The site of a World War II
explosion that killed 320 people and started the desegregation of the
military is now part of the national park system. President Barack
Obama on Wednesday signed a bill by Rep. George Miller, giving the Park
Service control of the Port Chicago Naval Magazine Memorial and making
it eligible for federal funding.
On July 17, 1944, an explosion
destroyed two munitions ships and crippled Port Chicago in Suisun Bay,
the main Pacific port during the war. More than 200 of the dead sailors
were black.
White sailors got a month off after the blast. The
black seamen were ordered back to work and, when they defied orders,
were imprisoned. Public outrage led to desegregation of the Navy in
1945.
By 1948, President Truman issued an order desegregating all the Armed Forces.
