Union Iron Works

thumb|right|Union Iron Works at [[Pier 70, San Francisco|Pier 70, 1918]]

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.

History

thumb|left|Company logo, 1906

Peter Donohue, an Irish immigrant, founded Union Brass & Iron Works in the south of Market area of San Francisco in 1849. It was later run by his son, James Donohue. After years as the premiere producer of mining, railroad, agricultural and locomotive machinery in California, Union Iron Works, led by I. M. Scott, entered the ship building business and relocated to Potrero Point where its shipyards still exist, making the site on the north side of the Potrero the longest running privately owned shipyard in the United States. After Bethlehem Shipbuilding Corporation bought the works in 1905, the consolidated company came to include the Alameda Works Shipyard, located across the San Francisco Bay in Alameda and the Hunter's Point shipyard to the south.

thumb|right| at a [[dry dock in Bremerton, Washington, 1896]]

In 1885, the Union Iron Works launched the first steel-hulled ship on the west coast, , built with steel from the Pacific Rolling Mills. In 1886, UIW was awarded a $1,000,000 contract to build the cruiser for the United States Navy, which they completed in eighteen months. From the completion of Arago in 1884 to 1902, UIW built seventy-five marine vessels, including two of the most famous vessels of the Spanish–American War, and .

An 1892 description of the yards stated that between 1200 and 1500 men were employed and the yearly gross revenue was between $2,000,000 and $4,000,000. By the turn of the century, the shipyard had expanded in area and employment had more than doubled to 3,500. These industrial facilities used five types of power, distributed throughout; electricity, compressed air, steam, hydraulic and coal or gas fire.

Union Iron works built a number of ships for the United States Navy. These ships include USS Oregon laid down in 1891, and s and which were launched in 1902 and 1903, respectively. The latter two were subcontracted from the Holland Torpedo Boat Company, and were the first submarines built on the West Coast.

thumb|left|upright=1.2|Congressional candidate [[William J. Wynn addresses a meeting of Union Iron Works employees, October 7, 1904]]

In 1902, the Union Iron Works was absorbed into a combine called the United States Shipbuilding Company and was mired in three years of litigation. In 1905, the entire shipyard was purchased by Bethlehem Shipbuilding Corporation for one million dollars. Charles M. Schwab stood on the steps of the UIW office building on 20th Street during the auction. At this point, he was the only bidder. Schwab was widely believed to have engineered the demise of the U.S. Shipbuilding Corporation in order to gain control of the industry. Whether or not that was true, he certainly benefited from the collapse of the US Shipbuilding combine.

World War II slipways

thumb|right|December 1943, ways 1–4 in top left corner

thumb|right|February 1945, the Navy annex is to the left of the large storage tanks

{| class="wikitable"

! style="text-align: center;" | Slipway

! Width !! Length !! Angle !! Date

! style="text-align: center;" | 1

! style="text-align: center;" | 2

|1890s-1941

|1941

3 tankers for Union Oil of California
Olinda, La Brea, Los Angeles
6 tankers for Pan American Petroleum and Transport Company (1917–1920)
George G. Henry, Wilhelm Jebsen, S. M. Spalding, Paul H. Harwood, William H. Doheny, Franklin K. Lane
6 of 27 R-class submarines
first keel laid: R-16, 26 April 1917, last: R-19, 23 June 1917
first launch: R-15, 10 December 1917, last: R-19, 28 January 1918
...
12 of 51 S-class submarines
...
26 of 111 s for the United States Navy between 1917 and 1919
first keel laid: Ringold, 20 October 1917, last: Stansbury, 9 December 1918
first launch: McKee, 23 March 1918, last: Stansbury, 16 May 1919
8 are launched on 4 July 1918
...
...
...
40 of 156 s for the United States Navy between 1918 and 1921
...
3 ferries for Six Minute Ferry Co. auto ferry. Short-lived ferry company funded by "Sunny Jim" James Rolph
San Mateo, Shasta, Yosemite
3 ferries for the Richmond–San Francisco Transportation Company in 1924
El Paso, New Orleans, Klamath
3 of 6 ferries for the Southern Pacific Railroad in 1927
Fresno, Stockton, Mendocino
2 of 4 s
, for the United States Navy in 1937 and 1938
5 of 95 C1-B
contract date: 18 Sep 1939
Alcoa Puritan, laid down 15 Jan 1941,
following the Two-Ocean Navy Act
4 of 8 s; for the United States Navy between 1941 and 1945
, , ,
36 of 415 destroyers
9 of 30 s for the United States Navy in 1941 and 1942
,
...
18 of 175 s for the United States Navy in 1942 and 1943
...
,
6 of 58 s for the United States Navy in 1944 and 1945
...
3 of 98 s
...
in addition: , cancelled, launched incomplete
12 of 563 destroyer escorts and APDs
12 of 148 s for the United States Navy in 1943 and 1944
...

Ships reconstructed by the Union Iron Works include:

- Refitted unsuccessfully due to heavy damage caused by the 1906 San Francisco earthquake. Refit and repairs completed elsewhere.

References

Bethlehem Steel Company Shipbuilding Division. A century of progress, 1849–1949: San Francisco Yard. San Francisco, 1949

Mains'l Haul - Journal of Pacific Maritime History - Fall 1998

External links

Images of America: Black Diamond Mines Regional Preserve (Google Books "preview" version; contains some locomotive photographs)
Museum of San Francisco
Current photos and history
A guide to the Irving Murray Scott Jr. business papers and plans, 1881-1943
Finding Aid to the Bethlehem Steel Corporation. Shipbuilding Division Photographs, circa 1900-1945
A guide to the John T. Scott photograph collection, 1856-1923
A guide to the John T. Scott photograph collection, 1900-1916
A guide to the John Thomas Scott business papers and plans, 1888-1921

History

World War II slipways

See also

References

External links