Arthur S. Siegel photographed this truckload of ship painters at Baltimore’s Bethlehem-Fairfield shipyard in May 1943. They were part of a workforce expanding at extraordinary speed to build merchant ships during World War II.
Fairfield’s workforce grew from 355 in April 1941 to about 47,000 by late 1943, according to the Baltimore Museum of Industry. The yard had begun operating in 1941, when Bethlehem’s other Baltimore yards at Sparrows Point and Key Highway were already occupied.
The first Liberty ship built at Fairfield, the Patrick Henry, took 245 days to complete. By 1943, the yard could build one in roughly 30 days. Workers assembled prefabricated sections, with a rail connection bringing components from a fabrication shop at Curtis Bay.
Fairfield produced 384 Liberty ships between 1941 and 1945. Siegel’s photograph brings that enormous production effort down to the scale of one group of workers, packed onto a truck.
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On the AtlasNewSee where this happenedBethlehem-Fairfield Shipyard site39.2392° N · 76.5848° W
