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Fortress City

The Militarized Landscape of Seattle

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Book cover The Resilient City in World War II

Part of the book series: Palgrave Studies in World Environmental History ((PSWEH))

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Abstract

Seattle played a critical role in the allied war effort during World War II. Situated far from the battlefront, the war nevertheless served as a transformative force, turning urban and rural landscapes into sites of war production. Leaders in government and business sought to use the war as an opportunity to remake the city and the region. The efforts of planners and the demands of the military coalesced to bring war industries to the Pacific Northwest and Seattle. This essay examines the development of Seattle’s major war industries, particularly aircraft manufacture and shipbuilding, and demonstrates how the war reshaped Seattle by generating new networks of capital and commodities and by creating a lasting military-industrial complex in the city.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    Boeing reached its peak production of B-17s in 1943 and B-29s in 1945. Richard C. Berner, Seattle Transformed: World War II to Cold War , vol. 3 of Seattle in the 20th Century (Seattle: Charles Press, 1999), 59–60; Carlos Schwantes, The Pacific Northwest: An Interpretive History, rev. ed. (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1996), 411; 1. Mrs. Sutton Gustison, “The Boeing Story,” The Pacific Northwest Quarterly 45:2 (1954): 44; History of the U.S. Naval Station, Seattle, Washington, RG 181, 13ND-5: Wartime Unit Histories, Box 4, Folder: “U.S. Naval Station – Seattle, Washington,” and Wartime History of the Supervisor of Shipbuilding, United States Navy, Seattle, Washington, RG 181, 13ND-5: Wartime Unit Histories, Box 6, Folder 2, National Archives and Records Administration, Seattle, WA (NARA-Seattle).

  2. 2.

    For an extensive discussion of the concept see, Chris Pearson, “Researching Militarized Landscapes: A Literature Review on War and the Militarization of the Environment,” Landscape Research 37, no. 1 (February 2012): 115–133; For a longer historical perspective, see Chris Pearson, Peter Coates and Tim Cole, eds., Militarized Landscapes: From Gettysburg to Salisbury Plain (London : Continuum, 2010); For postwar changes, see Simo Laakkonen, ed., “Militarized Landscapes: Environmental Histories of the Cold War ,” a special issue in Cold War History 16, no. 4 (November 2017): 377–481.

  3. 3.

    Seattle ’s population in 1940 numbered 368,302, compared to more than 3 million residents in Chicago and 1.5 million in Los Angeles . US Bureau of the Census, Sixteenth Census of the United States: 1940, Population, Vol. 1 Number of Inhabitants (Washington, DC: US Government Printing Office, 1942), United States Summary, table 12.

  4. 4.

    The use of the term “fortress city” is borrowed from Roger Lotchin’s concept of the “metropolitan-military complex” as explained in Fortress California, 1910–1961: From Warfare to Welfare (New York : Oxford University Press, 1992), and is a play on the importance of Boeing and its “Flying Fortress” and “Superfortress” aircraft to Seattle .

  5. 5.

    National Resources Planning Board , Region 9, Pacific Northwest Region: Industrial Development (Washington, DC: US Government Printing Office, 1942), 2.

  6. 6.

    For more on the impact of the railroads on the Pacific Northwest see Richard White, Railroaded: The Transcontinentals and the Making of Modern America (New York : W.W. Norton, 2011); Bruce Cumings, Dominion from Sea to Sea: Pacific Ascendancy and American Power (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2009); and Schwantes, The Pacific Northwest: An Interpretive History.

  7. 7.

    See Matthew Klingle, Emerald City: An Environmental History of Seattle (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2007) for an overview of how Seattle’s landscape changed from the eighteenth century to the present.

  8. 8.

    Robert Ficken, “Seattle ’s ‘Ditch’: The Corps of Engineers and the Lake Washington Ship Canal,” Pacific Northwest Quarterly 77, no. 1 (January 1986): 11.

  9. 9.

    Lucile Carlson, “Duwamish River: Its Place in the Seattle Industrial Plan,” Economic Geography 26:2 (April 1950), 147; Klingle, Emerald City: An Environmental History of Seattle, 75–76. The regrading of Seattle’s hills during the first decades of the twentieth century also resulted in extensive changes to the city’s environment, but did not significantly alter land use patterns. For more on the regrades see David B. Williams, Too High and Too Steep: Reshaping Seattle’s Topography (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 2017).

  10. 10.

    Gerald Williams, “The Spruce Production Division,” Forest History Today (Spring 1999): 3; Robert J. Sterling, Legend and Legacy: The Story of Boeing and Its People (New York : St. Martin’s Press, 1992), 2–3.

  11. 11.

    National Resources Planning Board , Pacific Northwest Region: Industrial Development, 20–21; Klingle, Emerald City: An Environmental History of Seattle , 185–186.

  12. 12.

    National Resources Planning Board , Development of Resources and of Economic Opportunity in the Pacific Northwest (Washington, DC: US Government Printing Office, 1942), 12.

  13. 13.

    Harold Ickes , speech at the Chamber of Commerce, Spokane, WA, 19 August 1941, Box 341, Harold L. Ickes Papers, Library of Congress.

  14. 14.

    Leonard Arrington, “The New Deal in the West: A Preliminary Statistical Inquiry,” Pacific Historical Review 38, no. 3 (August 1969): 314–315.

  15. 15.

    Paul Hirt, Wired Northwest: The History of Electric Power, 1870s–1970s (Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 2012), 268–269.

  16. 16.

    National Resources Planning Board , Industrial Location and National Resources (Washington, DC: US Government Printing Office, 1943), 1; John B. Appleton, Pacific Northwest Resources (Portland , OR: Northwest Regional Council, 1943), 112.

  17. 17.

    “Facility Expansion of Boeing Aircraft Company, Seattle , Washington,” and “Summary of Case History of Boeing Aircraft Company, Seattle, Washington,” p. 1–3, RG18 Army Air Forces , Office of the Assistant Chief of Air Staff Materiel and Services (A-4), Research and Development Branch Case Histories, Box 31, “Boeing” folder, National Archives and Records Administration, College Park, MD.

  18. 18.

    “Summary of Case History of Boeing Aircraft Company, Seattle , Washington,” 10–11.

  19. 19.

    “A Report of Accomplishment in Engineering, Production and Cost Reduction by Boeing Aircraft Company and Boeing Airplane Company for the year 1943,” Boeing Archives, Bellevue, WA.

  20. 20.

    Schwantes, The Pacific Northwest: An Interpretive History, 411.

  21. 21.

    Hirt, Wired Northwest, 308, 312.

  22. 22.

    Hirt, Wired Northwest, 306; J.D. Ross, First Annual Report of the Bonneville Administrator (Washington, DC: US Government Printing Office, 1939), 20.

  23. 23.

    Carleton Green, The Impact of the Aluminum Industry on the Economy of the Pacific Northwest (Vancouver, WA: Aluminum Company of America, June 1954), 3–4, Bonneville Power Administration Library, Portland , OR (BPA Library).

  24. 24.

    Bonneville Power Administration Information Service, press release September 1, 1940, Box 7, Samuel Moment Collection, BPA Library; National Resources Planning Board , Pacific Northwest Region: Industrial Development, 29.

  25. 25.

    “Ickes Says Aluminum Firm Proves Bonneville Worth,” The Oregon Daily Journal, December 25, 1939.

  26. 26.

    National Resources Planning Board , Pacific Northwest Region: Industrial Development, 29.

  27. 27.

    War Production Board , “Materials Handbook, Aluminum,” (War Production Board, Statistical Services Division, issued July 6, 1945): 3-X, Samuel Moment Collection Box 244, Folder: “I WPB, All Products, Supply and Consumption Materials handbook, confidential,” BPA Library.

  28. 28.

    Aluminum at Work In the Air, On Land and Sea, In Space: The Story of Aluminum Products From the Boeing Company (Portland , OR: Western Aluminum Producers, 1979), 3.

  29. 29.

    Robert J. Serling, Legend and Legacy: The Story of Boeing and Its People (New York : St. Martin’s Press, 1992), 32–33; Boeing Aircraft Company Seattle , Washington “B-17 Production and Construction Analysis,” Prepared by: Air Materiel Command Headquarters, Los Angeles AAF Procurement Field Office, Industrial Planning Section (29 May 1946): 17, Boeing Archives.

  30. 30.

    Boeing Aircraft Company, Master Manual Plant 2, Boeing Aircraft Company (April, 1943), Boeing Archives.

  31. 31.

    “B-17 Production and Construction Analysis,” 32–34.

  32. 32.

    Peter Bowers, Boeing Aircraft since 1916, 2nd ed. (Annapolis: Naval Institute Press, 1989), 319; Boeing Aircraft Company Seattle , Washington “B-29 Production and Construction Analysis,” Prepared by: Air Materiel Command, Western District Headquarters T-5 Research Office (21 January 1946): iii, 4, Boeing Archives.

  33. 33.

    “Summary of Case History of Boeing Aircraft Company, Renton , Washington,” 1–4, RG18 Army Air Forces , Office of the Assistant Chief of Air Staff Materiel and Services (A-4), Research and Development Branch Case Histories, Box 32, “Boeing Airc. Co. Renton, Wash.” folder, NARA-College Park. “B-29 Production and Construction Analysis,” vi, 12–14.

  34. 34.

    Bowers, Boeing Aircraft since 1916, 286, 328.

  35. 35.

    “Work Rushed to Prepare For Building 20 Destroyers,” Seattle Daily Times, November 10, 1940.

  36. 36.

    “An Appraisal of U.S. Naval Industrial Reserve Shipyard Plant ‘B’ Seattle , Washington, For General Services Administration Contract No. 60,602,253 August 1960 By Harry R. Fenton, M.A.I., and Jerrold F. Ballaine, M.A.I.” p. 12. RG 291 Box 103, NARA-Seattle.

  37. 37.

    Art Ritchie, ed., The Pacific Northwest Goes to War (State of Washington) (Seattle : Associated Editors, 1944), 19, 34.

  38. 38.

    “Improved Timber Construction Speeds Expansion of the Shipyards,” Marine Engineering and Shipping Review (July 1941), 82–84; Timber Engineering Company, The Forest Fights! (Washington, DC: Timber Engineering Company, 1942), Box 4, MSS2547 Oregon Shipbuilding Corporation, Oregon Historical Society, Portland , OR.

  39. 39.

    “Defense! Lumber’s Part,” The Timberman (July, 1941): 10–11; “Use of Wood in Ships,” The Timberman (August, 1942): 85; National Resources Planning Board , Pacific Northwest Region: Industrial Development, 30.

  40. 40.

    Ritchie, The Pacific Northwest Goes to War, 53, 79, 150.

  41. 41.

    State of Washington, Report of the Washington State Census Board for the Years 1943 and 1944 (Olympia: State of Washington, 1944), 14.

  42. 42.

    Housing Authority of the City of Seattle , First Annual Report of the Housing Authority of the City of Seattle (January 1, 1941).

  43. 43.

    Housing Authority of the City of Seattle , Housing the People: Sixth Annual Report of the Housing Authority of the City of Seattle (February 1, 1946), 8–11.

  44. 44.

    All of Seattle ’s permanent World War II-era housing projects have only recently been redeveloped. For example, the Rainier Vista project, completed in 1942, was redeveloped beginning in 1999. Seattle Housing Authority , “Rainier Vista Redevelopment,” https://www.seattlehousing.org/about-us/redevelopment/rainier-vista-redevelopment, accessed December 9, 2017.

  45. 45.

    Carlson, “Duwamish River: Its Place in the Seattle Industrial Plan,” 148–149; City of Seattle Department of Planning & Development, “Duwamish M/IC Policy and Land Use Study Draft Recommendations” (November 2013), 5, 9, http://www.seattle.gov/dpd/cs/groups/pan/@pan/documents/web_informational/p1903847.pdf, accessed December 1, 2017.

  46. 46.

    Conservation: The Resources We Guard (Washington, DC: US Department of the Interior, 1940), 29; emphasis in the original.

  47. 47.

    William McNamara, “Wartime Operation Problems at Seattle ,” Sewage Works Journal 16, no. 6 (November 1944): 1244–1245; US Environmental Protection Agency, Region 10, Record of Decision: Lower Duwamish Waterway Superfund Site (November 2014), 2, 4, https://semspub.epa.gov/work/10/715975.pdf, accessed December 1, 2017; US Environmental Protection Agency, Region 10, Five-Year Review Report: Harbor Island Superfund Site, Seattle, King County, Washington (September 2015), 9–10, https://semspub.epa.gov/work/10/100014200.pdf, accessed December 1, 2017.

  48. 48.

    Gerald D. Nash, World War II and the West: Reshaping the Economy (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1990), 4.

  49. 49.

    University of Washington Bureau of Business Research, An Analysis of Manufacturing in the Puget Sound Area (Seattle : University of Washington, July 1955), 110.

  50. 50.

    Dominick Gates, “Wrecking Ball Looms for Historic Boeing Plant 2,” Seattle Times, January 13, 2010, http://www.seattletimes.com/business/boeing-aerospace/wrecking-ball-looms-for-historic-boeing-plant-2/, accessed 30 November 2017; The Boeing Company, “Renton Production Facility,” http://www.boeing.com/company/about-bca/renton-production-facility.page, accessed November 30, 2017.

  51. 51.

    Ann R. Markusen, et al., eds., The Rise of the Gunbelt: The Military Remapping of Industrial America (New York : Oxford University Press, 1991), 4; 1. Roger W. Lotchin, Fortress California at War: San Francisco , Los Angeles , Oakland, and San Diego, 1941–1945 (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1994).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Loyola University Chicago, Chicago, IL, USA

    Katherine Macica

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  1. Katherine Macica
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Editors and Affiliations

  1. University of Turku, Turku, Finland

    Simo Laakkonen

  2. Georgetown University, Washington, DC, USA

    J. R. McNeill

  3. University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI, USA

    Richard P. Tucker

  4. Department of Biology, University of Turku, Turku, Finland

    Timo Vuorisalo

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Macica, K. (2019). Fortress City . In: Laakkonen, S., McNeill, J.R., Tucker, R.P., Vuorisalo, T. (eds) The Resilient City in World War II. Palgrave Studies in World Environmental History. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-17439-2_3

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-17439-2_3

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