Loading the Sting

They got to see the world but there was hard work along the way when your job was arming the airplanes:

Here, deckhands are loading a torpedo on a T4M-1 aboard Saratoga (CV-3) in May 1929.

National Archives 80G-21692

This is a 1,000-lb bomb being slung under a Marines Corps BG-1 dive bomber in February 1937.

National Archives 80G-216907

Being part mountain goat didn't hurt at times, particularly when the job was loading ammunition in the folded wings of a Grumman FM-1 Wildcat aboard Mission Bay (CVE-59) in January 1944.

 National Archives 80G-229237

But it wasn't all rough duty. Sometimes it was bombing up a Martin PM-1 seaplane at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii in October 1933...

National Archives 80G-216911

National Archives 80G-216914