© 2006 Frank Murphy

Roused to avenge the attack on Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941, thousands of men across the U.S. enlisted into the armed forces, causing a drained workforce within American industrial plants. In turn, this event catalyzed women’s large scale entrance into employment in war production. As one of the nation’s most important arsenals, the Springfield Armory had to develop a strategy to hire a workforce to fill this labor vacuum. While following guidelines set by the War Manpower Commission and New Deal social programs of the federal government, the Armory simultaneously reached out to its immediate community. It collaborated with Springfield’s Technical Vocational School to design and implement new training methods to teach women skills necessary for war production employment. With the help of federal and state funds, the Armory’s vocational training program reflected the national phenomenon of women’s quick and effective preparation for employment.1 Women comprised 20% of the Armory’s workforce by June 1942 and grew to 43% the following year.2

A girl is being taught in the techniques of brazing metal at Apprentice School

War production industries overcame significant social obstacles surrounding women’s roles in the labor force in 1941. A widespread atmosphere of doubt and skepticism surrounded the employment of women, whom management widely perceived as ill-equipped with the industrial skills necessary to do the work.3 To alleviate such concerns, the U.S. federal government and War Manpower Commission collaborated to produce the famed “Rosie the Riveter” posters that directly addressed the gendered social norms of the 1940s. Such posters, the most well-known of which was painted by Norman Rockwell, clearly depicted strong, able women that convinced both women and industry employers to bring women back to the workforce after the Depression. In addition, the Armory likely received the Training Within Industry Materials text, a guide distributed by the federal government to respond to management’s concerns. In her study of the Springfield Armory, author Constance Greene furthermore argued that these social norms about women’s age, marital status, and education, which previously barred or discouraged women from employment, had to be abandoned.4

The active redefinition of women’s employment by the federal government, the war industries, and women themselves who identified with Rosie, resulted in concentrated efforts to modify the training processes. The Training Within Industry Materials text urged plants to continue their pre-existing apprenticeship programs, which trained men to become multi-skilled as supervisors and trainees. Plants also simultaneously adopted programs that quickly trained workers in single disciplines.5The Armory still employed men during World War II, but advanced them to higher, more technical positions. The Armory therefore faced the challenge of hiring capable women to fill the many vacant entry-level positions by increasing recruitment of women workers who could learn fast and perform well. Springfield Armory’s long-established Apprentice School faced changes in its purpose because it developed courses that increased the training rate at which new employees learned, moving them into actual production and on-the-job training. The Springfield Trade School grew to become one of Massachusetts’s largest because the Armory remained as a large employer during the war and needed its training demands met as it increased its female employment. The Armory’s Apprentice School, at the outset, prepared prospective employees through the industrial training process. Springfield’s Technical Trade School made available more federally-appropriated funds and hired highly qualified instructors to increase female employment. Some young men who were already working in the Armory, but needed additional training, comprised the group of supplementary trainees. This training quickly exceeded pre-employment instruction and eventually opened up to meet the needs of women who wanted to advance their skills as employment increased.6

An advertisment depicting the training program at the Springfield Armory

The new training process required cooperation between three levels: at the national level from where the funds came; the state level at which the Department of Education controlled vocational schools; and local levels at which individual industries collaborated with neighborhood or nearby vocational schools to design training programs and provide machinery and equipment on which workers learned.7The Armory linked its new employees to the training facilities at which women took courses for no expenses since employers assumed no one had any prior experience in operating machinery. Because the Armory assigned workers to vocational training at the Technical Trade School and paid for courses, the successful completion of the course and turnover-rate reached so high a ratio as 86%. This meant that from 1941 to 1944, women workers tended to stay at the same job with the Armory. Of those interviewed by a Massachusetts Education Board study of vocational schools for the whole state, 82% responded that their present employment utilized their training.8 This suggests that the Armory, and other crucial wartime production plants, invested time in helping to design training courses and assigning new employees to the best courses to maximize efficiency and keep them employed.

Ester Kelly is observed while she grinds chambering reamers

The Springfield Armory enlisted the pedagogical expert of Springfield public schools, Ed Whalen, to develop aptitude tests. He devised tests that measured the “latent” capacities of women in terms of the skills needed for a specific job. Whalen instituted these tests before training began to evaluate a woman worker’s innate abilities--not skills she gained from education. He sent those with astute mental abilities to the Armory’s specialized Apprentice School. The Armory studied the tests cost-effectively. Women were required to bring their aptitude reports with them to training, whereupon a trainee or employer accepted them if their innate abilities fit the task. For example, trainees redirected a “mechanic learner” away from a job requiring accurate visual perception. Whalen trained the Armory to deem a mechanic learner as “the person whose left hand permitted her to turn a handle clockwise rapidly while her right hand simultaneously cranked counter-clockwise,” a match for profiling a gun. In contrast, “The woman whose fingers proved nimble in placing small pins in the shallow grooves of a steel plate could presumably run a drill press where speed of hand and accuracy of eye were essential.” The Armory saved time and money from avoiding training a woman in skills to which she was not inclined.9

By the end of 1941, women entered the war work force and short training programs that prepared them to work in the most-needy industries. In extreme shortage cases, plants hired women on the spot, sometimes upon successful completion of a five week training program at vocational schools where they could take night classes or get on-the-job training right in the plant. The Armory dictated to the vocational school system its needs and the vocational schools responded by developing highly successful training programs to supply the war industries with a skilled and predominantly female workforce. Women stayed at their jobs because both their occupations and training were in close proximity in the Springfield community.