Industry | Shipbuilding |
---|---|
Founded | December 1941 in Hewitts Cove, Weymouth Back River, Hingham, Massachusetts |
Defunct | 1945 |
Number of employees | 23,000 |
Parent | Bethlehem Shipbuilding Corporation |
Footnotes /references 42°15′5.37″N70°55′3.55″W / 42.2514917°N 70.9176528°W |
The Bethlehem Hingham Shipyard of Hingham, Massachusetts, was a shipyard in the United States from 1941 until 1945. Located on Weymouth Back River, it was owned by the Bethlehem Shipbuilding Company and operated by the nearby Fore River Shipyard. During the three and a half years that the yard was operational, it produced 277 ships, [1] including a destroyer escort delivered in 23 days. [2]
Shortly before the entry of the United States into World War II, the United States Navy began designs on destroyer escorts and commissioned Bethlehem Steel to be the major contractor. Because Bethlehem's shipyards were operating at full capacity, there was need to build a new shipyard. A location for a shipyard was chosen in Hingham, Massachusetts, at the site of the former Bayside Airport. [3] Within weeks of the attack on Pearl Harbor, a survey team arrived in Hingham and crews worked around the clock to clear 150 acres of land. After the land was cleared, a steel mill stretching a third of a mile was erected, and wooden cradles that would hold each ship were built. [1] Sixteen ways were also constructed at the yard, which was managed by the nearby Fore River Shipyard. [4]
Facing a lack of skilled labor, 400 shipbuilders were brought in to train a workforce that totaled 15,000 within a year. Included in this number were 2,500 women due to a lack of available men. [1]
A simplified process was created to streamline how ships were constructed at the time. Steel would be first cut into patterns, numbered, and then welded together separate of the ship, building the ship from the ground up by this process. This enabled a construction rate of around six ships a month. As a result, the Navy ordered sixty ships to be delivered in 1943, a quota which was matched and exceeded when the yard produced ninety ships that year, for which it was awarded the Army-Navy "E" Award. [1] The nearby Fore River Shipyard had earned the same honor the previous year. [2]
Around this time, orders in the yard shifted from destroyer escorts to Landing Ship Tank craft, which were first delivered in 1944. The last ship delivered at the shipyard was LST 1080, which was delivered on 29 May 1945. [4]
In 2017, the warehouse building (designated as Building #19) that had previously been headquarters of Building 19 (a discount retail outlet, which operated from the 1970s into the 2000s, which, at its peak, had about 20 stores throughout New England), was razed after becoming badly damaged due to years of neglect. [5] Some of the timbers in the building were salvaged by a Massachusetts reclaimed lumber company and recycled into new products. [6] [7]
The Boston Navy Yard, originally called the Charlestown Navy Yard and later Boston Naval Shipyard, was one of the oldest shipbuilding facilities in the United States Navy. It was established in 1801 as part of the recent establishment of the new U.S. Department of the Navy in 1798. After 175 years of military service, it was decommissioned as a naval installation on 1 July 1974.
The Gearing class was a series of 98 destroyers built for the U.S. Navy during and shortly after World War II. The Gearing design was a minor modification of the Allen M. Sumner class, whereby the hull was lengthened by 14 ft (4.3 m) at amidships, which resulted in more fuel storage space and increased the operating range.
Union Iron Works, located in San Francisco, California, on the southeast waterfront, was a central business within the large industrial zone of Potrero Point, for four decades at the end of the nineteenth and beginning of the twentieth centuries.
USS Kimberly (DD-80) was a Wickes-class destroyer built for the United States Navy during World War I.
USS Bell (DD-95) was a Wickes-class destroyer built for the United States Navy during World War I.
Bethlehem Steel Corporation Shipbuilding Division was created in 1905 when the Bethlehem Steel Corporation of Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, acquired the San Francisco-based shipyard Union Iron Works. In 1917 it was incorporated as Bethlehem Shipbuilding Corporation, Limited.
Fore River Shipyard was a shipyard owned by General Dynamics Corporation located on Weymouth Fore River in Braintree and Quincy, Massachusetts. It began operations in 1883 in Braintree, and moved to its final location on Quincy Point in 1901. In 1913, it was purchased by Bethlehem Steel, and later transferred to Bethlehem Shipbuilding Corporation. It was sold to General Dynamics in 1963, and closed in 1986. During its operation, yardworkers constructed hundreds of ships, for both military and civilian clients.
The Federal Shipbuilding and Drydock Company was a United States shipyard in New Jersey active from 1917 to 1948. It was founded during World War I to build ships for the United States Shipping Board. Unlike many shipyards, it remained active during the shipbuilding slump of the 1920s and early 1930s that followed the World War I boom years. During World War II, it built merchant ships as part of the U.S. Government's Emergency Shipbuilding program, at the same time producing more destroyers for the United States Navy than any yard other than the Bath Iron Works. Operated by a subsidiary of the United States Steel Corporation, the shipyard was located at Kearny Point where the mouth of the Hackensack River meets Newark Bay in the Port of New York and New Jersey.
USS Mizar (AF-12) was the United Fruit Company fruit, mail and passenger liner Quirigua that served as a United States Navy Mizar-class stores ship in World War II.
The Seattle-Tacoma Shipbuilding Corporation was an American corporation which built escort carriers, destroyers, cargo ships and auxiliaries for the United States Navy and merchant marine during World War II in two yards in Puget Sound, Washington. It was the largest producer of destroyers (45) on the West Coast and the largest producer of escort carriers of various classes (56) of any United States yard active during World War II.
USS William M. Wood (DE-287) was a proposed United States Navy Rudderow-class destroyer escort that was never built.
USS Williams (DE-290) was a proposed United States Navy Rudderow-class destroyer escort that was never built.
Liberty Fleet Day was first observed on 27 September 1941, the day that 14 merchant ships were launched in shipyards across the United States under the Emergency Shipbuilding program. Among the ships launched was the first Liberty ship, SS Patrick Henry. Some of the merchant ships were subsequently converted to other purposes, including as troop transports and a Royal Navy aircraft carrier. In addition to the merchant ships launched, the US Navy launched two destroyers at the Boston Navy Yard.
Hingham Bay is the easternmost of the three small bays of outer Boston Harbor, part of Massachusetts Bay and forming the western shoreline of the town of Hull and the northern shoreline of Hingham in the United States state of Massachusetts. It lies east of Quincy Bay and is met at the southwest by the mouth of Weymouth Fore River, also forming part of the waterfront of Weymouth. The bay is home to several of the Boston Harbor Islands.
HMS Stockham (K562) was a British Captain-class frigate of the Royal Navy in commission during World War II. Originally constructed as a United States Navy Buckley class destroyer escort, she served in the Royal Navy from 1943 to 1946.
HMS Thornborough (K574), sometimes spelled Thornbrough, was a British Captain-class frigate of the Royal Navy in commission during World War II. Originally constructed as a United States Navy Buckley class destroyer escort, the ship served in the Royal Navy from 1943 to 1945.
Bethlehem Atlantic Works of East Boston, Massachusetts, was a shipyard in the United States from 1853 until 1984. It was owned by the Bethlehem Shipbuilding Company. It is located directly to the west of the East Boston Immigration Station. The company's offices were in the Atlantic Works Warehouse, built in 1893.
Bayside Airport was an airfield operational from at least 1938 to 1941. The airfield was located alongside Hingham Bay in Hingham, Massachusetts. Following the Attack on Pearl Harbor, the land was appropriated into the Bethlehem Hingham Shipyard, which produced destroyer escorts in tandem with Fore River Shipyard until 1945.
USS LST-1062 was an LST-542-class tank landing ship in the United States Navy. Like many of her class, she was not named and is properly referred to by her hull designation.
Bethlehem Shipbuilding San Pedro was a major shipbuilding company on Terminal Island in San Pedro, California owned by Bethlehem Shipbuilding Corporation. To support the World War 2 demand for ships Bethlehem Shipbuilding San Pedro built: US Navy Destroyers and after the war tugboats. The yard became involved in World War II production in the early shipbuilding expansions initiated by the Two-Ocean Navy Act of July 1940. At its peak during the war about 6,000 worked at the yard, Bethlehem Shipbuilding San Pedro shipyard was opened in 1918 as Southwestern Shipbuilding by Western Pipe & Steel. Western Pipe & Steel sold the shipyard to Bethlehem Shipbuilding Corporation in 1925. Shipbuilding ended after World War 2 in 1946. In 1983 the shipyard was sold to Southwest Marine. In 1997 Southwest Marine operated four shipyards, which they sold to The Carlyle Group. Carlyle Group renamed the shipyard US Marine Repair. In 2002 US Marine Repair sold all six of its yards to United Defense Industries. In 2005 it was sold to BAE Systems but the yard was not used and the yard is now part of the Port of Los Angeles. The shipyard was located at 1047 South Seaside Ave, San Pedro.