During World War I, Washington’s economy boomed. Washington’s timber resources were vital to shipbuilding and to the fledgling aircraft industry.
The Emergency Fleet Corporation commandeered the nation’s shipbuilding yards and ordered the construction of a thousand ships, including 300 from the Pacific Northwest. Shipbuilders were exempt from the draft and there was an influx of workers. Seattle’s 28 shipyards built about one-fourth of the nation’s new ships.
At Grays Harbor, Washington, work crews raced to set a world’s record in constructing the S.S. Aberdeen to help win the Great War (World War I). One of the displays in the Washington State History Museum in Tacoma looks at this project.
According to the display:
“An industrial army has assembled to build a ship that will transport troops across the Atlantic to fight in Europe. Like a general, the shipyard superintendent commands and coordinates the division of clerks and purchasers, bandsaw workers and planers, framers and joiners, shipwrights and fasteners, carpenters and caulkers, blacksmiths and boilermakers, machinist and coppersmiths, plumbers, pipefitters, and painters.”
Timber Workers
The war meant that timber had to be harvested by efficient and disciplined logging crews. The Army sent Colonel Brice Disque, a former prison warden, to Washington to make sure that the lumber industry could meet national production goals. Disque halted the labor warfare between Wobblies and the companies. Labor got an eight-hour day and improved timber camps while management got an increase in production.
More Museum Photo Tours
Veterans Memorial Museum: World War I (Photo Diary)
Museums 101: World War II Military and the Oregon Coast (Photo Diary)
Museums 101: An Army Depot (Photo Diary)
Museums 101: A Collection of Military Vehicles (Photo Diary)
Museums 101: California Transportation (Photo Diary)
Museums 101: Some Farm Equipment (Photo Diary)
Museums 101: Sawmill (Photo Diary)
Museums 101: The Hanford Reach Nuclear Facility (Photo Diary)