Margaret Welsh and Helen Walters, Murray Corporation of America

Portrait of Margaret Welsh and Helen Walters at the Murray Corporation of America factory. Article on back: "Rarely do the news columns tell of an entire family going to war, but this is a story of young fighting men and even grandparents joining in the fight to hold what they have, and help push America ahead to even greater things. Margaret Welsh, working in Dept. 261, is the grandmother of the family, and the latest to 'join up,' having just completed her aircraft training course in the Murray school. Her husband, Robert, has been an Ecorse plant employee for the past nine years and is on the Jeep frame production line, supplying those baby monsters to the services in all parts of the world. The Welshs' have two sons in the Navy, Alex, 23, and James, 20, which explains a lot about the Welsh movement to the production front. The older boy, a navy yeoman, has been on sea duty aboard a battleship and is thought to have participated in the landing in North Africa. He is presently on shore duty, stationed, his family believes, in Africa. The younger son is undergoing training in aircraft gunnery, rated a seaman, second class in the navy. A daughter, Mrs. Helen Walters, is in the same department as her mother, and her husband is a supervisor in the department, although Mrs. Welsh was quick to exclaim that 'she doesn't work under her husband's supervision.' The Walters' are the proud parents of a five months old daughter, just putting the Welshs' in the grandparents class. Mrs. Welsh, a housewife since her marriage in 1918 just before her husband's embarkation for France, decided to enroll in the aircraft training school when she grew tired of 'sitting around the house all day worrying.' She says that 'I don't have time to worry now, I'm so busy, and I really feel that I'm helping Alex and James get back home that much quicker!' Mrs. Welsh displays a commendation to the crew of the battleship on which her son was serving. Signed by the commanding officer of the 'battle wagon,' it congratulates the crew of the ship on 'their splendid conduct and machine-like precision under enemy fire' during the African landing. Proud of her son, it hasn't occurred to her that he is probably just as proud of her and his father when he reads of what they're doing to help him in the battle over there." Stamped on back: "Photographic Department. Authorized print no. 910-2, date 11-1-43. Murray Corporation, Detroit." Handwritten on back: "Women workers."