Wednesday, June 17, 2015

Wednesday Wonderful Collection - Arkansas World War II defense plant employees collection,
MS. 396

In October 1941 the United States War Department announced that defense plants would be built across Arkansas. The Arkansas Ordnance Plant at Jacksonville built fuses, detonators, and other military ammunition. Maumelle Ordnance Works at Marche produced ammonium picrate, an explosive to be used in armor-piercing shells. Malvern (Jones Mill), produced aluminum. The Camden plant was built late in World War II as a rocket loading, assembling, and storage site.

This collection contains questionnaires, essays, training tests, the "AOP News" (newsletter of the Arkansas Ordnance Plant in Jacksonville, Arkansas), and certificates belonging to men and women of Arkansas who worked in Arkansas defense plants. Most of the materials represented men and women who worked at the Arkansas Ordnance Plant at Jacksonville, Arkansas. Others represent the Maumelle Ordnance Work located at Marche, Arkansas, Malvern (Jones Mills), Arkansas Remmel Dam Aluminum Plant, and the Camden, Arkansas, shell loading plant. 

  • 1. Lanora Bryant Diederich, Arkansas Ordnance Plant, Jacksonville (Box 1)
  • 2. Frank Fowlkes, Jacksonville, Arkansas, resident
  • 3. Alma Lou Morland Gibbs, Arkansas Ordnance Plant, Jacksonville
  • 4. Vernelle Shumate Gray, Arkansas Ordnance Plant, Jacksonville
  • 5. Mary Evelyn Phelps Harris, Camden, Arkansas, Shell Loading Plant
  • 6. Joe Bill Hocott, Maumelle, Arkansas, Ordnance Works at Marche
  • 7. Jewell A. Burroughs Holland, Arkansas Ordnance Plant, Jacksonville
  • 8. Laura Herring Kennedy Jigouleff, Arkansas Ordnance Plant, Jacksonville
  • 9. Catherine and L.W. Lowry, Arkansas Ordnance Plant Jacksonville
  • 10. Mary McKee, Arkansas Ordnance Plant, Jacksonville
  • 12. Mildred Rettig Northcutt, Arkansas Ordnance Plant, Jacksonville
  • 13. Opal Faye Nusko, Jones Mill, Arkansas, Aluminum Plant
  • 14. Georgia Harral Peterson, Arkansas Ordnance Plant, Jacksonville (Box 2)
  • 15. Lillie Willis Langley Post, Arkansas Ordnance Plant, Jacksonville
  • 16. Ethel Fisher Rayburn, Arkansas Ordnance Plant, Jacksonville
  • 17. Merle Dorsett Seemel, Arkansas Ordance Plant, Jacksonville
  • 18. Merle Dorsett Seemel, Arkansas Ordance Plant, Jacksonville
  • 19. Thomas W. Swann, Arkansas Ordnance Plant, Jacksonville