Formerly | Bethlehem Steel Corporation |
---|---|
Company type | Corporation |
Industry | Shipbuilding |
Founded | 1905Quincy, Massachusetts, U.S. | in
Defunct | 1997 |
Headquarters | Quincy, Massachusetts, U.S. , U.S. |
Area served | United States |
Products | Ships |
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. [1] [2] In 1917 it was incorporated as Bethlehem Shipbuilding Corporation, Limited.
The division's headquarters were moved to Quincy, Massachusetts, after acquiring the Fore River Shipyard in 1913.
In 1940, Bethlehem Shipbuilding was the largest of the "Big Three" U.S. shipbuilders that could build any ship, [3] followed by Newport News Shipbuilding & Drydock and New York Shipbuilding Corporation (New York Ship). Bethlehem expanded shortly before and during World War II as a result of the Long Range Shipbuilding Program and later the Emergency Shipbuilding program orchestrated by the United States Maritime Commission and the Two Ocean Navy program and its war-time successors by the military establishment.
In 1964, the now-corporate headquarters moved to Sparrows Point, Maryland, southeast of Baltimore, whose shipyard had been acquired in 1916.
The Quincy / Fore River yard was sold to General Dynamics Corporation in the mid-1960s, and closed in 1986. The Alameda Works Shipyard in California was closed by Bethlehem Steel in the early 1970s, while the San Francisco facility (former Union Iron Works) was sold to British Aerospace in the mid-1990s and survives today as BAE Systems San Francisco Ship Repair.
Bethlehem Steel ceased shipbuilding activities in 1997 in an attempt to preserve its core steelmaking operations.
Shipyards owned or operated by Bethlehem:
Vigor Shipyards is the current entity operating the former Todd Shipyards after its acquisition in 2011. Todd Shipyards was founded in 1916, which owned and operated shipyards on the West Coast of the United States, East Coast of the United States and the Gulf. Todd Shipyards were a major part of the Emergency Shipbuilding Program for World War II.
Crescent Shipyard, located on Newark Bay in Elizabeth, New Jersey, built a number of ships for the United States Navy and allied nations as well during their production run, which lasted about ten years while under the Crescent name and banner. Production of these ships began before the Spanish–American War and occurred far before the outbreak of World War I. Arthur Leopold Busch, a recent emigre from Great Britain, started the yard with former Navy Lt. Lewis Nixon in January 1895. Both men previously worked for William Cramp & Sons in Philadelphia. Both Nixon and Busch were regarded to be amongst the best in their respected fields - and what they did at this time - as designers and builders of the latest, most advanced types of ships.
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.
Maryland Steel, in Sparrows Point, Maryland, US, was founded in 1887. It was acquired by Bethlehem Shipbuilding Corporation in 1916 and renamed as the Bethlehem Sparrows Point Shipyard. The shipyard was sold in 1997 to Baltimore Marine Industries Inc. In 2012, it was owned by Barletta Industries, which had converted it to the Sparrows Point Shipyard and Industrial Complex. As of 2021, it is owned by Sparrows Point Terminal, LLC and has been renamed Tradepoint Atlantic.
Type C1 was a designation for cargo ships built for the United States Maritime Commission before and during World War II. Total production was 493 ships built from 1940 to 1945. The first C1 types were the smallest of the three original Maritime Commission designs, meant for shorter routes where high speed and capacity were less important. Only a handful were delivered prior to Pearl Harbor. But many C1-A and C1-B ships were already in the works and were delivered during 1942. Many were converted to military purposes including troop transports during the war.
The Alameda Works Shipyard, in Alameda, California, United States, was one of the largest and best equipped shipyards in the country. The only building remaining from the yard is the Union Iron Works Powerhouse, which is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.1956.
The Emergency Shipbuilding Program was a United States government effort to quickly build simple cargo ships to carry troops and materiel to allies and foreign theatres during World War II. Run by the U.S. Maritime Commission, the program built almost 6,000 ships.
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 Bethlehem-Fairfield Shipyard of Baltimore, Maryland, was a shipyard in the United States from 1941 until 1945. Located on the south shore of the Middle Branch of the Patapsco River which serves as the Baltimore Harbor, it was owned by the Bethlehem Shipbuilding Company, created by the Bethlehem Steel Corporation of Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, which had operated a major waterfront steel mill outside Baltimore to the southeast at Sparrows Point, Maryland in Baltimore County since the 1880s.
The Type C4-class ship were the largest cargo ships built by the United States Maritime Commission (MARCOM) during World War II. The design was originally developed for the American-Hawaiian Lines in 1941, but in late 1941 the plans were taken over by the MARCOM.
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.
The United States Shipbuilding Company was a short-lived trust made up of seven shipbuilding companies, a property owner and steel company. Its stocks and bonds were unattractive to investors, and several of its member shipyards were overvalued, conditions which brought down the company less than a year after it was formed in 1902. The company was replaced by the Bethlehem Steel Corporation in 1904.
The Industrial Union of Marine and Shipbuilding Workers of America (IUMSWA) was an American labor union which existed between 1933 and 1988. The IUMSWA was first organised at the New York Shipbuilding Corporation shipyard in Camden, New Jersey after striking in 1934 and 1935. From here it slowly spread to a number of other private shipyards in the Northeast, gaining representation at the Staten Island shipyard in 1936, the Federal Shipyard in 1937, Brooklyn and Hoboken in 1939, Baltimore and Sparrows Point in 1941, as well as a range of other smaller ship repair yards in the New York area. The IUMSWA's industrial coverage of all production workers in the shipbuilding industry brought it into conflict with established craft unions, such as the boilermakers, leading the IUMSWA to be refused an AFL charter in 1933. The IUMSWA later joined the Congress of Industrial Organizations in 1936.
Ore Steamship Company and the Ore Navigation Corpoartion were subsidiaries of the Bethlehem Steel Company founded in New York City in 1927. Ore Steamship Company was a proprietary company that was founded so Bethlehem Steel could move goods needed by Bethlehem Steel Company. Ore Steamship Company would transport iron ore to the Bethlehem Steel mills on the Atlantic coast. Some ships took steel and steel products to Bethlehem Shipyards. Port of Baltimore was a major Bethlehem Steel port, the dock was 2,200 feet long in order to load and unload three large, 28,000-ton cargo ships at the same time.
Bethlehem Key Highway Shipyard started as William Skinner & Sons in downtown Baltimore, Maryland in 1815. In 1899 the shipyard was renamed Skinner Shipbuilding & Dry Dock Company. Also at the site was Malster & Reanie started in 1870 by William T. Malster (1843–1907). In 1879 Malster partnered with William B. Reaney (1808-1883). In 1880 Malster & Reanie was sold and renamed Columbian Iron Works & Dry Dock Company. Malster & Reanie and Skinner Shipbuilding & Dry Dock Company merged in 1906, but remained as Skinner Shipbuilding. In 1914 the company was renamed Baltimore Dry Dock & Shipbuilding Company. Baltimore Dry Dock & Shipbuilding Company sold to Bethlehem Steel in 1922, becoming part of Bethlehem Shipbuilding Corporation. Bethlehem Steel operated the shipyard for ship repair, conversion and some ship construction. Bethlehem's main ship construction site was across the harbor at Bethlehem Sparrows Point. Bethlehem Key Highway Shipyard was known as the Bethlehem Upper Yard located north-east side of Federal Hill. Bethlehem Fort McHenry Shipyard located on the west side of Locust Point peninsula was known as the Lower Yard, near Fort McHenry.
Hoboken Shipyard or Hoboken Yard or Beth Steel Hoboken was a Bethlehem Shipbuilding Corporation shipyard that operated from 1938 to 1982 in Hoboken, New Jersey. Bethlehem Steel purchased the shipyard in 1938.
Bethlehem Beaumont Shipyard was a shipyard in Beaumont, Texas that opened in 1948. The yard is located on an island in the Neches River and upstream of the Sabine Pass that grants access to the Gulf of Mexico. The deep-water port shipyard was founded in 1917 as the Beaumont Shipbuilding & Dry Dock Company. Beaumont Shipbuilding & Dry Dock Company started as a World War I Emergency Shipbuilding Program yard.
Bethlehem Staten Island also called Bethlehem Mariners Harbor was a large shipyard in Mariners Harbor, Staten Island, New York. The shipyard started building ships for World War II in January 1941 under the Emergency Shipbuilding Program and as the result of the Two-Ocean Navy Act of July 1940. The shipyard was part of the Bethlehem Shipbuilding Corporation which built ships for the United States Navy, and the United States Maritime Commission. Bethlehem Steel purchased the shipyard in June 1938 from United Shipyards. Bethlehem Shipbuilding Corporation closed the shipyard in 1959. The propeller factory and foundry continued operation for 10 more years at the site. Since 1980 the site is the May Ship Repair Contracting Corporation next to Shooters Island at the southern end of Newark Bay, off the North Shore.