The Star Weekly At War : Blog: Wartime Wednesdays | Elinor Florence. Image of a Rosie the Riveter 1940s Woman going to work walking between 2 men in uniform

Source: Elinor Florence

Today’s, Vintage Photo Tuesday, are wartime photos of women doing their part during WW2. This is not a new topic for me as I have shared posts on the home front effort many times before (see end of post) but I really wanted to do it again to stress how important it is to “Do Your Part”. For us in 2020 that means just staying home. For the ladies (and of course the men) during WW2 it meant leaving the home and heading into factories, hospitals and overseas.

Let’s take a look at this weeks photos….

Vintage Photos of the Women of World War 2

Helping with the War Effort

1940s Photo of a women working in a WW2 Factory. This is Miss Elsie Richards of Bulladelah, who assisted her parents in the running of a store, now she machines the copper driving band of 25 pounder shells.

1940s Photo of a women working in a WW2 Factory. She is wearing a hair turban to protect her hair from the machines.

Source: Flickr

Willa Beatrice Brown (January 22, 1906 – July 18, 1992) was an American aviator, lobbyist, teacher, and civil rights activist.

She was the first African-American woman to earn her pilot’s license in the United States, the first African-American woman to run for the United States Congress, the first African-American officer in the US Civil Air Patrol, and the first woman in the United States to have both a pilot’s license and a mechanic’s license.

A lifelong advocate for gender and racial equality in flight and in the military, Brown not only lobbied the U.S. government to integrate the U.S. Army Air Corp and include African Americans in the Civilian Pilot Training Program (CPTP), but also co-founded the Cornelius Coffey School of Aeronautics with Cornelius Coffey, which was the first private flight training academy in the United States owned and operated by African Americans.

She trained hundreds of pilots, several of whom would go on to become Tuskegee Airmen (Source). YES!!!!

1940s Vintage Photo: Willa Beatrice Brown was the first black woman to earn a pilot's license in the US, and is widely credited with helping to create the squadron that became known as the Tuskegee Airmen.

Source: Wikipedia

1940s Photo: View of the main operations room shows mostly women volunteers “plotting” the position of the Victoria Air Sector, 25 aircraft aloft at the time.

1940s Photo: View of the main operations room shows mostly women volunteers "plotting" position of the Victoria Air Sector, 25 aircraft aloft at the time.

Source: Flickr

1944 Photo of Sergeant Karen M. Hermiston of the Canadian Women’s Army Corps, holding a Rolleiflex camera.

Source: Flickr

U.K. Women carpenters, 1941 photo. 16 year old Stella Day drills a hole in a wooden beam during the production of huts at this workshop, somewhere in England, 1941. According to the original caption, Miss Day’s father is a Petty Officer in the Royal Navy.

1940s Photo: U.K. Women carpenters, 1941 photo. 16 year old Stella Day drills a hole in a wooden beam during the production of huts at this workshop, somewhere in England, 1941. According to the original caption, Miss Day’s father is a Petty Officer in the Royal Navy.

Source: Imperial War Museum

Los Angeles, Calif. — Miss Ethel Mildred Lee, 23-year-old girl born in this country of Chinese parents, is shown at her job as an electrician-helper at the Los Angeles yards of the California Shipbuilding Corporation, where she has worked for almost two years.

Extra incentives to help the war effort are two brothers in the U.S. Army and one in the Navy yard at Honolulu, Hawaii. Miss Lee, who’s 4 feet 10 inches tall and weighs 98 pounds, buys $100 worth or War Bonds a month. — January 20, 1944

1940s Vintage Photo of a young Chinese woman working in a WW2 factory. Miss Ethel Mildred Lee, 23-year-old girl born in this country of Chinese parents, is shown at her job as an electrician-helper at the Los Angeles yards of the California Shipbuilding Corporation, where she has worked for almost two years.

Source: Tumblr

Two Army nurses sit on the steps at Cape Gloucester, New Britain in August 1944.

Source: Digital Collections of the National WW2 Museum

1940s Photo of a young Black woman working on a machine in a factory. According to the Library of Congress, “Plant foremen point to 20-year-old Annie Tabor as one of their best lathe operators, despite her lack of previous industrial experience.”

1940s Vintage Photo: 1940s Photo of a young Black woman working on a machine in a factory. According to the Library of Congress, "Plant foremen point to 20-year-old Annie Tabor as one of their best lathe operators, despite her lack of previous industrial experience."

Source: Buzzfeed

ATS anti-aircraft artillery spotters learn to use an identification telescope at No.7 ATS Training Centre at Stoughton near Guildford, 24 September 1941.

1940s Photo: ATS anti-aircraft artillery spotters learn to use an identification telescope at No.7 ATS Training Centre at Stoughton near Guildford, 24 September 1941.

Source: Imperial War Museum

1940s Photo of a Women Ordnance Worker (WOWs) during World War II. Wartime posters celebrating these women, who worked in war plants making weapons, ammunition, and other military supplies. The most famous WOW was Rosie the Riveter.

1940s Photo of a Women Ordnance Worker (WOWs) during World War II. The most famous WOW was Rosie the Riveter.

Source: Tumblr

“The WOW bandana, designed in accordance with U.S. Army specifications, is an attractive, safe, and unifying head covering to identify women ordnance workers. About 27” square, it is available either in ordnance red with white ordnance insignia, or in white with red ordnance insignia. Every woman in your plant will want one – it’s a “WOW” for morale!“ (Ad, 1943).

The head scarf with flaming bomb designs became the symbol of women working in war industries (Source).

1940s Vintage ad for The WOW bandana, designed in accordance with U.S. Army specifications, is an attractive, safe, and unifying head covering to identify women ordnance workers

Source: Tumblr

Here are other posts on Women on the Home Front that you should check out, as we near the end of Women’s History Month:

World War 2 Women’s Contributions & Homefront Posts

Hope everyone is doing well and keeping safe!

Liz

Girl’s Hair-Do (aka bows in the hair) Reveals Love Life-1944

Bow on the top of the head: means that Ann Mitchell is “out to get herself a man.”

Bow worn in back: means that Betty is “not interested in men.”

Bow worn on the right side: indicates that Becky is deeply in love.

Bow worn at left: is a signal and challenge. It means Betty Chaney is “going steady.”

Girl's Hair-Do (aka bows in the hair) Reveals Love Life-1944.

Remember School Rings?

Teens would show that they were”going steady” with someone with these pieces of jewelry. The guy would give the girl his ring and she would typically wear it as a necklace.

Here is a scene from Grease when Danny gives Sandy his ring (video clip).

Letterman Jacket “gifting”

Giving a girl you liked your Letterman Jacket was a symbol of affection and to tell the world “that is my girl”, as seen on this pretty young lady in the 1940s.

“Sword Signals”, 1957. Pins Tell Teen Date Status

The article states:

“In San Diego enterprising teenagers have abandoned the unsubtle old system of advertising their dating status by wearing (or not wearing) fraternity pins on their sweaters. Instead they have developed an ingenious signal code with homemade sword pins which, at a glance, will tell anyone who knows the code all he needs to know.

It all started innocently a few months ago when some fund-raising Girl Scouts began making the swords purely for ornament, out of pins, colored beads and plastic cord hilts, as part of a hobby-craft program, and selling them for $0.15 each. Soon local junior high schoolers started making them on their own and putting them together in patterns fraught with romantic significance. The fad, spreading furiously throughout San Diego County, threatens to head north to Hollywood, after which there may be no stopping it.”