world war II – Page 2 – Hinges of History

Mary Bingham

WAVE Mary Bingham talks about enlisting in the WAVES and serving in the Navy.

Her story is part of our month of video countdown to the home video release of Homefront Heroines: The WAVES of World War II.

Liane Rose Galvin

Aerographer (meteorologist) Liane Rose Galvin talks about her WAVE experiences.

It’s part of our month of video countdown to the home video release of Homefront Heroines: The WAVES of World War II.

Hair Raising

War or no war, we must have clean hair

– reads the caption from this photograph from 1943. WAVES at the “modern and up-to-date” beauty salon at NATTC Norman, Oklahoma.

It comes from the National Archives.

Outdoor Exercise

Drills may have been indoors, but calisthenics were outside in February 1943 at NATTC, Norman, Oklahoma.

The Wayne Miller photo comes from the National Archives.

Control Tower Operators

Control Tower Operators at Naval Air Station Norfolk keep tab on plane traffic using binoculars.

The color photograph comes from the National Archives.

This February 1943 photograph shows a WAVE writing a letter aboard a train while en route from the Cedar Falls boot camp to the Madison, Wisconsin advanced training facility for radio coding/decoding.

The photograph comes from the National Archives.

Aviation Week!

We’re going to round out the month of October here at the Hinges of History blog with a look at WAVES in aviation.

This photo is of an unidentified WAVE sitting in the “cockpit” of a Link trainer, which was used to train Navy pilots in the skills of instrument flight.

It comes from the Schlesinger Library at the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study, Harvard University.

Learning the Ropes

Ah, the adjustments WAVES had to make during boot camp!

This cartoon comes from the Schlesinger Library at the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study, Harvard University.

Engine Work

Jacksonville WAVES work on a plane engine in this October 1943 photograph.

It’s by Ens. V. Jorgensen and comes from the National Archives.

“Where Did You Get That Hat?”

This is one of our favorite color photographs of the WAVES, showing women trying on the new overseas hat at Naval Air Station New Orleans. The hat would be a uniform addition (the “bucket” style hat would also remain an option during World War II), bu the overseas hat would eventually become the sole uniform standard for Navy women in the post-war years.