Boeing Wonderland and working together

Mom and Dad were both working in Seattle for Boeing Aircraft in 1942, Dad as a fabricator and Mom as a rivet bucker. They, like the vast majority of Americans living on the West Coast during World War II, were very concerned about enemy airplane bombers. Pearl Harbor was a very recent horror story. 

The huge Boeing aircraft complex was over a million square feet and would be a prime target for enemy aircraft. The Boeing company, in conjunction with the U.S. Department of Defense, decided to “camouflage” the entire plant by creating “The Boeing Wonderland” on the factory rooftops. Over 30 rooftop acres of fake cardboard houses and chicken wire trees were built in such a convincing way that enemy airplanes would have a near impossible time locating the real factories.

Fortunately, enemy aircraft never made it to the West Coast.

That Boeing Wonderland model inspires me. Our country all working together, government and private industry and citizens. We can accomplish so much when we are United.

Let’s keep that Wonderland Hope alive.

STEVE JOHNSON

Sagle