Wyneemee

With plenty of pride the Navy formally announced last week that it had been operating for months from a mammoth new base in California about 80 miles north of Los Angeles. The once sleepy little town of Hueneme (pronounced Wyneemee) now harbors the major advanced depot for Pacific operations.

It has capacity for loading eight Liberty ships at one time. It sends across the Pacific more war material than the ports of Los Angeles and San Francisco combined. Its five square miles house the largest Seabee station on the Pacific Coast, an antiaircraft school, an amphibious operations training area where Marines and soldiers learn about chemical warfare, camouflage, laying airfields, shooting mortars. Its personnel numbers some 40,000.

Since the Navy summarily moved in two years ago, farmers of surrounding Ventura County have cast peevish and curious glances at this furious bustle of activity. They financed and built the original port themselves as an outlet for their lima beans and lemons after a Federal grant had been rescinded on the grounds that no port was needed.

Last week their curiosity was satisfied but their peeves were still evident. The busy Navy had rudely awakened them from a long cherished dream, but it has not yet gotten around to paying in full the purchase price of $2,200,000.

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