How We Won The War

Recalling an era that has almost disappeared from living memory, but one which played a vital role in the preservation and shaping of 20th century America, we have attempted to place before you some of the best illustrations we could locate in our collections that depict that hard-fought era when America and Newark pulled out all the stops to survive against a tyrannical Germany in Europe and ultra-aggressive Japan in Asia. This is the 60th anniversary of the winning of that tremendous war.

Time to Roll Out the Barrel – raising money for the USO at Broad Street and Raymond Boulevard. Summer 1942.

Included in that photographic essay we show headings in the Newark News, the Star-Ledger and the Sunday Call announcing the outbreak and successful conclusion of WW II.

Another destroyer launched at the Newark Federal Ship Yard.

We mention a few of the massive war-time industrial achievements of industrial Newark, and we show pictures of the Newark Yard of Federal Shipbuilding and Dry Dock Company. The role of women as a major work source is illustrated in both posed and un-posed pictures. Emphasized in the exhibition is the role of the “Home Front” in Newark: The Air Raid Drills, the City Blackouts, the Empty Butcher Shop Windows, the Ration Stamps, an Air Raid Warden’s cap and armband, the War-Time posters, the Victory Gardens, the Men and Women in Service, the Social Agencies Supporting the Troops, Father Washington, and even the Nazis of Newark and New Jersey who quickly disappeared as war-time activity accelerated.

Blueprints are consulted by these lath operators at the Port Newark yard of Federal Shipbuilding & Dry Dock Co.  December 1942.

We hope this photographic essay will remind you of just how hard Americans, and in particular Newarkers, worked to support the dream of a free country and society.