Union Iron Works - History

History

The Donahue Brothers Peter and James, Irish immigrants, founded Union Iron Works in the south of Market area of San Francisco in 1849. 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.

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

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 the USS Oregon laid down in 1891, and Adder-class submarines Grampus and Pike which were launched in 1902 and 1903, respectively.

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 40-acre (160,000 m2) shipyard was purchased by Bethlehem Shipbuilding Corporation for one million dollars. Charles M. Schwab stood on the steps of the UIW office building on twentieth 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. In 1908, Bethlehem Shipbuilding Corporation bought the Hunters Point, San Francisco, California drydocks. In the pre-World War I era, Union Iron Works built several navy ships that became internationally famous due to the Spanish-American war; Commodore Dewey's flagship the Olympia. After 1905, the shipyard operated as part of Bethlehem Steel, and produced both warships and merchant ships.