Del Courtney Orchestra at shipyards

Photographer

Berns, Harry

Date

• August 11, 1943

Summary

• Taken August 11, 1943 and published in the Manitowoc Herald Times the next day over the caption “Music with their meal,” this picture shows a large crowd of Manitowoc Shipbuilding Company workers gathered around a platform near the “clockhouse” at the center of the shipyards to listen to a noontime concert by Del Courtney and his orchestra. Members of the orchestra can be seen performing around an upright piano, visible on the platform in the middle of the crowd. Some workers stand on rooftops and trucks to get a better view. The popular “big band,” based in San Francisco, was in Manitowoc for an engagement at the Capitol Theater, and had agreed to play a 25-minute concert for the shipyard crews who were building submarines for the U.S. Navy. According to the newspaper account which described the music as “both soft and hot,” this was the first “touring orchestra” to entertain yard workers. Many other morale-building events like this were presented for shipyard employees during the course of World War II. This picture, which was taken by a Shipbuilding Company photographer, also was published in the July-August 1943 issue of Keel Block, the company newsletter.