An African American man commutes to work on Boston’s public transport, his employer identified by the Boston Navy Yard button pinned to his chest. Surrounded by white women, he looks uneasy, staring out at the viewer with a vulnerable gaze that belies his powerful frame.

In 1941 the defense industry banned racially discriminatory hiring practices, mainly due to wartime labor shortages rather than civil rights concerns. John Woodrow Wilson recalled, “I resented the fact that almost everyone on my block was on welfare until they needed us in the shipyards and factories.”