Abstract:

American Car and Foundry Company is a manufacturer of railroad rolling stock and railcar parts, founded in 1899. In 1901, the company began leasing the facilities of a railroad rolling stock and shipbuilding manufacturer the Jackson and Sharp Company. From the end of World War One to 1938, the plant built small pleasure boats. These photographs document different activities at the American Car and Foundry Company Jackson and Sharp Plant shipyard in Wilmington, Delaware, during World War II. There are several photos taken on the occasion of the presentation of the Army-Navy "E" award in 1942.

Scope and Contents: These images often include both photographs of the shipyards and the multitude of ships they produced. The regions are: Baltimore-area (includes Baltimore Dry Dock Co.), Fairfield and Sparrows Point, Maryland, yards which are noteworthy for their extensive holdings of Liberty and Victory ship negatives; Boston-area (includes photographs from repair yards, The Atlantic Works Inc. and Simpson Patent Dry Docks, which Bethlehem superseded), World War One shipyards at Fore River, Quincy, and Squantum, Massachusetts and a World War Two shipyard at Hingham, Massachusetts; California shipyards include San Francisco (the Union Iron Works period and, many years later, a ventilation caisson built for BART (Bay Area Rapid Transit), Alameda (originally a Union Iron Works yard), and Terminal Island at San Pedro where Liberty ships and destroyers were built; New York-area yards include Brooklyn 27th St. (originally built by Theodore Crane & Sons and James Shewan & Sons) and 56th St. (originally built by Morse Iron Works), Hoboken, New Jersey (originally W. & A. Fletcher Co.), and Staten Island; Beaumont, Tex., yard which was once Pennsylvania Shipbuilding; Wilmington, Delaware, where the former Harlan and Hollingsworth site changed to Bethlehem ownership in 1904.Several separate components also should be noted. These consist of photographs of American yachts, non-military, and military ships. Some of these images include nineteenth century vessels. Note that examples from the following shipyards are included: Atlantic Works (Boston), J. Abrahams (Baltimore), Beany Son & Archbold (Chester, Pennsylvania), Brown & Bell (New York), Columbian Iron Works (Baltimore), William Cramp & Sons Ship and Engine Building Co. (Philadelphia), A. & W. Denmoad & Sons (Baltimore), James B. Edes (St. Louis), John W. Griffith (Kittery, Me.), Harlan & Hollingsworth Corp. (Wilmington, Delaware), Herreshoff Mfg. Co. (Bristol, Connecticut), Howard & Ellis (White Hall, N.C.), Iowa Iron Works (Dubuque), Newport News Ship Building (Virginia), N.F. Palmer & Co. (Chester, Pennsylvania), Peak & Kirby (Cleveland, Ohio), Penine, Secor & Co. (Jersey City, New Jersey), Samuel Pook (Fairhaven, Connecticut), John Roach & Son (Chester, Pennsylvania), Union Iron Works Co. (San Francisco). Nineteenth century items include a drawing of a 50 HP Nagel & Weingaertner steam engine and a hand drawn illustration of a revenue cutter (circa...

Abstract:

The Bethlehem Steel Corporation was the number two steel producer in the United States between 1916 and 1984. For a time it was also the largest shipbuilding firm in the world. The records of the Bethlehem Steel Corporation (parent company) are a series of fragments, lacking the complete runs of corporate and executive documents that normally comprise a business archive, and largely consist of fragmentary corporate records and files from executive officers.

Abstract:

Frederick William Wood (1857-1943) was an executive and engineer in the steel and shipbuilding industries. His papers constitute a major source on the history of the American steel industry in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. The papers are primarily official records of the various companies with which Wood was associated.

Abstract:

Frederick William Wood (1857-1943) was an executive and engineer in the steel and shipbuilding industries. The Frederick W. Wood photographs document the career of Frederick W. Wood in the steel and shipbuilding industries, most notably his time working for Pennsylvania Steel Company at Steelton, Pennsylvania, Maryland Steel Company and Bethlehem Steel Company at Sparrows Point, Maryland, and the American International Shipbuilding Corporation at Hog Island Shipyard, located in Pennsylvania on the Delaware River. Researchers interested in the steel and iron industries, the shipbuilding industry, company towns, and the regional history of the greater Philadelphia and Baltimore areas would find this collection useful.

Abstract:

Howard Potts (1900-1978) was a supervisor for the American Car and Foundry shipyard. In the oral history done by Hagley Museum curatorial staff with Potts, he comments on a series of photographs taken at the yard during the time he worked there and describes the process involved in wooden shipbuilding and sailmaking.

Abstract:

John Elgar was a Quaker master mechanic employed in the York, Pa., foundry of Phineas Davis, Israel Gartner and James Webb. The letter is an order for sheet iron used to build the hull of the steamboat Codorus.

Abstract:

John Farrell Metten (1873-1968) was a marine engineer and shipbuilding industry executive. This collection contains photographic prints, postcards, documents, drawings, and an identification card pertaining to the career of John Farrell Metten and views of Naval ships built at the New York Shipbuilding Company, Camden, New Jersey.

Abstract:

Lukenweld, Inc. was the first U.S. commercial shop to cut and fabricate shapes from steel plate by arc welding. The records are files of Robert C. Sahlin (1896-1967), a member of Lukenweld's sales staff. Sahlin's files record his dealings with Lukenweld's customers and his other activities as a salesman. Most Lukenweld orders were custom work, fabricating individual machine parts, so there was frequent interplay between sales and engineering staff.

Abstract:

Maryland Steel Company was a steel-works and shipyard operated from 1891 until 1916, when Bethlehem Steel acquired the Pennsylvania Steel Company and its subsidiary, Maryland Steel. This collection consists of 3 albums containing 204 cyanotype photographs taken at the Maryland Steel Company's steel plant and shipyard between 1890 and 1894. The photographs show steel buildings, steel workers, shipyard buildings, ship construction, tugs and steamships.

Abstract:

The Joseph Bancroft & Sons Company operated cotton textile mills in Wilmington, Delaware, where they manufactured, bleached, dyed, and finished a variety of cotton-made goods. The Pusey & Jones Corporation were shipbuilders, founders, and machinists of Wilmington, Delaware, which later expanded into papermaking machinery manufacturing. This collection consists of eleven small notebooks from the two companies regarding their work.

Abstract:

The Pusey & Jones Corporation were shipbuilders, founders, and machinists of Wilmington, Delaware, which later expanded into papermaking machinery manufacturing. This collection includes the files of John Biggs III (1927-), attorney, who oversaw the bankruptcy proceedings and dissolvement of the company.

Abstract:

The Pusey & Jones Corporation were shipbuilders, founders, and machinists of Wilmington, Delaware, which later expanded into papermaking machinery manufacturing. The collection is a plat of the property around Pusey and Jones Company plant in Wilmington, Delaware.

Abstract:

This collection reflects material from a small amount of manufacturers operating in the Philadelphia and Trenton, New Jersey, largely in the early-to-mid 19th century. The records primarily include correspondence, bills, receipts, and accounts. There are also various legal papers and testimonies concerning suits involving land and water rights in Burlington County, New Jersey, with descriptions of miscellaneous dams, saw, grist, woolen, and fulling mills.

Abstract:

The Philadelphia Naval Shipyard occupied two different locations. The second site at League Island was the larger of the two sites and saw the greatest amount of shipbuilding activity. The Dravo Wellman Company was a pioneer manufacturer of steel plant equipment with an international reputation for engineering some of the largest material-handling projects ever built. Photographs show tests of a revolving crane ship (perhaps manufactured by Wellman-Seaver-Morgan Company) in the Philadelphia Navy Yard.