8/25/2023 0 Comments World war two navy pacific tattooWith Navy clients, however, he made an exception: “There’s not much you can do when the place is full of sailors.”īut it’s been years since the shop saw that kind of crowd. Walters says he usually refuses to tattoo drunk customers because they won’t sit still and they’ve been known to cause a mess. Even when some grew impatient, wandered to the nearest pub and returned inebriated, the shop wouldn’t turn them away. Many young sailors had little else to spend their money on.ĭuring the shop’s heyday, servicemen would wait for up to three hours for Grimm’s artistry. Looking back across the years, manager Rick Walters says the shop’s busiest days came with the regularity of military paychecks. In another, a young sailor faces away from the camera, displaying an elaborate image scrawled across his entire back: a sailing vessel floating above the words Homeward Bound, flanked by two huge flying fish. In one graying picture, a smiling sailor shows off his full-chest tattoo, a submarine propeller in front of a waving American flag. One sheet among the dozens offers traditional Navy tattoos, with prints of winding ropes and a sinking ship above the words “Sailor’s Grave.”įramed black-and-white photographs of sailors with fresh tattoos, many drawn by Grimm himself in the 1950s, hang in corners and along the ceiling, advertising the shop’s most visibly patriotic clients. Customers wishing to become walking artwork for about $30 to $125 can choose from hundreds of images: an ark’s worth of animals plus cartoon characters (including Popeye the sailor, who himself bears a large anchor tattoo on his bulging forearm) and sundry symbols of love and hate. Grimm’s walls are lined with sheets of tattoo designs ranging from plain (roses) to elaborate (sailing scenes). Says Dave Gibson, an artist in the studio during the early 1980s: “I think it’s the coolest tattoo shop in existence.” The tattoo artists and sailors who listened to the needle’s buzz say the shop’s own lore, like its excruciating artwork, will last forever. Its artists count on repeat business and guard their reputations as craftsmen above all else.Ī job at Grimm’s used to be considered the finest hands-on training an artist could get. “Nowadays, I think more people outside the service have tattoos than people in the service.” “It used to be a tradition, part of being in the Navy,” said Robert Audiss, 30, a Navy SEAL instructor in San Diego who got his first tattoo at Grimm’s in 1983, two years after he joined up. In the Pentagon, image-conscious Navy officials also frown on the designs. But even in those Navy strongholds, today’s young seamen, with their better technical training and high school educations, seem less likely to want tattoos. In towns such as San Diego and Norfolk, Va.-homes to two of the world’s largest naval bases-tattoo shops still ink crowds of sailors. With the departure of the Navy, the traditional tie between tattoos and sailors in Long Beach has withered. With painstaking care, they etched symbols of love or belief in God and country onto countless sailors waiting to go to battle. This post by National WWII Museum Curator Meg Roussel.From Grimm’s downtown storefront, artists have watched since 1927 as the Navy made its mark on Long Beach, home port to hundreds of ships during World War II, and the Korean and Vietnam wars. Five-pointed nautical stars were meant to prevent getting lost at sea. Christian crosses were placed on the bottom of feet to ward off sharks, and the words “Hold Fast” across the knuckles as a reminder to hold tight to the ropes. Some men would have pigs, roosters, or other aquaphobic animals tattooed on their bodies with the idea that if thrown overboard, the water-fearing animal would seek out dry land quickly and thereby lead the sailor to safety. Turtles or images of King Neptune were earned once a seaman had crossed the Equator. Swallows-tattoos of which were earned by logging 5,000 miles at sea-are known for returning safely to their homes and were therefore seen as good luck to seafarers. To wear such tattoos without having earned them would be a grave mistake for a new sailor among old salts. A golden dragon, for example, could be worn once a sailor had crossed the International Date Line, while an anchor represented having crossed the Atlantic Ocean. Many typically nautical tattoos had to be earned, worn as a badge of merit and accomplishment. Serving as souvenirs of travels abroad, some motifs were more common than others, such as ropes, stars, or mermaids. After “discovering” the tattoos and tribal markings of the native people of Polynesia and other Pacific islands, the naval tradition was born. The association of sailors with tattoos presumably originated with the British Royal Navy in the 18 th century as it sailed throughout the South Pacific. The ink on sailors’ bodies is as telling as the pages of a scrapbook. Adding to the collection aboard the USS New Jersey(BB-62), December 1944.
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