Tampa Shipbuilding Company, or TASCO, was one of a number of shipyards in Tampa, Florida. It operated from 1917 to after World War II, closing in 1947. The site is now Gulf Marine Repair which operates with floating dry docks. [1] [2]
Originally Tampa Shipbuilding & Engineering Company, founded in 1917, the yard built ships under the United States Maritime Commission's pre-war long-range shipbuilding program. It was also called the Tampa Shipbuilding & Dry Dock Company. It would use the facilities of the Tampa Foundry & Machine Co. Tampa Foundry that ceased to exist in 1916. The Tampa Foundry was established in 1892 and was later incorporated in 1905. [3]
The company borrowed $750,000 in 1938 from the Public Works Administration to help pay for the construction of a 10,000-ton dry dock that was being built. After the dry dock was constructed, in 1939, they were awarded a contract worth $8 million to build four cargo ships. The growth in the shipyard resulted in about 2,000 new jobs being created and helped to combat unemployment in the city. The company ended up only producing one of the ships in the contract, MS Sea Witch as the company announced it was in bad financial shape. [4]
As a result of the company going into a bad financial state, the Maritime Commission and Reconstruction Finance Corporation (that had assumed the PWA loan) tried to find new owners for the company, replacing Ernest Kreher. George B. Howell, who worked for the Exchange National Bank, was encouraged by this to buy the company for $500. Howell was charged by the US Accounting Office with illegally selling ships and overcharging the US Navy, but was never prosecuted. [4] The shipyard was renamed to Tampa Shipbuilding Company (TASCO) after it was sold. [3]
During the war, TASCO was one of four other shipyards in Tampa. The other three being: Bushnell-Lyons; Tampa Marine; and Hooker's Point Yard, started by Matthew H. McCloskey, Junior. [5] TASCO was the largest company that existed. [6] A company newspaper published during World War II was titled the Tascozette. [7]
African American workers who worked in shipyards were usually excluded from joining local unions as it was common during that time period to not accept them. Those in the shipyard who were African American usually worked as cooks, assistants, janitors and learners which were some of the only job positions they could take. The jobs available to African American workers were not unionized in general. The accomplishments of African American workers were rarely if never highlighted in the company newspapers of the shipyards in Tampa. 17% of workers at the shipyard were female making it twice the rate it was at the national level. [7]
Apart from doing work at the shipyard during World War II, recreational activities were also provided for workers there. A bowling, softball and basketball league was created at the shipyard. Eventually a swim club and fencing club would be established along with volleyball, tennis and badminton would also being introduced. A radio program would be created by the management of the shipyard. An RCA recording would be broadcast from the Morale Department located in the yard originally being an hour long program at noon. The radio program would be expanded in October 1944 and would also include songs requested by employees. [8]
Immediately before and during the United States entry into the Second World War the company built US Navy auxiliaries. Tampa Shipbuilding built: Admirable-class minesweepers and Type C2 cargo ships, like USS Lassen, USS Mauna Loa and MS Sea Witch, which gained some note in a last attempt to deliver U.S. Army planes to Java, though the twenty-seven crated P-40s had to be destroyed after delivered to prevent them from falling into Japanese hands. [9] During the war TASCO also built Cannon-class destroyer escorts like USS Cates, USS Sutton and USS Slater. At its peak, it was the largest employer in Tampa, employing 16,000 people. Tampa Shipbuilding closed after the war in 1947, and few traces remain of its facilities. [3]
Newport News Shipbuilding (NNS), a division of Huntington Ingalls Industries, is the sole designer, builder, and refueler of aircraft carriers and one of two providers of submarines for the United States Navy. Founded as the Chesapeake Dry Dock and Construction Co. in 1886, Newport News Shipbuilding has built more than 800 ships, including both naval and commercial ships. Located in the city of Newport News, Virginia, its facilities span more than 550 acres (2.2 km2).
The Mare Island Naval Shipyard was the first United States Navy base established on the Pacific Ocean and was in service 142 years from 1854 to 1996. It is located on Mare Island, 23 miles (37 km) northeast of San Francisco, in Vallejo, California. MINSY made a name for itself as the premier U.S. West Coast submarine port as well as serving as the controlling force in San Francisco Bay Area shipbuilding efforts during World War II.
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.
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.
The Admirable class was one of the largest and most successful classes of minesweepers ordered by the United States Navy during World War II. Typically, minesweepers detected and removed naval mines before the rest of the fleet arrived, thereby ensuring safe passage for the larger ships. They were also charged with anti-submarine warfare (ASW) duties with rear-mounted depth charge racks and a forward-firing Hedgehog antisubmarine mortar. Their job was essential to the safety and success of U.S. naval operations during World War II and the Korean War. These minesweepers were also employed as patrol vessel and convoy escorts. The only remaining ship of this class is located at Freedom Park, Omaha, NE.
Avondale Shipyard was an independent shipbuilding company, acquired by Litton Industries, in turn acquired by Northrop Grumman Corporation. In 2011, along with the former Ingalls Shipbuilding, the yard was part of Huntington Ingalls Industries. It closed in October 2014. The yard was located on the west bank of the Mississippi River in an area called Bridge City, about 20 miles (32 km) upriver from New Orleans near Westwego, Louisiana. It was the site of the modernization of the battleship USS Iowa in the early 1980s and also constructed some of the lighter aboard ships (LASH). At one time, it was the largest employer in Louisiana, with about 26,000 employees.
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 Cockatoo Island Dockyard was a major dockyard in Sydney, Australia, based on Cockatoo Island. The dockyard was established in 1857 to maintain Royal Navy warships. It later built and repaired military and battle ships, and played a key role in sustaining the Royal Australian Navy. The dockyard was closed in 1991, and its remnants are heritage listed as the Cockatoo Island Industrial Conservation Area.
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.
Type C3-class ships were the third type of cargo ship designed by the United States Maritime Commission (MARCOM) in the late 1930s. As it had done with the Type C1 ships and Type C2 ships, MARCOM circulated preliminary plans for comment. The design presented was not specific to any service or trade route, but was a general purpose ship that could be modified for specific uses. A total of 162 C3 ships were built from 1939 to 1946.
The Auk class were a class of minesweepers serving with the United States Navy and the Royal Navy during World War II. In total, there were 93 Auks built.
Willamette Iron Works was a general foundry and machine business established in 1865 in Portland, Oregon, originally specializing in the manufacture of steamboat boilers and engines. In 1904, the company changed its name to Willamette Iron and Steel Works, under which name it operated continually until its close in 1990.
SS Mauna Loa was a steam-powered cargo ship of the Matson Navigation Company that was sunk in the bombing of Darwin in February 1942. She was christened SS West Conob in 1919 and renamed SS Golden Eagle in 1928. At the time of her completion in 1919, the ship was inspected by the United States Navy for possible use as USS West Conob (ID-4033) but was neither taken into the Navy nor commissioned.
SS Comet may also refer to one of several commercial passenger steamships:
General Engineering & Dry Dock Company was a shipbuilding and ship repair company in Alameda, California that was active from the 1920s through the 1940s. The company built ships for the Southern Pacific Railroad and the United States Coast Guard in the late 1920s and early 1930s and took part in the World War II shipbuilding boom, making diesel-propelled steel hulled auxiliaries for the United States Navy, primarily oceangoing minesweepers.
The American Ship Building Company was the dominant shipbuilder on the Great Lakes before the Second World War. It started as Cleveland Shipbuilding in Cleveland, Ohio in 1888 and opened the yard in Lorain, Ohio in 1898. It changed its name to the American Ship Building Company in 1900, when it acquired Superior Shipbuilding, in Superior, Wisconsin; Toledo Shipbuilding, in Toledo, Ohio; and West Bay Shipbuilding, in West Bay City, Michigan. With the coming of World War I, the company also acquired Buffalo Dry Dock, in Buffalo, New York; Chicago Shipbuilding, in Chicago, Illinois; and Detroit Shipbuilding, in Wyandotte, Michigan. American Shipbuilding ranked 81st among United States corporations in the value of World War II military production contracts.
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Bay Shipbuilding Company (BSC) is a shipyard and dry dock company in Sturgeon Bay, Door County, Wisconsin. As of 2015, Bay Ships was a subsidiary of Fincantieri Marine Group and produces articulated tug and barges, OPA-90 compliant double hull tank ships and offshore support vessels. It also provides repair services to the lake freighter fleet. In the past the shipyard located in Sturgeon Bay has operated under several different names and traces its history back to 1918.
USS Deucalion (AR-15) was the third ship of the Amphion-class of repair ship built for the United States Navy by Tampa Shipbuilding Company during World War II. Named after Deucalion the mythological king of Thessaly, her keel was laid down on December 15, 1944, but her construction was canceled on August 12, 1945, shortly after the Atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
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.