Remembering the Port Chicago Explosion, 80 Years Later

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n the anniversary of a horrifying explosion that killed 320 men — 202 of them African American — most people would expect a reverent service or somber memorial to mark the tragedy. Not big bands full of brass instruments playing 1940s jazz and swing music. Not people dancing, twisting and flapping in jubilee.

But that’s exactly the sort of energy renowned bandleader and composer Marcus Shelby wants to evoke at an event marking the 80th anniversary of the Port Chicago Explosion, the deadliest incident on mainland American soil of World War II and one of the worst disasters in U.S. military history.

Utilizing entertainment in order to educate people on what happened at Port Chicago, just north of Concord, is imperative to Yulie Padmore. “Ultimately,” says Padmore, the director of the Port Chicago Alliance, “this is a history I’m very passionate about.”

Padmore is quick to enumerate the often-overlooked significance of the disaster and its aftermath. The subsequent legal proceedings laid the groundwork for the civil rights movement. It directly led to the desegregation of the Navy, and later the military as a whole. It also influenced desegregation in the broader U.S. workforce, as well as the country’s education system.

“What we’re saying is,” says Padmore during a phone call, “this work happened right here in The Bay.”

Padmore and Shelby are just two of the many folks preparing for Port Chicago Weekend, a three-day series of events spanning from July 18–July 21. Along with live music and dancing, the lineup includes a performance of Port Chicago 50, a play by David Shackelford and Dennis Rowe.

Attendees will also get to hear firsthand from relatives of those who died in the tragic events of July 17, 1944 — exactly 80 years ago.

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n 1944, the United States was in the thick of World War II, and all throughout the Bay Area, workers played a huge role in the war effort. Women entered the workforce in droves, a shift often symbolized through the fictional character of Rosie The Riveter, and immortalized in a namesake park and museum in Richmond. Around that same time, UC Berkeley scientists worked on The Manhattan Project, which brought about the atom bomb. Thousands more labored in mills in Marin County, factories in Oakland and on ships in Hunters Point, all in support of the war effort.

In July, at a naval base on Suisun Bay, hundreds of men worked tirelessly to load munitions onto a 440-foot-long cargo ship, the S.S. E.A. Bryan. Reports show that between big cluster bombs, small ammunitions, naval mines and other explosives, over 4,600 pounds of weaponry was loaded onto the vessel at the time of the incident. The cargo ship itself, loaded with over 5,000 barrels of bunker oil, was highly flammable. Approximately 430 tons of ammunition and bombs sat in railroad cars not far from where the ship was moored. Another ship, the S.S. Quinault Victory, was directly adjacent.

Just after 10 p.m. on the night of July 17, witnesses heard the sound of metal falling before a booming explosion sent a fireball measuring three miles in diameter into the sky. Shrapnel was launched 1,200 feet into the air. The explosion was reportedly heard as far away as Nevada. It measured 3.4 on the Richter scale in Berkeley, 20 miles away.

Of those men working on the ship, 320 were killed instantly, vaporized by the blast. Hundreds more were injured. Those who perished in the explosion accounted for 15% of African American servicemen who died during WWII.

The exact cause of the explosion was never identified. But during a trial, it became clear that the Navy hadn’t followed protocol in training the largely African American workers how to properly load munitions. What’s more, three weeks later the remaining workers were sent to Mare Island in Vallejo to continue loading munitions for the Navy.

Seeing that no new safety measures had been taken, workers protested. Over 250 men initially refused the unsafe labor conditions. But soon, the majority returned to work, leaving 50 men — known as the Port Chicago 50 — to protest.

Charged with disobedience and mutiny during wartime, the men were supported by Thurgood Marshall, who wasn’t their lawyer but attended the hearings and publicized their case. This was years before Marshall worked on the landmark case Brown v. Board of Education or became the first African American Supreme Court justice, but as lead counsel with the NAACP Legal Defense Fund, Marshall’s name still held weight.

In support of the Port Chicago 50, Marshall said, “This is not 50 men on trial for mutiny. This is the Navy on trial for its whole vicious policy toward Negroes. Negroes in the Navy don’t mind loading ammunition. They just want to know why they are the only ones doing the loading.”

In the end, the 50 men were imprisoned, with sentences ranging from eight to 15 years at Terminal Island Disciplinary Barracks in San Pedro. The higher ranking officers, all of them white, walked away scot-free. On Capitol Hill, the Navy requested compensation for each of the victim’s families in the amount of $5,000; after protests from the staunchly racist Mississippi Congressman John Rankin, that figure was reduced to $3,000.

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y January 1946, the war was over and the Port Chicago 50 were released from prison. That same year, the Navy ended all formal segregation. Two years later, on July 26, 1948, President Harry Truman formally desegregated the military and established the President’s Committee on Equality of Treatment and Opportunity in the Armed Services.

In 1999, President Bill Clinton officially pardoned Port Chicago 50 member Freddie Meeks. But a number of other men refused to accept the pardon, as it would inherently acknowledge some form of guilt.

“My goal is to the see the men exonerated this year,” says Yulie Padmore. Working with the likes of Friends of Port Chicago National Memorial President Rev. Diana McDaniel, Padmore is also actively ensuring that the story of the Port Chicago disaster and the Port Chicago 50 is accessible to all.

In 1994, the Port Chicago Naval Magazine National Memorial was dedicated to those who died in the explosion. Fifteen years later, President Barack Obama signed a bill establishing that same site as a unit of the National Park Service. The problem is that the public doesn’t readily have access to that land, as it’s on an active naval base.

But there’s a new park in the works: Thurgood Marshall Regional Park — Home of the Port Chicago 50. “We’re going to have a visitors center here in the Bay Area,” says Padmore of the forthcoming space in the Los Medanos Hills, a 2,500-acre site between the cities of Concord and Pittsburg. And although the center is 40 years out, just the name of the site is a significant step. “It’s the first regional park named after people who’ve been formerly incarcerated,” says Padmore, noting that the community pushed to add “Home of the Port Chicago 50” to the title.

“It’s much greater than we can imagine at this point,” Padmore tells me. “Folks from California, we go to Washington, D.C., and we learn about our history … but where do we have a significant history of this magnitude for African Americans in the state of California?”

Although the center’s opening is well into the future, and the story of the disaster at Port Chicago happened 80 years in the past, this piece of history is more relevant now than ever.

From workers rights to diversity, equity and inclusion in the workplace, this month’s 80th anniversary event holds weight. For academics and activists, there’s the opportunity to learn about people like Dr. Robert L. Allen, who wrote the book The Port Chicago Mutiny. There’s even something for those discussing reparations and land repatriation.

And, in addition to education, as Padmore reminds us, there’s room for entertainment — all while honoring the legacy of the Port Chicago 50.

Port Chicago Weekend takes place Thursday–Sunday, July 18–21, at various locations in Port Chicago, Vallejo, Pittsburg, Oakland, San Francisco and San Bruno. More details on the weekend’s events here.