Liberty Ships, Closed Doors · Episode 1 of 13 · 37 min
A Town the War Built: Marin City's Long Fight to Integrate
The series opens with Marin City, a town the federal government built in 1942 beside the Marinship shipyard on a Sausalito mudflat to house war workers, including Black families from the South. The yard closed but the town stayed, and so did the question of who belongs in its schools. The episode previews the wartime migration and the doors it opened for Black Southerners and women and shut on Japanese Americans.
Who's who
- Franklin D. Roosevelt+28 more episodesPresident whose executive orders opened and closed wartime doors
Where it happens
- Marin City, California+3 more episodesFederal town built to house Marinship workers
- Sausalito, California+3 more episodesSite of the Marinship shipyard
- San Francisco Bay Area, California+3 more episodesDestination of 46,000 Black migrants in wartime
- West Coast of the United States+1 more episodeRegion from which Japanese Americans were forcibly removed
Timeline
- June 25, 1941Executive Order 8802 bans discrimination in defense industries
- 1942Executive Order 9066 authorizes removal of Japanese Americans from the West Coast
- 1942Marinship built in Sausalito and Marin City raised for its workers
- 1941-1945Home-front migration peaks; nearly 19 million women are working by 1945
- 1945War ends and the yards wind down
Still debated
Counts of wartime migrants differ by definition, though it is well established as the largest internal movement in U.S. history. The claim that Sausalito was among the first districts to integrate is a family account still to be checked against the record.
Connected episodes in other series
The Good War's Fine Print: The WWII Draft's Forgotten LosersGreeting: America and the Draft · Episode 5Also features Franklin D. Roosevelt
How the CCC Secretly Rehearsed World War IIRoosevelt's Forest Army · Episode 3Also features Franklin D. Roosevelt
As West Point Serves the Army: The Making of Kings PointThe Fourth Arm · Episode 4Also features Franklin D. Roosevelt
An Honorable Discharge: How the WPA Ended in 1943The Infinite Dividend: The WPA · Episode 12Also features Franklin D. Roosevelt