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The North Dakota is shown in at the Navy Yard, 1910.

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Can-DO BY LAURENCE M. HAUPTMAN

Oral histories tell known as a virtuoso in laying Yard were instrumental in the out castings for machinists. ’ achievement of the story of the He wanted to enlist, but was victory in the war. We know encouraged to stay at the many of their stories because . shipyard until the end of the between 1987 and 1989 and war because of his special again between 2007 and skill. Carmela Celardo Zuza, 2010, the Brooklyn Historical here’s the story of one of nine children of Italian Society carried out more than Tony Ferrara, who immigrants from Naples, forty interviews related to the couldn’t serve in the became a welder at the ship- history of the Brooklyn Navy military during World yard, enduring the taunts of Yard. Although some of the TWar II because of an some of her male colleagues older interviews are grainy eye injury. Instead, he became in order to help the war and less audible, some stand a fire warden at the Brooklyn effort. Some, like Charles out, revealing substantial Navy Yard, a 356-acre naval Rocoff, worked for a while at information. Subjects were construction complex employ- the shipyard and then went employees, both civilian and ing more than 70,000 wartime off to war in 1943. Richard naval personnel, or those who workers like Ferrara whose Johnson, who held a degree lived near the facility and/or unflagging efforts earned it in engineering and was a had daily contact with the the nickname the “Can-Do naval officer, used his knowl- shipyard and its workers. They Yard.” Clarence Irving secured edge to serve as an assistant included naval personnel who

LIBRARY OF CONGRESS work as a mechanic there, at superintendent at the supervised the shipbuilding a time when few African shipyard. efforts, civilians who had Americans held jobs at the special skills needed for shipyard beyond menial Many Stories defense work, men ineligible positions. Harry Tatowicz was Workers at the Brooklyn Navy for military service because of

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J The war effort at age or physical condition, and suggested that workers some- for specializing in building women, many of whom had times were perceived by their larger warships. In 1940, the the shipyard was 24/7 husbands in military service. supervisors as “unwashed, American military buildup and resulted in: Their stories are enlighten- unskilled interlopers” who did for World War II transformed ing not only about their roles not deserve employment. He the Brooklyn Navy Yard and at the shipyard, but about witnessed and questioned the put it on a war footing. 3 their lives before and after racial barriers restricting the Prior to 1940, the shipyard their employment there. In a skilled jobs open to African was already an impressive built remarkable videotaped inter- Americans and the low pay site, with thirty miles of track view conducted just prior to scale for many categories of running through it. Besides his death, , the civilian workers. In Zinn’s eight piers, there were Marine 5 noted historian and activist, interview, along with others’, barracks, four dry docks, aircraft carriers built recounted his days working at there are references to efforts cylindrical floats for salvage the Brooklyn Navy Yard and at union organizing at the work, a power plant, a hospi- some of the downsides of the shipyard. In 1943, Zinn, at tal, foundries, machine shops, 3,581 job. Zinn went to work as an age 21, quit his job there and warehouses, and a radio apprentice shipfitter at the enlisted in the United States station. After 1940, with war prefabricated landing shipyard in 1940. One of the Air Force as a bombardier on clouds on the horizon, the craft assembled perks of working there was a B-17. The trauma of this war complex expanded substan- that his family became eligible experience led him to become tially. In an interview, machinist to move from their tenement a pacifist the rest of his life. Clarence Irving referred to the 250 to an apartment in the vast complex as “a city within ships outfitted newly-built Fort Greene War Footing a city.” By the end of the war, Houses. However, Zinn, a first The shipyard was established there were a total of 270 generation American, felt in 1801 on the northwest buildings in the complex. 5,000 uncomfortable in the hierarchal Brooklyn shore of the East Women made up approxi- and inequitable world that River across from Lower mately 11 percent of the ship- warships repaired he found at the shipyard. He at . yard workforce nationwide, The first warship was launched but only 8 percent at the from the shipyard in 1820 Brooklyn Navy Yard during J and the site was continuously World War II. Before the war, active after that. During World 100 women were hired at the War I, the site employed shipyard to manufacture flags 18,000 workers, and, unlike some of the other naval ship- yards, became better known

Brooklyn Navy Yard, ca. 1895 | LIBRARY OF CONGRESS

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Left: Women sewed flags by hand at the yard for both world wars.

Below: The shipyard was established in 1801 on the northwest Brooklyn shore of the , across from . LIBRARY OF CONGRESS LIBRARY

and pennants flown on navy ships. During the war, 2,300 women worked in administra- tive positions as typists, secre- taries, and clerks or as nurses in the shipyard hospital; 4,657 were classified as being skilled workers—crane operators, electricians, metal workers pipefitters, truck drivers, and welders—who built ships, weapons, and communication equipment. Women Accepted for Volunteer Emergency Service (WAVES) were assigned there to operate communica-

tions equipment and decode NEW YORK PUBLIC LIBRARY messages. NEW YORK STATE ARCHIVES

www.nysarchivestrust.org 26 Female student welders on lunch break, 1944

67633, WORLD WAR II PHOTOGRAPH COLLECTION (PR076), NEW-YORK HISTORICAL SOCIETY construction. After her employment at the shipyard, she became a science teacher and later principal at a public school. Despite their significant contributions to the war effort, women faced gender discrimination in work assign- ments and were given less pay. According to historian Arnold Sparr in an article in New York History in 2000, few women were in supervi- sory positions and never over male labor. Few women received advanced training and many who were skilled workers were actually classi- Sexist Taunts tough-minded young women fied as “helpers” and men supervised their assignments. Carmela Celardo Zuza Women at the shipyard had nevertheless persevered, Despite learning and using to put up with the taunts of taking great joy when the their skills during the war, recounted how she rough and tumble shipyard USS was launched in once World War II ended in workers and the lack of chang- 1944. Perhaps the most became a vertical September 1945, these ing and bathroom facilities. heralded ship built in Brooklyn women were closed out of welder working on the After a six-week course, some during the war, the USS the workforce and were became welders. In one of Missouri was the flagship on restricted from employment of the USS Missouri the more informative inter- which General Douglas and union membership in the views, Carmela Celardo Zuza MacArthur and his military when the ship was construction trades. recounted how she became a staff accepted the formal Japanese surrender on under construction. vertical welder working on African Americans the deck of the USS Missouri September 2, 1945. The vessel With the passage of the Fair when the ship was under also served in the Korean and Employment Practices Act of construction. Despite being a Vietnam Wars before its final 1941, restrictions on the patriotic young woman eager decommissioning. employment of African to help the war effort, she Another woman, Eleanor Americans in defense indus- was discouraged by her family Bailor Capson, whose father tries, including at the Brooklyn in this line of what was emigrated from Eastern Europe Navy Yard, were officially lifted, considered male work. Once in 1905, had an advanced but discrimination did not she started at the shipyard, science degree from Columbia disappear. Although several male workers shouted at her University and worked in the thousand African American to “go back to the kitchen.” materials testing lab at the New Yorkers were finally Sylvia Honigman Everitt, who shipyard. Her job was to allowed to be employed, also worked as welder, pointed determine how to insulate most were hired as unskilled out that the women responded wires used on ships so that workers. According to historian in kind: “I had never cursed in they didn't get moldy. She Craig Wilder in his excellent my life and that language was also tested the tensile book, A Covenant With Color: very attractive. It remained strength of different materials Race and Social Power in with me all my life.” These that were to be used in ship

­NEW YORK archives • WINTER 2020 27 Many women worked on the construction of the USS Missouri and took great joy when it was launched in 1944.

THE ARCHIVES CONNECTION

his article is dedicated Tto the memory of my aunt Gladys Karol and my mother-in-law Freda Jacobs, both of whom worked at the Brooklyn Navy Yard during World War II. Jacobs worked as a clerical worker at the shipyard while her LIBRARY OF CONGRESS LIBRARY husband, a physician, was serving in the North African campaign. Brooklyn (2001), African under the nearby Brooklyn have moved into the shipyard Besides listening to the American employment was and Manhattan Bridges to property, now owned by oral histories at the Othmer mostly centered on menial reach Wallabout Bay. In 1960, New York City and managed Library of the Brooklyn positions in the and a fire during the construction by the Brooklyn Navy Yard Historical Society or online was at “the lowest rate of of the USS Constellation Development Corporation at the BNY Collections site any major defense-production resulted in forty-nine deaths (BNYDC), a non-profit corpo- (archives.brooklynnavyyard. region.” Besides allowing a and hundreds of injuries. Five ration. According to New org), the best place to racially-based, two-tiered years later, the USS Duluth, York City’s own website, start your research on the wage system to operate, an amphibious transport and NYC City Record Online, Brooklyn Navy Yard is to investigations by the Fair landing craft became the last the BNYDC generates an pay a visit to its three-story Employment Practices ship built at this famous ship- estimated $2 billion for the on-site museum at building Commission and the War yard. By the mid-1960s, just city’s economy. n #92, 63 . Manpower Commission when the United States was The museum has exhibits on found that African American preparing to expand its war the shipyard as well as on women on the night shift in effort in Vietnam, Secretary of the history of the Brooklyn the naval clothing department Defense Robert McNamara Clarence Irving and Family, 1945 waterfront. Other materials, at the Brooklyn Navy Yard announced the formal closing CLARENCE IRVING PHOTOGRAPHS COLLECTION; especially photographs, can were replaced with white of the shipyard, laying off MC/2; BROOKLYN NAVY YARD DEVELOPMENT CORPORATION ARCHIVES, BROOKLYN, NY be found at the New-York women with lower seniority. approximately 9,000 workers. Historical Society and in the Today, while battleships Brooklyn Collection at the New Uses and aircraft carriers aren’t Brooklyn Public Library Although there was a post- being built, a vibrant reimag- Central Branch at Grand war lull in naval shipbuilding, ining of the shipyard is taking Army Plaza. the Brooklyn Navy Yard con- place. During the 2016 tinued to play a major role in presidential campaign, the the nation’s military prepared- Democratic Party held one of For more about Clarence ness right through the Korean its debates between Hillary s Irving’s later life and his War, when 20,000 workers Clinton and commitment to community were employed there. at the shipyard. Start-ups, service, see “Stepping Up However, by the late 1950s, television and film studios, to the Plate” by Robert D. the shipyard was becoming manufacturing facilities with Parmet in the Winter 2018 technologically obsolete and 400 businesses employing issue of New York Archives. newer ships, much bigger in about 9,000 people, and even size, could not maneuver a Wegman’s Food Market

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