W.C. Ritchie & Company, Chicago, Illinois. Fiber powder containers for World War I Ammunition.

Women working in ordnance plants in World War I: making fiber powder containers for 3" Stokes gun ammunition. Women crimping top on fibre containers at W.C. Ritchie & Co., Chicago, Illinois.

This manufacturer of paper boxes, founded by the Canadian-born William C. Ritchie, began to operate in Chicago in 1866 as Ritchie & Duck. Its name became W. C. Ritchie & Co. in 1881. By 1910, the company employed 1,100 workers at two Chicago box plants; it also owned a factory in nearby Aurora. Women working in the WWI effort, circa 1915. 

In 1955, W. C. Ritchie was purchased by the Stone Container Corp., another Chicago-based paper box manufacturer. 

Compiled by Neil Gale, Ph.D.