One of the lesser- known
chapters in Los Angeles history during world war II, was the
extensive use of camouflage on the buildings, lots, and grounds
of major defense plants, necessary to disguise these huge production facilities from the
air. Beneath LA.com was fortunate enough to find these photos in the California State
University Northridge Digital Archive, depicting the Lockheed Burbank plant during the
war.
Southern California has long been a Mecca for aerospace
research and manufacture. The warm weather combined with a large workforce has
understandably been an attraction to makers of war machines. After President Franklin
Delano Roosevelt (FDR) announced "Lend-Lease" in 1940, he wanted to
increase production of military aircraft from 2,800, the total output of 1939, to 50,000
planes within 12 months. Despite the fact that America was still trying to recover from
the depression, suffering a seventeen percent unemployment rate, and not yet involved in
the war in Europe, FDR was able to convince American
industry to act. Hughes, Macdonald Douglas, Northrop, and
Lockheed were among the larger factories that began employing tens of thousands of
workers, who produced much of the aircraft that not only won WW II, but also
revolutionized air travel, as we know it today.
At the
onset of the Second World War, these companies were faced with a dilemma, how to fulfill
the governments contracts for thousands of planes, and yet remain somewhat secret to the
enemy and the world at large. The biggest task was disguising these huge plants, so that
enemy reconnaissance flights and bombers could not easily target them. It turns out that
bombing these plants was beyond the reach of the Axis, but during the war it was perceived
as a very real threat. 
As you may notice from the accompanying photographs, to make
this truly convincing from the air, it was necessary to paint the tarmac as an extension
of the imaginary town, and to cover the parking lots as well. Where the Lockheed air
terminal once sat, they created the illusion of a hill with a large residence on top. I
have included some pictures with the camouflage and some without, for comparison reasons,
as well as a high altitude photo of the airport to illustrate the daunting task these
disguise artists faced. That said, it is important to remember that Burbank airport is
mere blocks from the movie lots of Warner Brothers, Universal, and Disney, so finding the
skilled people to accomplish this task (in cooperation with the defense dept) was probably
not that difficult. Is that a "Hidden
Mickey" on the roof of Lockheed building #5?
