Aircraft Workers, 1942

Another of those wonderful photos from Shorpy, this one taken at the Douglas Aircraft facility in Long Beach. Check out the army-green lunchbox!

The photo was taken in October 1942 by Alfred Palmer of the Office of War Information. The silvery backdrops are Nacelle parts of a heavy bomber--a new word for me. Nacelle means the covering of an airplane's engine, fuel or other equipment, separate from the fusilage.

I signed up for daily delivery of Shorpy photos a few months ago. One of the pleasures of my day is to pause in my ritual deletions of pharmacy ads, job and stock offerings, warnings from banks I have no accounts with, and ads from stores I've never shopped at, so that I can look at three or four pictures that capture a time I will never know. Sometimes Shorpy sends shots of Civil War soldiers relaxing or washing out clothes in a river, or street scenes of turn-of-the-century Washington DC, or 1950's Christmas photos taken in suburbia. You never know what you'll find there in their emails.