Women's Reserve Camouflage Corps

In 1917, British artist Norman Wilkinson submitted a proposal to the Royal Navy to paint optical illusions of geometric shapes, known as dazzle camouflage, to disguise ships.

[1] Thousands of women in France were employed as camoufleurs painting guns for the British army by 1917,[2] while others worked with the American forces, making nets to hide artillery and garlands to string through trees and uniforms.

For the nets and garlands, brown and green burlap, dyed to match the foliage, was sewn by the women into wire and fishnet tenting to drape over or in front of machinery.

[5] In November and December, 1917, newspapers began advertising for women artists with experience as sculptors, or scene and landscape painting, to join a training program organized in Marshfield Hills, Massachusetts.

[11][12] Other known camoufleurs include Eleanor Arnett, Dorthea Fischer, Katherine Munoz and Elizabeth Pilsbury, all of Philadelphia;[8][13] Clara Lathrop Strong of Massachusetts;[14] and Clara Armstrong, Edith Barry, Marguerite Becht, Diana Cauffman, Constance Cochrane, Edith Cohen, Evelyn Curtis, Frances Forbush, Sarah Furman, Patricia Gay, Myra Hanford, Helen Harrison, Helen F. Hobart, Helen Kalkman, Louise Larned, Ellen Macmillan, H. Rosalie Manning, Marie H. Moran, Dorothy Murphy, Rose Stokes, Eloise P. Valiant, Gertrude Welling and Bertha Wilson, all whom worked in New York City.