond’s citizens faced as a result of rapid war

mobilization and postwar readjustment have left a

legacy of urban problems with which the community

still struggles, but its citizens have begun to embrace

a new found sense of pride in Richmond’s wartime

accomplishments and legacy.

WARTIME MOBILIZATION

The cultural transformation of wartime mobilization

was very evident in the East Bay community of

Richmond. It was the home of four Kaiser shipyards

and over 50 other war-related industries—more than

any other city of its size in the United States. These

included new industries as well as existing plants

and facilities that were converted to wartime

production. In tonnage, the Port of Richmond

became the 2nd leading port on the Pacific Coast

and the 12th leading port in the United States, as

commodities consisting largely of supplies and

equipment connected with the war effort moved

through its four terminals to the war zone. 

WARTIME BOOM AND 

DEMAND FOR HOUSING

The San Francisco Bay Area saw more economic

activity, social disruption, and sheer wartime frenzy

than most regions of the country. As the nation’s

number one shipbuilding center and key port of

embarkation to the war’s Pacific theater, the Bay

Area’s population swelled by more than half a

million from 1940 to 1945. Over half of these

newcomers, many of them from the South and

Midwest, settled outside of San Francisco in the East

and North Bay areas. In the process, the area’s

population composition, urban environment, and

social and cultural life were transformed. Thus, the

long-term social and demographic impacts of the

war, including changes in the racial and cultural

diversity of the Bay Area, would remain a permanent

feature of urban social and political relations, long

outliving the economic forces that brought it about.

Small industrial cities like Richmond became

boomtowns: from a prewar population of fewer than

24,000 in 1940, the city’s population grew to

approximately 100,000 at the end of the war.

Richmond earned a citation as the quintessential

war boomtown bestowed by both the Washington

Post and Fortune magazine. In 1943, it was

recommended that Richmond be a “Purple Heart

City” because of the fiscal, environmental, social,

and economic impacts of the industrial build up and

associated population explosion that it experienced

during World War II. The relatively small

community was suddenly thrown into civic chaos

and social upheaval and forever altered by the events

of the war. A February 1945 article in Fortune

magazine, entitled “Richmond Took a Beating,”

described Richmond’s challenges as an impacted

home front city.

Richmond’s challenges were many. Along with the

population increase, Richmond’s overnight growth

overwhelmed public services (fire, police, health,

and social), housing, schools, and infrastructure. Its

elementary school population quadrupled, while its

secondary school population more than doubled,
necessitating double sessions and school building additions.

Family breakdown, social dislocation, and criminal and antisocial

behavior were associated with this overnight growth. Henry J.

Kaiser, other major defense contractors, and federal, state, and

local government agencies initiated efforts to meet the social,

educational, recreational, and economic needs of the burgeoning

population.

As the migration of war workers to Richmond began, previously

vacant housing in the city was quickly occupied. Residents took

in boarders; suitable—as well as unsuitable—space was rented,

including rooms, garages, and barns; and private builders

attempted to meet the demand with new, low-cost housing. “Hot

beds” (beds rented for an eight-hour shift) became

commonplace. As more and more newcomers continued to

arrive, they were often forced to sleep in movie theatres, parks,

hotel lobbies, and automobiles.

Not only did many newcomers find poor living conditions in

Richmond, but they often encountered resentment, jealousy, and

prejudice, as well. Prior to World War II, Richmond had been a

relatively small, close-knit, semi-pastoral community by East Bay

standards. Despite its industrial growth since its founding in 1905,

there was abundant open space along its south side. Open fields

covered the area south of Cutting Boulevard, where poorer

families grazed goats and other livestock during the depression

years. The downtown area was fairly small, encompassing the

main thoroughfare of Macdonald Avenue and a few cross streets.

29

Rosie the Riveter/World War II Home Front National Historical Park

Housing poster, Office of War Information, 1944. National Archives.
30

Richmond’s predominately pre-war working class

citizenry found it difficult to adjust to the sudden

influx of war workers, many of whom came from

lower class, unskilled, and uneducated elements of

the rural South. Thus, the city’s way of life was

drastically changed by the war.

Richmond’s available housing was totally inadequate

to take care of the flood of new arrivals. Private

house builders attempted in vain to meet the

problem. Rollingwood, a neighborhood of 700

modest homes built in the unincorporated area

between Richmond’s Hilltop neighborhood and San

Pablo, was among the Federal Housing

Administration’s (FHA) first attempts in the nation

to relieve wartime housing shortages through

partnerships with local housing developers. To meet

the continuing critical housing shortage, the

Richmond Housing Authority was incorporated in

Richmond on January 24, 1941, to exert some

degree of control over imminent federally sponsored

construction.

The Lanham Act of 1940 provided $150 million to

the Federal Works Administration, which built

approximately 625,000 units of housing in

conjunction with local authorities nationwide. The

Richmond Housing Authority was selected to be the

first authority in the country to manage a defense

project. The site of Atchison Village, which would

contain 450 dwelling units, was selected for its close

proximity to the Kaiser shipyards, two miles to the

south, and to the commercial downtown area to the

east. Constructed in 1941 as the city’s first public

defense housing project, Atchison Village was one of

20 public housing projects built in Richmond before

and during the war.

The Richmond Housing Authority completed three

federally funded housing projects in Richmond

during its first year of operation: Atchison Village,

Triangle Court, and Nystrom Village. By the end of

World War II, Richmond would maintain the largest

federal housing program in the nation. More than

21,000 public housing units were constructed in the

city by 1943, providing housing for more than 60%

of Richmond’s total population. Funding for these

various projects came not only from the Lanham

Act, but also from the United States Maritime

Commission, the Federal Public Housing

Administration, and the Farm Security

Administration.

The Richmond Housing Authority initiated

segregated public housing policies in the city,

creating a kind of buffer zone between the prewar

predominately white community and the increasing

numbers of African American residents. As a result

of the housing discrimination faced by African

Americans in Richmond, a local branch of the

National Association for the Advancement of

Colored People (NAACP) was established at Harbor

Gate Homes in 1944. 

Overall, Richmond developed the largest federally

funded housing program in the United States before

and during American involvement in World War II.

Costing more than $35 million, the city’s housing

program was the largest in the nation controlled by a

single housing authority and included more units

than were built in the entire state of Michigan

during the same time period.

CHAPTER 2: HISTORIC OVERVIEW

Atchison Village duplex, Richmond, California, ca. 2004.

National Park Service
LARGEST SHIPBUILDING COMPLEX IN AMERICA

The building of new shipyards began in America in 1940—first in

support of America’s Lend Lease assistance program to Great

Britain, already at war, and then to supply naval needs after entry

of the United States into the war following the Japanese attack on

Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941.

Massive new shipyards were built in the vicinities of Los Angeles,

the San Francisco Bay, Portland, Seattle, and other major ports

around the United States. Although western shipyards had not

produced a single merchant vessel between 1929 and 1939,

federal funds and industrial enterprise were united to create the

capacity on the West Coast to produce 52% of the ships built

during the war.

The largest concentration of shipyards in the United States during

World War II was in the San Francisco Bay Area. Shipyards were

established at Richmond, Sausalito, Oakland, Mare Island,

Hunters Point in San Francisco, and the Stockton Channel. Well

over half of the shipyard workers were employed in the East Bay

area at 12 shipyards located between Alameda and Richmond,

making the East Bay the largest producer of cargo ships on the

West Coast. Bay Area shipbuilders launched more than 4,600

ships during the war—almost 45% of all cargo tonnage and 20%

of all warship tonnage built in the United States during the war.

In addition to constructing new ships, many of the shipyards also

repaired damaged vessels for return to service.

The most important development in East Bay shipbuilding and

the largest shipyard operation on the West Coast consisted of a

complex of four shipyards built on the mudflats along the

undeveloped shoreline of Richmond by Henry J. Kaiser.

Richmond was selected as the site for the shipyards because of its

deepwater port, which had been developed in 1929. On

December 20, 1940, the newly organized Todd-California

Shipbuilding Corporation in Richmond accepted a contract from

the British Purchasing Commission to build 30 cargo vessels for

Great Britain.

Construction of Shipyard No. 1 began on January 14, 1941, under

the management of Todd-California Shipbuilding Corporation.

Just a month later, however, on February 14, the shipyard came

under the control of the Kaiser Permanente Metals Corporation. 

Construction of Shipyard No. 2 was started on April 10, 1941, by

the Richmond Shipbuilding Corporation, a subsidiary of the

Kaiser Permanente Metals Corporation. After the attack on Pearl

Harbor in December of that year, the government awarded

Kaiser the first of many contracts for Maritime Commission

Liberty ships—large merchant vessels used to supply Allied

troops. To complete these contracts, two more shipyards were

constructed adjacent to the first two in Richmond. 

31

Rosie the Riveter/World War II Home Front National Historical Park
32

Construction began on Shipyard No. 3 during the

spring of 1942 by the Kaiser Company, Inc. During

the same period, Shipyard No. 3A, which became

Shipyard No. 4, was built by the Kaiser Cargo

Company. By late 1942 the four completed shipyards

featured 27 graving basins/dry docks.

NEW SHIPBUILDING METHODS

The Richmond shipyards set historic precedents by

producing more ships, more quickly and more

efficiently, than had ever been done before. New to

shipbuilding, Kaiser’s engineers revolutionized the

shipbuilding industry during World War II by

introducing mass production techniques,

segmenting job tasks, training unskilled labor, and

substituting welding for the time-consuming task of

riveting steel plates and components together. 

CHAPTER 2: HISTORIC OVERVIEW

Kaiser Shipyard No. 1 in Richmond, California, ca. 1943. Richmond Museum of History.

Kaiser Shipyard No. 3, Richmond, California, ca. 1945.

Richmond Museum of History.
Until the war, shipbuilding was a skilled craft characterized by

slow and laborious processes. Beginning in May 1942, and

coinciding with increased recruitment of women, African

Americans, and out-of-state workers, Kaiser instituted a new

system of prefabrication adapted from his previous dam-building

ventures. Under this system, whole sections of a ship’s

superstructure—boilers, double bottoms, forepeaks, after-peaks,

and deck-houses—were preassembled in a new prefabrication

plant located between Shipyards No. 3 and 4. This system—which

allowed more work with more personnel to be conducted away

from the ships with less welding, riveting, and crane lifts—

resulted in the completion of ships in two-thirds of the time and

at a quarter of the cost of the average of all other shipyards at the

time.

As preassembly required a large amount of space for workers,

warehouses, and cranes, the expansive new West Coast locations

were ideal. These yards were designed with a city-like grid system

of numbered and lettered streets to provide for a straight flow of

parts and materials to facilitate and speed production processes;

they differed noticeably from the tight vertical design of older

East Coast shipyards. Whirley cranes were used to lift, move, and

lower prefabricated ship components weighing up to 50 tons

from station to station. 

33

Rosie the Riveter/World War II Home Front National Historical Park

Whirley cranes, Richmond, California, ca. 1945, Richmond Museum of History.
34

Proliferation of jobs in down-hand welding

(considered the easiest position) facilitated quick

placement of new workers, and prefabrication

resulted in increased specialization and “de-skilling”

of basic trades. In the boilermaker trade alone,

subassembly techniques fostered more than 17

different job classifications. These narrow job

classifications allowed workers the opportunity for

rapid advancement from one grade to another,

normally within 60 days. Under the right conditions,

an unskilled newcomer could advance from trainee

to journeyman status within several months—a

fraction of the time once required. This not only

increased the speed of construction, but also the size

of the mobilization effort, and in doing so, opened

up jobs to women and minorities.

TYPES OF SHIPS

During World War II, 747 ships were constructed in

the Richmond shipyards, a feat unequaled anywhere

in the world before or since. Ship production

included approximately 20% (519) of the country’s

Liberty ships—huge, nondescript, versatile vessels

that have been given credit for helping to swing the

war in favor of the United States. 

In addition to Liberty ships, the Richmond

shipyards also produced 228 other vessels. These

included 142 Victory ships, a class of emergency

vessels designed to replace the Liberty ships after

1943. The Victory ships were faster, larger, and more

efficient than the Liberty ships, featuring more

modern steam plants, better trim and stability,

stronger hulls, and electrically driven winches and

windlasses. Other types of ships built in the

Richmond shipyards during the war included 15

tank landing ships, 12 frigates, 35 troop transports,

and 24 “Pint-size” Liberty ships.

The troop transports—all C4-S-A1 troop

transports—were among the most time consuming

to build. The first was constructed on November 25,

1942, and the last on August 12, 1945. While it took

only 15,000 hours of joiner work to build a Liberty

ship, it took almost four times as many hours for a

C-4 troop transport. Some 9,600 components were

required to construct a Liberty ship, while a C-4

required 130,000. 

SHIPYARD WORKFORCE

At peak production during the war, the Richmond

shipyards employed more than 90,000 people.

During the early months of the war, many of the

new employees in the Richmond shipyards were

from agricultural and mining areas in Northern

California—many were unemployed farm workers

from the Central Valley. As the demand for new

workers grew, however, more than 170 Kaiser

recruiters scoured the United States for workers,

resulting in a massive migration and resettlement

program. The Richmond Chamber of Commerce

supported the labor recruiting effort by distributing

a publication, “Job Facts,” nationally through the

1,500 offices of the U.S. Employment Office. By the

end of the war, Kaiser had brought nearly 38,000

workers to Richmond, fronting their train fare—

another 60,000 came on their own with recruiter

referrals. 

Many of the newcomers, including former farm

workers and sharecroppers, came from Texas,

Oklahoma, Arkansas, and Louisiana. Recruiters paid

transportation fees and provided travel advances

that were deducted from the workers’ first months’

pay at a rate of $10 per week in exchange for signed

one-year contracts.

Kaiser was among the first defense contractors to

employ women in substantial numbers. By 1944

CHAPTER 2: HISTORIC OVERVIEW

Liberty ships under construction, Richmond, California,

ca. 1943. Richmond Museum of History.
women constituted 27% of the workforce in the Richmond

shipyards, accounting for more than 41% of all welders and 24%

of all craft employees. Although the shipbuilding, iron, and steel

industries employed the largest number of women in the

manufacturing sector, thousands also worked in machine shops,

auto plants, military supply and ordnance, communications,

electrical parts plants, and food processing in Richmond and

throughout the nation.

The San Francisco Bay shipyards, including those at Richmond,

were among the first defense industries to employ African

Americans and other persons of color. The California shipyards

provided the biggest single opportunity for African Americans to

obtain higher-paying industrial work. By 1944 the Kaiser

shipyards at Richmond employed more than 10,000 African

American workers. 

The influx of African American workers had a profound

demographic impact on Richmond. In 1940 the city had only 270

African Americans (1.1% of the population) who lived primarily

in a semi-rural, four-block area just outside the city limits in

North Richmond. By 1944 the number of African Americans in

Richmond had increased to approximately 5,700, and by 1947 to

more than 13, 700. By 1950 African Americans accounted for

13.4% of Richmond’s population.

35

Rosie the Riveter/World War II Home Front National Historical Park

Richmond shipyard work crew, ca. 1945. Clem family archives.
36

Other minorities also found employment

opportunities in the Kaiser shipyards. In an abrupt

reversal of past practices, Chinese Americans were

mobilized for the war effort and played an active

role in Bay Area shipbuilding and other defense

work. In early 1943, Kaiser employed more than

2,000 Chinese workers, the majority of whom were

local residents. Increasing numbers of Mexican

Americans also found employment in the shipyards,

thus intensifying the crowding and expansion of

Richmond’s small pre-war Mexican American

community that had centered near the Santa Fe

Railroad yards. Although Italian Americans had

constituted Richmond’s largest ethnic group before

World War II, ethnic-specific organizations in the

city by the end of the war included Gustav Vasa,

Croatian Fraternal Union of America, United Negro

Association of North Richmond, Jewish Community

Service of Richmond, and Hadassah.

By 1943, the Richmond population also included a

small group of more than 1,000 American Indians.

Most of them lived at the foot of Macdonald Avenue

in converted boxcars and cottages provided by the

Santa Fe Railroad, a major employer of the group.

American Indians also found work in the local

shipyards; at least 75 worked at the Kaiser yards

alone.

LABOR UNIONS

Richmond witnessed increasing labor union activity

during the war. The International Brotherhood of

Boilermakers, Iron Shipbuilders and Helpers of

America was the union that represented the majority

of West Coast shipyard workers, including more

than one-third of the Kaiser shipyard workers in

Richmond. It manifested the traditional exclusivity

and conservatism of American Federation of Labor

craft unions. Chartered in August 1942, Richmond’s

Local 513 quickly became the Boilermakers’ third

largest local in the nation with more than 36,500

members. Primarily concerned with maintaining the

status quo of long-time shipyard workers, the union

was the most vocal opponent of the prefabrication

process and “de-skilling” of the shipbuilding trade.

Under federal government and employer prodding,

women were admitted to union membership in

September 1942. Prior to the war, the Boilermakers 

had established auxiliary unions for African

Americans, and a segregated auxiliary—Local 

A-36—was established in Richmond in early 1943

for African American shipyard workers. Although

the auxiliary represented new access into the labor

union movement for black workers in the shipyards,

it was controlled by a white “parent” local; its

members had no representation at national

conventions, had no grievance mechanisms or

business representatives, and received no reduced

insurance benefits.

TRANSPORTATION

With the majority of shipyard workers commuting

between points in the East Bay, the federal

government established provisional train, bus, and

streetcar lines to alleviate the chronic overcrowding

of local carriers. Most notable of these was the

“Richmond Shipyard Railway,” constructed and

operated by the Key System for the U.S. Maritime

Commission from Emeryville and Oakland to the

Richmond shipyards from January 18, 1943 to

September 30, 1945. 

Initially, the trains were operated only to Potrero

Avenue and 14th Street, several blocks from

Shipyard No. 2. By February 1943, service was

extended to all of the Richmond shipyards. In early

March 1943, a single track loop was completed to

the immediate vicinity of the prefabrication plant

between Shipyards No. 3 and 4, and the security

checkpoints of Shipyard No. 2. 

CHAPTER 2: HISTORIC OVERVIEW

Fred and Mourine Merrow, a husband and wife bucker and

riveter, ca. 1944. National Park Service.
Constructed from old inter-urban track lines, the railway featured

converted cars from the recently abandoned New York City’s

Second Avenue elevated line of the Interborough Rapid Transit

Company. Initially, 39 trains were operated in each direction each

day, but by late February 1943, the total number of daily trains

had increased to 94. A daily average of some 11,000 passengers

used the transit line.

COMMUNITY SERVICES INCLUDING 

CHILD CARE SERVICES

Federal, state, and local public and private agencies coordinated

their efforts to develop an extensive program of public services in

Richmond to support new residents and to acclimate them to

their new urban-industrial conditions. In addition to housing,

war workers needed health care, child care, and recreational

opportunities. 

The Richmond Health Department extended its services to the

new housing areas, and the Richmond Board of Education

initiated an extensive recreational program in community centers

that included music, dancing, crafts, athletics, and a variety of

playground facilities. With leadership and fundraising support by

the Elks Club, the Richmond Community Chest remodeled an

armory building in 1944 to provide headquarters for the

Richmond Boys’ Club, a new organization designed to provide

recreational and educational opportunities for boys aged six and

older.

Funded by the Community Chest and the State of California, and

operated by the Young Men’s Christian Association (YMCA) and

the Richmond Recreation Department, Hospitality House was

opened in 1944 to provide recreation and sleeping quarters for

servicemen as well as space for a YMCA Youth Center.

Richmond’s United Services Organization building provided a

range of recreational and leisure activities designed to build

morale among servicemen and servicewomen, as well as defense

industry workers.

In the highly competitive labor market during the war, Henry J.

Kaiser played a leading role in providing corporate welfare to the

workforce in Richmond as an incentive to promote productivity,

employee retention, and social harmony in the community. Kaiser

offered a wide variety of recreational and sports programs (32%

of the shipyard workforce participated); a company newsletter

(Fore ‘N’ Aft); counselors and specialists to help improve work

conditions and promote responsible personal financial

management and family health; work time music; entertainment

during elaborate lunchtime events; and inter-shipyard

competitions to promote efficiency and safety and to spur

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Rosie the Riveter/World War II Home Front National Historical Park
38

production. Additionally, Kaiser actively advocated

adequate housing and community services for his

workforce.

Frustrated by the inadequacy of local programs,

Kaiser helped to establish approximately 35 child

care centers of varying sizes in Richmond to provide

child care for mothers working in the shipyards.

Some were established in new buildings built

specifically for this purpose, while others were in

converted buildings or in existing schools. At its

peak, with some 24,500 women on the Kaiser

payroll, Richmond’s citywide child care program

maintained a total daily attendance of some 1,400

children. All but one of the 35 centers were

segregated.

With federal agencies providing for the buildings

and the Richmond school district supplying the

administration, the first government-sponsored

child care centers opened in Richmond during the

spring of 1943. The first was the Terrace Nursery

School, located at the Terrace War Apartments, near

the western edge of the Richmond shipyards. The

Terrace Housing Community Center opened this

nursery with a capacity of 45 children, aged two to

four. The daily cost was 50 cents per child, with the

option of adding a breakfast for an additional 10

cents.

The most substantial facilities built specifically for

child care were the Maritime Child Development

Center and its near-twin, the Pullman Child

Development Center (since renamed the Ruth C.

Powers Child Development Center). Funded by the

Maritime Commission and operated by the 

Richmond School District, the centers incorporated

progressive educational programming developed by

child welfare experts from the University of

California at Berkeley. Kaiser’s innovative child care

program was designed to help newcomers adapt by

teaching youngsters how to “eat, sleep and play,”

and how to practice “proper habits.” The program

provided 24-hour care, and included well-balanced

hot meals, health care, and optional family

counseling.

CHAPTER 2: HISTORIC OVERVIEW

Maritime Child Development Center, rear view, ca., 1945. Source unknown.

Child care in “War Nursery,” ca. 1943. Franklin Delano

Roosevelt Library.
HEALTH CARE

Kaiser’s most significant contribution in the arena of social

services during World War II was in health services—a field in

which the company set an industry standard. Following major flu

and pneumonia epidemics in the East Bay in 1941, Kaiser

inaugurated the Permanente Health Plan in 1942.

The plan involved a three-tier medical care system that included

six well-equipped first aid stations at the individual shipyards, the

Kaiser Permanente Field Hospital (sometimes referred to as the

Richmond Field Hospital), and the main Permanente Hospital in

Oakland. Together these facilities served the employees of the

Kaiser shipyards who had signed up for the Permanente Health

Plan (commonly referred to as the “Kaiser Plan”)—one of the

country’s first voluntary pre-paid medical plans to feature group

medical practice, prepayment, and substantial medical facilities

on such a large scale. By August 1944, 92.2% of all Richmond

shipyard employees had joined the plan that was financed

through paycheck deductions of 50 cents per week. 

The health plan was highly popular with workers and boosted

Kaiser’s image as a preferred employer. Kaiser’s initial investment

paid for itself many times over as better health care made for

healthier workers, less absenteeism, and increased productivity. 

39

Rosie the Riveter/World War II Home Front National Historical Park

Henry J. Kaiser, ca. 1945. Bancroft Library, University of California–Berkeley.
40

After the war, the health plan was extended to

include workers’ families, and it became the most

enduring of all of Kaiser’s programs. The “Kaiser

Plan” was a direct precursor of the Health

Maintenance Organizations (HMOs) defined by the

federal Health Maintenance Organization Act of

1973. Today Kaiser Permanente is among the

nation’s largest and most influential health

maintenance organizations.

POST WORLD WAR II RICHMOND

During the late 1940s Richmond experienced the

“bust” associated with the aftermath of the war

“boom”—large numbers of war workers were left

unemployed and homeless when the defense

industries shut down. 

Although new industries, such as International

Harvester, moved in to occupy some of the vacated

shipyard structures, Richmond’s unemployment

woes were exacerbated by the loss of industry to

outlying suburbs in the San Francisco Bay Area. The

most significant departure was the Ford Motor

Company, which moved to Milpitas, California, in

1955. 

War workers found it hard to obtain new jobs.

Shipyard efficiency during the war had been

obtained by implementing assembly line procedures,

i.e., one person, one job. After the war, those who

had learned only one skill found that they could not

easily transfer to other jobs in a highly competitive

job market. In addition, to protect their skilled

crafts, prewar workers had responded during the

war by creating a system of second-class union

auxiliaries for women, African Americans, and other

newcomers. At the end of the war, employers and

unions easily disposed of these marginalized

workers, thus creating serious economic dislocation

in East Bay cities such as Richmond.

Unskilled workers who were members of a minority

group faced the additional obstacle of prejudice

amid the tensions of the highly competitive job

market. Hence Richmond became witness not only

to the industrial development that supported

America’s effort to win World War II, but also to the

bleak realities of urban blight and economic

dislocation associated with peacetime conversion. 

In addition to employment challenges, many

workers found themselves without housing. Much of

the federally subsidized wartime public housing was

designed only for temporary use. To avoid conflicts

between public and private sector housing during

the peacetime conversion years, the Richmond

Housing Authority agreed to tear down public

housing within two years of the end of the war.

Communities like Seaport, which housed African

Americans adjacent to the shipyards, were

obliterated almost overnight.

Today, in Richmond, California, there is a growing

interest in remembering and honoring the city’s

history. Community revitalization efforts are

centered on the historic resources remaining from

the war years, and city celebrations are being

renewed with “home front” themes. Despite the

tumultuous years—both during and after World War

II—the citizens of Richmond are embracing their

city’s history and celebrating its many contributions

to victory in World War II and to significant social

changes to American society. 

CHAPTER 2: HISTORIC OVERVIEW
Rosie the Riveter/World War II Home Front National Historical Park

Richmond Tank Depot during World War II. There

were only three wartime tank depots in the United

States; the Ford Assembly Building is the only

surviving structure that housed one. Workers at the

depot equipped more than 60,000 military vehicles

including tanks, Army trucks, half-tracks, tank

destroyers, personnel carriers, scout cars,

amphibious tanks, snow plows, and bomb lift

trucks. These vehicles were transported to the plant

for final processing and to have up-to-the-minute

improvements installed on them before being

transported out through Richmond’s deepwater

channel to war zones throughout the world. 

In addition to its importance for its wartime uses,

the Ford Assembly Building is an outstanding

example of 20th century industrial architecture. It

was designed by internationally famed architect 

Albert Kahn who developed “daylighted” factories 

Historic Importance of 

Individual Park Sites

The legislation establishing Rosie the Riveter/World

War II Home Front National Historical Park

recognized the national significance of the historic

resources that are owned by private and public

partners within the City of Richmond, California.

The importance of those resources is discussed in

this section. While the park’s primary resources are

owned and managed by many different public and

private entities, they all help tell the story of Rosie

the Riveter and America’s World War II home front.

FORD ASSEMBLY BUILDING

The 500,000-square-foot Ford Assembly Building

illustrates the conversion of American peacetime

industries into wartime industries. Built as the

largest automobile assembly plant on the West 

Coast, the Ford Assembly Plant was converted to the

Ford Assembly Building, ca. 1935. The Henry Ford Museum.

41
42

“all under one roof.” The immense size of this

historic structure, along with the adjacent oil house,

can provide park visitors with an understanding of

the size and scale of the wartime industries that were

based in Richmond, California.

CHAPTER 2: HISTORIC OVERVIEW

Ford Assembly Building Craneway, 2002. Library of Congress.

RICHMOND SHIPYARD NO. 3 AND 

THE SS RED OAK VICTORY

The Richmond Shipyard complex built by Henry J.

Kaiser was one of the largest wartime shipyard

operations on the West Coast. Shipyard No. 3 is the

only remaining wartime shipyard of the four that

Kaiser constructed in Richmond; it is still relatively

intact and is listed in the National Register of

Historic Places. 

Richmond Shipyard No. 3 was built for the ease of

mass production of wartime ships, and has retained

its exemplary resources in part because it was built

to be a permanent facility. The level graving

basins/dry docks eased hull construction, while the

large assembly areas and the alignment and spacing

of the buildings contributed to production speed. 

Kaiser’s ship building methods involving

prefabrication allowed much of the initial

construction to be accomplished away from the drydocks/graving basins, which led to increased

efficiency and speed. Whirley cranes were used to

move the components from place to place in the

shipyard. After launching, the ships were taken to

the outfitting berths for the final electrical

connections, sheet metal work, furnishings, and

artillery installation. 

The park includes a surviving wartime ship that was

built in the Richmond Shipyards. The SS Red Oak

Victory is listed in the National Register of Historic

Places to recognize its military, transportation, and

engineering significance as an ammunition and

cargo vessel during World War II. The ship also is

acknowledged for its significance as a product of the

Kaiser Corporation’s revolutionary innovations in
Rosie the Riveter/World War II Home Front National Historical Park

shipbuilding techniques that were undertaken in the

shipbuilding industry during World War II. 

The SS Red Oak Victory is a tangible resource that

demonstrates the power and contribution of

individuals to the World War II war effort. The ship

helps visitors comprehend the massive undertaking

associated with the Richmond’s shipyards and the

American wartime home front. The size and scale of

the surviving shipyard help visitors to comprehend

the enormity of the American World War II effort.

By exposing visitors to the remaining historic sites

and structures of Richmond Shipyard No. 3, they

can learn how ships were made and how “Rosie the

Riveter” contributed to the effort. 

The views of the contemporary commercial land use

along the Santa Fe Channel from various park sites

helps provide visitors with the context and a sense

of size of the wartime industrial landscape. 

YARD 1 YARD 1

YARD 4 YARD 4

YARD 3

YARD 2 YARD 2

Kaiser Shipyards, ca 1945. Library of Congress. Richmond Museum of History.

43
44

CHAPTER 2: HISTORIC OVERVIEW

SS Red Oak Victory ship under construction, ca 1944. Richmond

Museum of History.

SS Red Oak Victory ship, 2004. National Park Service.
Rosie the Riveter/World War II Home Front National Historical Park

KAISER PERMANENTE FIELD HOSPITAL

In 1942, Henry J. Kaiser inaugurated the

Permanente Health Plan for his shipyard workers.

He instituted a three-tier medical care system

consisting of first-aid stations in the shipyards, a

field hospital, and a main hospital. One of Kaiser’s

original first-aid stations remains intact in Richmond

Shipyard No. 3. The Kaiser Permanente Field

Hospital still exists on Cutting Avenue in the national

historical park and is privately owned.

Preserving the Kaiser Permanente Field Hospital can

help visitors understand the health care needs of the

workers who labored in Richmond’s wartime

industries, and can also help them understand the

profound changes to America that resulted from

World War II home front activities.

Kaiser Permanente Field Hospital, ca 1945. Library of Congress.

Kaiser Permanente Field Hospital, 2002. National Park Service.

45
46

CHAPTER 2: HISTORIC OVERVIEW

CHILD DEVELOPMENT CENTERS

In addition to health care, Kaiser provided child care

for families working in Kaiser’s shipyards. The

centers he built with funding provided by the United

States Maritime Commission incorporated

progressive educational programming and 24-hour

care; services included well-balanced hot meals,

health care, and family counseling.

The largest child care facilities were the Maritime

Child Development Center and the Pullman Child

Development Center (later renamed Ruth C. Powers

Child Development Center). Both are still in

existence and were in use as child care centers until

just recently. By preserving the surviving child

development centers in Richmond, California,

visitors have the opportunity to explore the social

and community responses to the World War II home

front effort that occurred in cities and towns across

America.

Maritime Child Development Center, ca. 2004.

Ruth C. Powers (formally Pullman) Child Development Center, 2002. Architectural Resources Group.
Rosie the Riveter/World War II Home Front National Historical Park

WORLD WAR II WORKER HOUSING 

Small, pre-World War II industrial cities like

Richmond, California, became boomtowns during

the war; housing provides some of the most visible

evidence of the drastic changes that occurred in

these cities almost overnight. Beginning with a

prewar population of 23,642 in 1940, the city’s

population grew to more than 93,000 by 1943. With

a population increase of 296%, Richmond was

thrown into civic chaos and social upheaval and was

forever altered by the events of World War II. 

To meet the continuing critical housing shortage, the

Richmond Housing Authority was incorporated on

January 24, 1941. The program consisted of 20

projects that including apartments, dormitories, and

three trailer parks; these projects housed more than

60% of Richmond’s population during the war. 

Atchison Village, 1940. Library of Congress. Housing Unit, Atchison Village, 2002. National Park Service.

47
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