Now It Can Be Told: 1942

Submitted by Dave on Tue, 07/01/2008 - 2:27am.

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February 1942. Akron, Ohio. Another esoteric industrial process involving scary-looking thingamabobs essential to the war effort. Executive summary: Performing a painstakingly choreographed ballet of complicated tasks at precisely timed intervals, Joe Warworker here is doing his part to Speed Victory! View full size. 4x5 nitrate negative by Alfred Palmer for the Office of War Information.

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Atomic Welding

Submitted by Anonymous Tipster on Fri, 08/01/2008 - 5:57pm.

I'd guess "atomic [sic.] welding machine" should be "automatic welding machine" in this caption.

[Atomic welding is correct. Short for atomic hydrogen welding. - Dave]

Coded Chemicals

Submitted by cheneworth on Tue, 07/01/2008 - 3:35pm.

When I went to work at the Oak Ridge Gaseous Diffusion Plant in Tennessee in the mid-sixties, some of the old timers were still referring to common compressed gases by their wartime code names. We still had a section in the plant called "Coded Chemicals."