Western Pipe and Steel Company
Encyclopedia
The Western Pipe and Steel Company (abbreviated WPS) was an American manufacturing company that is best remembered today for its construction of ships
for the Maritime Commission in World War II. It also built ships for the U.S. Shipping Board in World War I and took part in the construction of the giant Grand Coulee Dam
project in the 1930s.
around 1907 by two brothers named Talbot and possibly a partner named T. A. Hays. Hays, a businessman with 21 years experience in the steel industry, was at some stage appointed Vice President of the new company, which in this period was a small-calibre steel pipe and metal casings manufacturer. An early President of the company was James A. Talbot
, later to make and lose a fortune as the head of the Richfield Oil Company.
Western Pipe & Steel quickly began to expand its operations. In 1910 it established a factory in Taft, California
for the supply of pipes and containers to the oil industry. Another factory was opened in Fresno
in 1913. In 1915 a third new factory was established in Phoenix, Arizona
to serve the agricultural and oil industries in that state.
The company made its first move into San Francisco in 1910 with the purchase of a local riveted pipe manufacturer, the Francis Smith Company, whose own origins dated back to 1854. Shortly thereafter, WPS purchased land in the Richmond District
of San Francisco, and moved the Francis Smith plant to the new location.
In 1917 Western Pipe & Steel bought out another local San Francisco company, the Schaw Batcher Pipe Works. Schaw Batcher had frontage on San Francisco Bay and had just received a contract from the U.S. Shipping Board for the building of 22 merchant ships in accordance with the Board's strategic goal of developing a naval auxiliary and merchant marine fleet. With the purchase of Schaw Batcher, Western Pipe & Steel inherited these contracts, thus gaining its first foothold into the shipbuilding industry.
The Shipping Board's contract with WPS called for the building of eighteen vessels of about 5,650 tons each and four larger vessels of 8,800 gross tons. The larger vessels were eventually cancelled in 1918 but all eighteen of the smaller ships were completed, though few were built in time to see service in the war. All of the vessels were of riveted construction, in accordance with the available technology of the period. They had a length of 410 feet (125 m), a beam of 54 feet (16.5 m), a draft of 24 in 2 in (7.37 m), and a displacement of about 8000 tons. They ran on oil fuel and had a speed of 11 knots (21.6 km/h) and a crew of 39 to 45.
Because of the shortage of water frontage, the company dredged a large rectangular launching basin, and four shipping ways - two per side - were built, which launched ships sideways into the basin. The side launching method was not ideal for ships of this size and some of the vessels suffered hull damage on launch which then had to be repaired. The company was however, to persevere with side launching for the whole of its existence, and eventually these technical problems would be overcome. The channel and the four shipping ways were completed in only three months, and the keel of the company's very first ship, Isanti, was laid on 30 November 1917.
The first eight of the ships were fitted with General Electric
steam turbines with a horsepower of 2500, but the plant proved unreliable and was subject to frequent breakdowns. Some of these vessels were lost at sea after foundering due to breakdown, and the rest were scrapped by 1930.
The remaining 10 vessels were fitted with triple expansion engines built by Joshua Hendy, a local San Franciscan company. The 2800 hp Joshua Hendy plant proved much more reliable, and many of the vessels powered by this engine went on to have long careers (one of them in fact, the West Camargo, was to enjoy a remarkable service life of almost 60 years, finally being scrapped only in the late 1970s). Ironically, while all of these vessels were originally built with World War I service in mind, none were lost in that conflict, but of the nine which survived to see service in World War II, more than half were sunk by enemy action.
Source: Mawdsley, pp. 95-114.
s and pipes. During this period the company is reported to have built self-propelled fuel, gasoline and water barges, and both self-propelled and non-self-propelled covered lighters
. The exact number is not known, but the company's hull number sequence suggests that as many as 34 such vessels may have been completed in the interwar years.
In this period the company also began to extend its operations into other regions. The Fresno factory was expanded and in the 1930s new operations were set up in the San Francisco peninsula, and at Grand Coulee
and Seattle, Washington
.
Perhaps the biggest peacetime contract awarded to Western Pipe & Steel was for work on the Grand Coulee Dam project in the 1930s. Destined to become the biggest hydroelectric
plant in the United States, this giant project was eventually to employ the services of 21 companies. Western Pipe & Steel was awarded the contract to build the dam's penstock
and pump inlet pipes. These pipes were so large that they could not be transported to the site, and had to be manufactured onsite in a fabrication plant built expressly for the purpose.
The first eighteen penstock pipes were each 290 feet (88.4 m) long and 18 feet (5.5 m) in diameter, while the remaining three had the same length but a 6 feet (1.8 m) diameter. The twelve pump-inlet pipes were each 14 feet (4.3 m) in diameter. Fabrication of the pipes required more than nine miles (14 km) of heavy welds, and the experience gained was to help make Western Pipe & Steel a world leader in the field of automated welding technology by the outbreak of World War II - expertise that would be put to good use after commencement of the company's wartime shipbuilding program.
in the Hetch Hetchy Valley
to the Crystal Springs Reservoir
on the San Francisco Peninsula, and its subsequent extension from San Mateo to San Francisco. Today, the Dam supplies water to 2.4 million San Franciscans. The company also worked at this time on a pipeline for Everett, Washington
.
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In the late 1930s, the Roosevelt Administration
set up the Maritime Commission, tasked with developing a scheme for replacing America's ageing merchant fleet with more modern vessels suitable for use as naval auxiliaries in the event of war. The Commission introduced the Long Range Shipbuilding Program
in 1937 which set a goal of producing 500 new merchant ships over a ten year period.
When the Commission began to offer public contracts for its shipbuilding program, the Western Pipe & Steel Company found itself in an advantageous position. To begin with, the company's President, H. G. Tallerday, served on the National Labor Relations Board
and thus had contacts in the Roosevelt administration
. Moreover, the company's years of experience with heavy welding in the 1930s now put it in the enviable position of being one of only three companies on the west coast
with sufficient expertise to immediately begin building ships with all-welded hulls.
The company's first bid - for the production of five C1 type
cargo vessels - proved successful, and in October 1939 a $10 million contract was signed. Along with the contract came a government grant of $400,000 to help restore the company's old World War I California shipyard. Three months later, the first C1 keel - that of American Manufacturer - was laid on 5 February 1940.
After the initial 1939 order for the five C1's was completed, more Maritime Commission contracts followed, but the company was to build no more C1's. Instead, the San Francisco shipyard switched in 1940 to manufacture of the larger and faster C3 type
, which had been expressly designed by the Maritime Commission with naval auxiliary service in mind. The C3's were to comprise the bulk of the company's manufacturing output in tonnage terms, with a total of 43 C3 hulls being produced by the company. Many of these hulls were not completed as standard C3 cargo vessels however, but were converted onsite (or at other yards) into naval auxiliaries, particularly escort carriers, attack transport
s and troopships.
In 1941, the US Navy joined the Maritime Commission in contracting work from Western Pipe & Steel. A Navy grant of $7 million enabled the company to establish a second shipyard with three building ways (later expanded to five) in San Pedro Bay, California
. As at the San Francisco yard, these ways were all of the side-launching type.
The most notable ships built at the San Pedro yard were the seven Wind class
icebreaker
s, whose specifications were so imposing that Western Pipe & Steel was the only bidder. The yard also built a number of small warships including destroyer escort
s, LSM's and Coast Guard cutters
. In 1943, a number of the destroyer escorts were cancelled by the Navy in favor of the LSM's, which were a much-needed type at the time. The cutters by contrast were a low priority and most were only completed after the war.
By August 1945 the company was able to report that a total of 118 ships had been repaired, with repairs taking an average of ten days per ship. But with the surrender of Japan in the same month, this work too came to an end.
In addition to the vessels listed below, the company also produced eleven 500 cubic yards (382.3 m³) dump scow
s for the US Navy during the war. These vessels were produced at the San Francisco shipyard and were for use at Midway Island in the Pacific.
Sources for this section: Maudsley pp. 115-179, Colton Company website, Hyperwar website, see References below.
, the war ended abruptly and the amount of work available to shipyards across America rapidly declined. The glut of vessels produced by US shipyards during the war now led to a shakeup in the industry with many shipyards closing and others consolidating their operations.
The company
In late 1945, shortly after the war, the Western Pipe & Steel Company was sold for a sum in excess of $6.2 million to Consolidated Steel of California, which in turn sold the assets for $8.3 million to Columbia Steel, a division of US Steel, in 1948. Columbia Steel transferred the assets to a new division, Consolidated Western Steel, which was later merged into the parent company, U.S. Steel
.
The shipyards
Little information is available concerning the fate of the San Pedro shipyard, except that it no longer exists.
In the years following the end of the war, various proposals for the revamping of the San Francisco shipyard came and went. In 1949, the Navy Bureau of Ships proposed the building of sixteen attack cargo ships (AKA) at the shipyard, but by 1952 it was decided these vessels would not be required. Instead the Navy proposed the building of several Landing Ships Dock (LSD), but a February 1953 survey concluded that the cost of modernizing the yard would probably be excessive.
In the early 1970s, the yard briefly came to life again when Howard Hughes
' Summa Corporation
began the construction of the Glomar Explorer and the large submersible barge HMB-1
, as part of the top-secret Operation Jennifer whose purpose was the salvage of a Russian nuclear submarine
which had sunk in the mid-Pacific. Many of the details concerning this operation are still secret.
In 1983, the site was sold to a commercial developer. Little evidence now remains of the shipyard which once existed there.
West Aleta
The WPS vessel with the shortest service history was West Aleta (WPS Hull No. 8). One of the vessels built by the company for the US Shipping Board in World War I, West Aleta was the last such ship to be fitted with the unreliable General Electric turbine motor.
Delivered in August 1919, she made her maiden commercial voyage the same month and was subsequently drydocked for repairs. A second voyage resulted in more repairs, this time to a cracked turbine. The following January she commenced a new voyage, and on 13 February was reported stranded in breakers northwest of Terschelling Island
, Holland. She subsequently broke up and was reported a total loss on 19 June 1920, having provided a mere six months of active service.
West Camargo
The WPS ship with the longest service life was probably West Camargo (WPS Hull No. 16), another vessel built under the US Shipping Board's World War I contract. Fitted with the much more reliable Joshua Hendy triple expansion engine, she was launched in 1920 and enjoyed an active service life as a commercial cargo vessel between the wars.
In 1942, the vessel was acquired by the US government and transferred to the USSR under lend-lease
, where she was renamed Desna. After the war, Desna remained in service with the Soviet Union as a special cargo vessel for the transport of fish, a role she retained until 1978. In that year she was acquired by Japanese interests and subsequently sold for scrap, bringing to an end a remarkably long career of 58 years.
West Cadron
The worst peacetime disaster to befall a WPS ship occurred to West Cadron (WPS Hull No. 12). Launched in 1920, she was renamed the Iowa in 1928, and foundered and sank near Cape Disappointment
at the mouth of the Columbia River
(site of the notoriously treacherous Columbia Bar
) on 12 January 1936, with the loss of all 34 crew.
American Leader
Another ill-fated crew was that of American Leader (WPS Hull No. 58), who were collectively to endure no less than three ship sinkings during the Second World War.
One of the five Type C1 vessels built by Western Pipe & Steel for its initial Maritime Commission contract, American Leader was delivered in July 1941 but only made a handful of voyages before being sunk by the German
auxiliary cruiser Michel
off the Cape of Good Hope
in September 1942. Eleven crew members were killed in the engagement but the remaining 47 were rescued by Michel, who turned them over to the Japanese as prisoners of war.
In April 1944 eighteen survivors of American Leader were being transported on the Japanese hell ship
Tamahoko Maru when the vessel was torpedoed and sunk by the submarine . Only five of the eighteen former American Leader crewmen onboard survived the attack. In September of the same year, five of another party of nine former crewmates were killed aboard the Japanese hell ship Junyo Maru
when she was torpedoed and sunk by .
Other crewmembers died in Japanese captivity. Of the original 58-man crew of American Leader, only 28 returned home from the war.
West Kader
Another of the World War I-era WPS ships, West Kader (WPS Hull No. 11), found a niche in history as part of Britain's
disastrous Convoy PQ-17
in 1942.
PQ-17 set out from Iceland
for the Russian port of Arkhangelsk
in June 1942. When the convoy commander was informed the German battleship
was on course to intercept, he decided to split up the convoy with disastrous results. German U-Boat
s and aircraft were able to easily pick off the isolated merchant vessels, sinking 25 of the convoy's 36 ships and putting PQ-17 into the history books as the greatest Russia-bound convoy loss of the war.
One of the victims of the debacle was West Kader, then operating under the name of Pan Kraft
. Pan Kraft was disabled by bombing near-misses and forced to be abandoned, after which she exploded and sank. The PQ-17 disaster proved so costly that the British were subsequently compelled to totally revise their convoy strategy.
Warships
A number of warships built by Western Pipe & Steel distinguished themselves in wartime service. Perhaps the most notable of these was the escort carrier . One of the four escort carriers built by the company for service with the Royal Navy, Fencer was credited with the sinking of four German U-Boats during the course of the war - U-666 on 10 February 1944, U-277 on 1 May, and U-674 and U-959 on the same day, 2 May 1944. Fencer also participated in Operation Tungsten, the successful attack on the German battleship Tirpitz in April 1944.
Some of the other warships built by Western Pipe & Steel which accumulated distinguished service records were , a destroyer escort
which won eleven battle stars during World War II, , an attack transport
which received four battle stars in World War II, four in the Korean War and two in the Vietnam War, and which received six battle honours for service with the Royal Navy in World War II.
Steel Artisan
One WPS ship with a particularly interesting and varied history was Steel Artisan (WPS Hull No. 62). The first Type C3 ship to be built by the company, she was destined to undergo two major conversions and serve in three different roles during her service life.
Launched in September 1941 under Maritime Commission contract, Steel Artisan had almost been completed as a standard Type C3 cargo ship when word came through that she was to be converted into one of the newly designed Bogue class escort aircraft carriers. The conversion was subsequently carried out and Steel Artisan briefly became before being transferred under lend lease to the Royal Navy who dubbed her .
Attacker was to serve with distinction during the war, taking part in the invasion of Salerno
and subsequently of Southern France. In 1944 she was transferred to the Pacific where she was part of the fleet that witnessed the surrender of the Japanese in August 1945. Shortly thereafter, Attacker sailed into Singapore
to take the surrender of the Japanese garrison there.
After the war, Attacker was decommissioned and returned to the United States, where her flight deck was removed. Laid up for some years, she was eventually bought by Russian entrepreneur Alexander Vlasov whose company the Sitmar Line undertook another major conversion of the vessel, this time into an ocean liner
.
Renamed Fairsky
the ship was assigned to the migrant passenger route between Britain and Australia in 1958, a role she retained until the early 1970s when Sitmar lost the migrant contract. Subsequently, she was operated by Sitmar as a popular cruise ship
.
In 1977 the ship was damaged in a collision and sold to a Philippine
consortium, who planned yet another major conversion for the vessel, into a casino ship named Philippine Tourist. The plans were dashed when the ship was tragically gutted by fire in 1978, after which the vessel was sold for scrap in 1980.
Sea Wren
Another WPS ship to undergo an interesting conversion was Sea Wren (WPS Hull No. 129). After serving during the war as attack transport (during which time she sustained casualties and damage from a Japanese kamikaze
attack), the ship returned after the war to cargo service with the San Francisco-based Matson Navigation Company, operating under the name Hawaiian Citizen.
In 1959, Hawaiian Citizen underwent a major conversion into a container ship
, thus becoming the first all-containerized freighter operating on the West Coast of the United States
. She was sold for scrap in 1981.
USS Cascade
One WPS ship, the destroyer tender (WPS Hull No. 63), has a minor connection with American literature
and the Hollywood
film industry
. During the Second World War, Typhoon Cobra devastated an American fleet in the Pacific led by Admiral Halsey
, killing 793 men and sinking three of the fleet's destroyers. In the aftermath, an inquiry chaired by Halsey heard allegations that the captain of one of the destroyers that sank, , had been negligent in his command. The inquiry was held on board Cascade.
American novelist Herman Wouk
later used this inquiry as the inspiration for his Pulitzer
-prize winning fictional work The Caine Mutiny
. The book was later turned into an Oscar-nominated film
starring Humphrey Bogart
.
Shipbuilding
Shipbuilding is the construction of ships and floating vessels. It normally takes place in a specialized facility known as a shipyard. Shipbuilders, also called shipwrights, follow a specialized occupation that traces its roots to before recorded history.Shipbuilding and ship repairs, both...
for the Maritime Commission in World War II. It also built ships for the U.S. Shipping Board in World War I and took part in the construction of the giant Grand Coulee Dam
Grand Coulee Dam
Grand Coulee Dam is a gravity dam on the Columbia River in the U.S. state of Washington built to produce hydroelectric power and provide irrigation. It was constructed between 1933 and 1942, originally with two power plants. A third power station was completed in 1974 to increase its energy...
project in the 1930s.
Early history
The origins of the company are somewhat obscure. It appears it was organized in Los Angeles, CaliforniaLos Angeles, California
Los Angeles , with a population at the 2010 United States Census of 3,792,621, is the most populous city in California, USA and the second most populous in the United States, after New York City. It has an area of , and is located in Southern California...
around 1907 by two brothers named Talbot and possibly a partner named T. A. Hays. Hays, a businessman with 21 years experience in the steel industry, was at some stage appointed Vice President of the new company, which in this period was a small-calibre steel pipe and metal casings manufacturer. An early President of the company was James A. Talbot
James A. Talbot
James A. Talbot was an American businessman who became President of the Western Pipe and Steel Company of San Francisco, California in the 1910s, and who later became head of the Richfield Oil Company based in the same city...
, later to make and lose a fortune as the head of the Richfield Oil Company.
Western Pipe & Steel quickly began to expand its operations. In 1910 it established a factory in Taft, California
Taft, California
Taft is a city in the foothills at the extreme southwestern edge of the San Joaquin Valley, in Kern County, California. Taft is located west-southwest of Bakersfield, at an elevation of 955 feet . The population was 9,327 at the 2010 census...
for the supply of pipes and containers to the oil industry. Another factory was opened in Fresno
Fresno
Fresno is the fifth largest city in California.Fresno may also refer to:-Places:Colombia* Fresno, TolimaSpain* Fresno, a ghost village in Nidáliga, Valle de Sedano, Burgos* Aldea del Fresno, Madrid* Fresno de la Vega, Ribera del Esla, León...
in 1913. In 1915 a third new factory was established in Phoenix, Arizona
Phoenix, Arizona
Phoenix is the capital, and largest city, of the U.S. state of Arizona, as well as the sixth most populated city in the United States. Phoenix is home to 1,445,632 people according to the official 2010 U.S. Census Bureau data...
to serve the agricultural and oil industries in that state.
The company made its first move into San Francisco in 1910 with the purchase of a local riveted pipe manufacturer, the Francis Smith Company, whose own origins dated back to 1854. Shortly thereafter, WPS purchased land in the Richmond District
Richmond District, San Francisco, California
The Richmond District is a neighborhood in the northwest corner of San Francisco, California.-Location:Lying directly north of Golden Gate Park, "the Richmond" is bounded roughly by Fulton Street to the south, Arguello Boulevard and Laurel Heights to the east, The Presidio National Park and Lincoln...
of San Francisco, and moved the Francis Smith plant to the new location.
World War I
The Shipping Board's contract with WPS called for the building of eighteen vessels of about 5,650 tons each and four larger vessels of 8,800 gross tons. The larger vessels were eventually cancelled in 1918 but all eighteen of the smaller ships were completed, though few were built in time to see service in the war. All of the vessels were of riveted construction, in accordance with the available technology of the period. They had a length of 410 feet (125 m), a beam of 54 feet (16.5 m), a draft of 24 in 2 in (7.37 m), and a displacement of about 8000 tons. They ran on oil fuel and had a speed of 11 knots (21.6 km/h) and a crew of 39 to 45.
Because of the shortage of water frontage, the company dredged a large rectangular launching basin, and four shipping ways - two per side - were built, which launched ships sideways into the basin. The side launching method was not ideal for ships of this size and some of the vessels suffered hull damage on launch which then had to be repaired. The company was however, to persevere with side launching for the whole of its existence, and eventually these technical problems would be overcome. The channel and the four shipping ways were completed in only three months, and the keel of the company's very first ship, Isanti, was laid on 30 November 1917.
The first eight of the ships were fitted with General Electric
General Electric
General Electric Company , or GE, is an American multinational conglomerate corporation incorporated in Schenectady, New York and headquartered in Fairfield, Connecticut, United States...
steam turbines with a horsepower of 2500, but the plant proved unreliable and was subject to frequent breakdowns. Some of these vessels were lost at sea after foundering due to breakdown, and the rest were scrapped by 1930.
The remaining 10 vessels were fitted with triple expansion engines built by Joshua Hendy, a local San Franciscan company. The 2800 hp Joshua Hendy plant proved much more reliable, and many of the vessels powered by this engine went on to have long careers (one of them in fact, the West Camargo, was to enjoy a remarkable service life of almost 60 years, finally being scrapped only in the late 1970s). Ironically, while all of these vessels were originally built with World War I service in mind, none were lost in that conflict, but of the nine which survived to see service in World War II, more than half were sunk by enemy action.
Total production 1918-1920
| Ship type | No. Built | Delivery date | Displacement (tons) | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| First | Last | Light | Full | Total | ||
| Cargo ship | 18 | 10/18 | 10/20 | 5,650 | 8,000~ | 101,700 |
Source: Mawdsley, pp. 95-114.
Between the wars
While many of America's First World War emergency shipyards shut down at the end of the war, Western Pipe & Steel continued to grow its business in the postwar era. The company closed its Richmond operation in 1921 and moved the plant located there to the San Francisco shipyard, which now began building bargeBarge
A barge is a flat-bottomed boat, built mainly for river and canal transport of heavy goods. Some barges are not self-propelled and need to be towed by tugboats or pushed by towboats...
s and pipes. During this period the company is reported to have built self-propelled fuel, gasoline and water barges, and both self-propelled and non-self-propelled covered lighters
Lighter (barge)
A lighter is a type of flat-bottomed barge used to transfer goods and passengers to and from moored ships. Lighters were traditionally unpowered and were moved and steered using long oars called "sweeps," with their motive power provided by water currents...
. The exact number is not known, but the company's hull number sequence suggests that as many as 34 such vessels may have been completed in the interwar years.
In this period the company also began to extend its operations into other regions. The Fresno factory was expanded and in the 1930s new operations were set up in the San Francisco peninsula, and at Grand Coulee
Grand Coulee
The Grand Coulee is an ancient river bed in the U.S. state of Washington. This National Natural Landmark stretches for about sixty miles southwest from Grand Coulee Dam to Soap Lake, being bisected by Dry Falls into the Upper and Lower Grand Coulee....
and Seattle, Washington
Seattle, Washington
Seattle is the county seat of King County, Washington. With 608,660 residents as of the 2010 Census, Seattle is the largest city in the Northwestern United States. The Seattle metropolitan area of about 3.4 million inhabitants is the 15th largest metropolitan area in the country...
.
Grand Coulee Dam
Hydroelectricity
Hydroelectricity is the term referring to electricity generated by hydropower; the production of electrical power through the use of the gravitational force of falling or flowing water. It is the most widely used form of renewable energy...
plant in the United States, this giant project was eventually to employ the services of 21 companies. Western Pipe & Steel was awarded the contract to build the dam's penstock
Penstock
A penstock is a sluice or gate or intake structure that controls water flow, or an enclosed pipe that delivers water to hydraulic turbines and sewerage systems. It is a term that has been inherited from the technology of wooden watermills....
and pump inlet pipes. These pipes were so large that they could not be transported to the site, and had to be manufactured onsite in a fabrication plant built expressly for the purpose.
The first eighteen penstock pipes were each 290 feet (88.4 m) long and 18 feet (5.5 m) in diameter, while the remaining three had the same length but a 6 feet (1.8 m) diameter. The twelve pump-inlet pipes were each 14 feet (4.3 m) in diameter. Fabrication of the pipes required more than nine miles (14 km) of heavy welds, and the experience gained was to help make Western Pipe & Steel a world leader in the field of automated welding technology by the outbreak of World War II - expertise that would be put to good use after commencement of the company's wartime shipbuilding program.
Hetch Hetchy pipeline
Another major project undertaken by Western Pipe & Steel in the interwar years was for construction of the large calibre water transport pipes between the O'Shaughnessy DamO'Shaughnessy Dam
The O'Shaughnessy Dam is a curved gravity dam on the Tuolumne River in the Hetch Hetchy Valley of California's Sierra Nevada. The dam is located in Yosemite National Park, and creates the Hetch Hetchy Reservoir. It is named for former San Francisco chief engineer and the original chief engineer of...
in the Hetch Hetchy Valley
Hetch Hetchy Valley
Hetch Hetchy Valley is a glacial valley in Yosemite National Park in California. It is currently completely flooded by O'Shaughnessy Dam, forming the Hetch Hetchy Reservoir. The Tuolumne River fills the reservoir. Upstream from the valley lies the Grand Canyon of the Tuolumne. The reservoir...
to the Crystal Springs Reservoir
Crystal Springs Reservoir
Crystal Springs Reservoir is a pair of artificial lakes located in the northern Santa Cruz Mountains of San Mateo County, California situated in the rift valley created by the San Andreas Fault just to the west of the cities of San Mateo and Hillsborough, and I-280...
on the San Francisco Peninsula, and its subsequent extension from San Mateo to San Francisco. Today, the Dam supplies water to 2.4 million San Franciscans. The company also worked at this time on a pipeline for Everett, Washington
Everett, Washington
Everett is the county seat of and the largest city in Snohomish County, Washington, United States. Named for Everett Colby, son of founder Charles L. Colby, it lies north of Seattle. The city had a total population of 103,019 at the 2010 census, making it the 6th largest in the state and...
.
World War II
Roosevelt Administration
There have been two Presidents of the United States with the surname "Roosevelt":*Theodore Roosevelt Administration, the 26th President of the United States, 1901 - 1909*Franklin D. Roosevelt Administration, the 32nd President of the United States, 1933 - 1945...
set up the Maritime Commission, tasked with developing a scheme for replacing America's ageing merchant fleet with more modern vessels suitable for use as naval auxiliaries in the event of war. The Commission introduced the Long Range Shipbuilding Program
Long Range Shipbuilding Program
The Long Range Shipbuilding program was implemented by the U.S. Maritime Commission shortly after its establishment in 1937 as part of the mandate of the Merchant Marine Act of 1936 which stated that:United States shall have a merchant marine...
in 1937 which set a goal of producing 500 new merchant ships over a ten year period.
When the Commission began to offer public contracts for its shipbuilding program, the Western Pipe & Steel Company found itself in an advantageous position. To begin with, the company's President, H. G. Tallerday, served on the National Labor Relations Board
National Labor Relations Board
The National Labor Relations Board is an independent agency of the United States government charged with conducting elections for labor union representation and with investigating and remedying unfair labor practices. Unfair labor practices may involve union-related situations or instances of...
and thus had contacts in the Roosevelt administration
Roosevelt Administration
There have been two Presidents of the United States with the surname "Roosevelt":*Theodore Roosevelt Administration, the 26th President of the United States, 1901 - 1909*Franklin D. Roosevelt Administration, the 32nd President of the United States, 1933 - 1945...
. Moreover, the company's years of experience with heavy welding in the 1930s now put it in the enviable position of being one of only three companies on the west coast
West Coast of the United States
West Coast or Pacific Coast are terms for the westernmost coastal states of the United States. The term most often refers to the states of California, Oregon, and Washington. Although not part of the contiguous United States, Alaska and Hawaii do border the Pacific Ocean but can't be included in...
with sufficient expertise to immediately begin building ships with all-welded hulls.
The company's first bid - for the production of five C1 type
Type C1 ship
Type C1 was a designation for small cargo ships built for the U.S. Maritime Commission before and during World War II. 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...
cargo vessels - proved successful, and in October 1939 a $10 million contract was signed. Along with the contract came a government grant of $400,000 to help restore the company's old World War I California shipyard. Three months later, the first C1 keel - that of American Manufacturer - was laid on 5 February 1940.
After the initial 1939 order for the five C1's was completed, more Maritime Commission contracts followed, but the company was to build no more C1's. Instead, the San Francisco shipyard switched in 1940 to manufacture of the larger and faster C3 type
Type C3 ship
Type C3 ships were the third type of cargo ship designed by the United States Maritime Commission in the late 1930s. As it had done with the Type C1 ships and Type C2 ships, MARCOM circulated preliminary plans for comment...
, which had been expressly designed by the Maritime Commission with naval auxiliary service in mind. The C3's were to comprise the bulk of the company's manufacturing output in tonnage terms, with a total of 43 C3 hulls being produced by the company. Many of these hulls were not completed as standard C3 cargo vessels however, but were converted onsite (or at other yards) into naval auxiliaries, particularly escort carriers, attack transport
Attack transport
Attack Transport is a United States Navy ship classification.-History:In the early 1940s, as the United States Navy expanded in response to the threat of involvement in World War II, a number of civilian passenger ships and some freighters were acquired, converted to transports and given hull...
s and troopships.
San Pedro Bay (California)
San Pedro Bay is an inlet on the Pacific Ocean coast of southern California, United States. It is the site of the Port of Los Angeles and the Port of Long Beach, which together form the fifth-busiest port facility in the world and easily the busiest in the Western Hemisphere...
. As at the San Francisco yard, these ways were all of the side-launching type.
The most notable ships built at the San Pedro yard were the seven Wind class
Wind class icebreaker
The Wind-class icebreakers were a line of diesel electric-powered icebreakers in service with the United States Navy, United States Coast Guard, Royal Canadian Navy, Canadian Coast Guard and Soviet Navy from 1944 through the late 1970s...
icebreaker
Icebreaker
An icebreaker is a special-purpose ship or boat designed to move and navigate through ice-covered waters. Although the term usually refers to ice-breaking ships, it may also refer to smaller vessels .For a ship to be considered an icebreaker, it requires three traits most...
s, whose specifications were so imposing that Western Pipe & Steel was the only bidder. The yard also built a number of small warships including destroyer escort
Destroyer escort
A destroyer escort is the classification for a smaller, lightly armed warship designed to be used to escort convoys of merchant marine ships, primarily of the United States Merchant Marine in World War II. It is employed primarily for anti-submarine warfare, but also provides some protection...
s, LSM's and Coast Guard cutters
Owasco class cutter
The Owasco Class Cutter was a cutter class operated by the United States Coast Guard. A total of thirteen cutters in the class were built, all named after lakes. Eleven were constructed by the Western Pipe & Steel Company at San Pedro, California, while the remaining two—Mendota and...
. In 1943, a number of the destroyer escorts were cancelled by the Navy in favor of the LSM's, which were a much-needed type at the time. The cutters by contrast were a low priority and most were only completed after the war.
Repair work
As the war progressed and the Allies began to achieve dominance, the need for new ships diminished and shipbuilding contracts began to wane. However, existing ships were suffering damage in combat and needed repair. Some required only minor repairs while others were badly damaged and needed extensive work. Western Pipe & Steel received its first contract for ship repair work in October 1944.By August 1945 the company was able to report that a total of 118 ships had been repaired, with repairs taking an average of ten days per ship. But with the surrender of Japan in the same month, this work too came to an end.
Total production 1941-1947
All shipbuilding contracts were signed during the war. A handful of ships that were still in the process of production upon the cessation of hostilities were completed in the immediate postwar period. This latter category included two icebreakers, five Type C3 cargo ships and eight high performance cutters.In addition to the vessels listed below, the company also produced eleven 500 cubic yards (382.3 m³) dump scow
Scow
A scow, in the original sense, is a flat-bottomed boat with a blunt bow, often used to haul bulk freight; cf. barge. The etymology of the word is from the Dutch schouwe, meaning such a boat.-Sailing scows:...
s for the US Navy during the war. These vessels were produced at the San Francisco shipyard and were for use at Midway Island in the Pacific.
| Ship type | No. Built | Delivery date | Displacement (tons) | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| First | Last | Light | Full | Total | ||
| Type C1 cargo ship Type C1 ship Type C1 was a designation for small cargo ships built for the U.S. Maritime Commission before and during World War II. 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... |
5 | 4/41 | 10/41 | 5,775 | 9,100 | 28,875 |
| 4 | 9/42 | 5/43 | 7,800 | 14,400 | 31,200 | |
| Destroyer tender Destroyer tender A destroyer tender is a ship designed to provide maintenance support to a flotilla of destroyers or other small warships. The use of this class has faded from its peak in the first half of the 20th century as the roles of small combatants have evolved .Due to the increased size and automation of... (Cascade USS Cascade (AD-16) USS Cascade , the only ship of its class, was a destroyer tender in the United States Navy.Originally designed as a passenger-freighter, the Cascade was launched on 6 June 1942 by Western Pipe and Steel Company in San Francisco, California. The ship was sponsored by Mrs. Charles W. Crosse, wife of... ) |
1 | 9/42 | 9/42 | 9,260 | 16,430 | 9,260 |
| Seaplane tender Seaplane tender A seaplane tender is a ship that provides facilities for operating seaplanes. These ships were the first aircraft carriers and appeared just before the First World War.-History:... (Chandeleur USS Chandeleur (AV-10) USS Chandeleur , a seaplane tender, was launched on 29 November 1941 by Western Pipe and Steel Company, San Francisco, California, under a Maritime Commission contract; transferred to the U.S... ) |
1 | 11/42 | 11/42 | 8,950 | 13,700 | 8,950 |
| Troop transport | 14 | 2/43 | 9/44 | 7,650 | 16,100 | 107,100 |
| Bayfield class Bayfield class attack transport The Bayfield class attack transport was a class of US Navy attack transports that were built during World War II.With the entry of the United States into the war, it was quickly realized that amphibious combat operations on hostile shores would be required, and that specialized ships would be... attack transport Attack transport Attack Transport is a United States Navy ship classification.-History:In the early 1940s, as the United States Navy expanded in response to the threat of involvement in World War II, a number of civilian passenger ships and some freighters were acquired, converted to transports and given hull... |
14 | 3/43 | 12/44 | 8,100 | 16,100 | 113,400 |
| Type C2 cargo ship Type C2 ship Type C2 ships were designed by the United States Maritime Commission in 1937-38. They were all-purpose cargo ships with five holds, and U.S. shipyards built 173 of them from 1939-1945. Compared to ships built before 1939, the C2s were remarkable for their speed and fuel economy. Their design speed... |
2 | 2/44 | 4/44 | 6,556 | 13,893 | 13,112 |
| Type C3 cargo ship Type C3 ship Type C3 ships were the third type of cargo ship designed by the United States Maritime Commission in the late 1930s. As it had done with the Type C1 ships and Type C2 ships, MARCOM circulated preliminary plans for comment... |
9 | 1/45 | 8/46 | 7,650 | 16,100 | 68,850 |
| SUMMARY | 50 | 4/41 | 8/46 | 7,768 | 15,134 | 380,747 |
| Ship type | No. Built | Delivery date | Displacement (tons) | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| First | Last | Light | Full | Total | ||
| Destroyer escort Destroyer escort A destroyer escort is the classification for a smaller, lightly armed warship designed to be used to escort convoys of merchant marine ships, primarily of the United States Merchant Marine in World War II. It is employed primarily for anti-submarine warfare, but also provides some protection... |
12 | 10/43 | 9/44 | 1,240 | 1,620 | 14,880 |
| 7 | 2/44 | 3/47 | 3,575 | 6,515 | 25,025 | |
| Landing Ship Medium (LSM) | 31 | 8/44 | 2/45 | 520 | 900 | 16,120 |
| 11 | 5/45 | 9/46 | 1,342 | 1,978 | 14,762 | |
| SUMMARY | 61 | 10/43 | 3/47 | 1,160 | 1,880 | 70,787 |
| Production Period | No. ships | Tonnage |
|---|---|---|
| World War II | 96 | 395,398 |
| Postwar | 15 | 56,136 |
| TOTAL | 111 | 451,534 |
Sources for this section: Maudsley pp. 115-179, Colton Company website, Hyperwar website, see References below.
Postwar developments
With the dropping of the atomic bombs on Nagasaki and HiroshimaHiroshima
is the capital of Hiroshima Prefecture, and the largest city in the Chūgoku region of western Honshu, the largest island of Japan. It became best known as the first city in history to be destroyed by a nuclear weapon when the United States Army Air Forces dropped an atomic bomb on it at 8:15 A.M...
, the war ended abruptly and the amount of work available to shipyards across America rapidly declined. The glut of vessels produced by US shipyards during the war now led to a shakeup in the industry with many shipyards closing and others consolidating their operations.
The company
In late 1945, shortly after the war, the Western Pipe & Steel Company was sold for a sum in excess of $6.2 million to Consolidated Steel of California, which in turn sold the assets for $8.3 million to Columbia Steel, a division of US Steel, in 1948. Columbia Steel transferred the assets to a new division, Consolidated Western Steel, which was later merged into the parent company, U.S. Steel
U.S. Steel
The United States Steel Corporation , more commonly known as U.S. Steel, is an integrated steel producer with major production operations in the United States, Canada, and Central Europe. The company is the world's tenth largest steel producer ranked by sales...
.
The shipyards
In the years following the end of the war, various proposals for the revamping of the San Francisco shipyard came and went. In 1949, the Navy Bureau of Ships proposed the building of sixteen attack cargo ships (AKA) at the shipyard, but by 1952 it was decided these vessels would not be required. Instead the Navy proposed the building of several Landing Ships Dock (LSD), but a February 1953 survey concluded that the cost of modernizing the yard would probably be excessive.
In the early 1970s, the yard briefly came to life again when Howard Hughes
Howard Hughes
Howard Robard Hughes, Jr. was an American business magnate, investor, aviator, engineer, film producer, director, and philanthropist. He was one of the wealthiest people in the world...
' Summa Corporation
Summa Corporation
Summa Corporation was the name adopted for the business interests of Howard Hughes after he sold the tool division of Hughes Tool Company in 1972. The tool division would merge with Baker International in 1987 to form Baker Hughes, the world's third-largest oil-services company...
began the construction of the Glomar Explorer and the large submersible barge HMB-1
Hughes Mining Barge
The Hughes Mining Barge, or HMB-1, is a submersible barge about 99 m long, 32 m wide, and more than 27 m tall...
, as part of the top-secret Operation Jennifer whose purpose was the salvage of a Russian nuclear submarine
Nuclear submarine
A nuclear submarine is a submarine powered by a nuclear reactor . The performance advantages of nuclear submarines over "conventional" submarines are considerable: nuclear propulsion, being completely independent of air, frees the submarine from the need to surface frequently, as is necessary for...
which had sunk in the mid-Pacific. Many of the details concerning this operation are still secret.
In 1983, the site was sold to a commercial developer. Little evidence now remains of the shipyard which once existed there.
Individual ships of note
Many of the ships built by Western Pipe & Steel were inevitably destined to relatively uneventful careers. Many of the Type C3 vessels, for example, played a modest role in the Second World War as troopships or transports and subsequently settled down to mundane postwar careers as cargo vessels. Others however had more unusual, more distinguished, or sometimes more tragic destinies. The following list includes a selection of these latter groups.West Aleta
The WPS vessel with the shortest service history was West Aleta (WPS Hull No. 8). One of the vessels built by the company for the US Shipping Board in World War I, West Aleta was the last such ship to be fitted with the unreliable General Electric turbine motor.
Delivered in August 1919, she made her maiden commercial voyage the same month and was subsequently drydocked for repairs. A second voyage resulted in more repairs, this time to a cracked turbine. The following January she commenced a new voyage, and on 13 February was reported stranded in breakers northwest of Terschelling Island
Terschelling
Terschelling is a municipality and an island in the northern Netherlands, one of the West Frisian Islands.Waddenislanders are known for their resourcefulness in using anything and everything that washes ashore. With few trees to use for timber, most of the farms and barns are built with masts...
, Holland. She subsequently broke up and was reported a total loss on 19 June 1920, having provided a mere six months of active service.
West Camargo
The WPS ship with the longest service life was probably West Camargo (WPS Hull No. 16), another vessel built under the US Shipping Board's World War I contract. Fitted with the much more reliable Joshua Hendy triple expansion engine, she was launched in 1920 and enjoyed an active service life as a commercial cargo vessel between the wars.
In 1942, the vessel was acquired by the US government and transferred to the USSR under lend-lease
Lend-Lease
Lend-Lease was the program under which the United States of America supplied the United Kingdom, the Soviet Union, China, Free France, and other Allied nations with materiel between 1941 and 1945. It was signed into law on March 11, 1941, a year and a half after the outbreak of war in Europe in...
, where she was renamed Desna. After the war, Desna remained in service with the Soviet Union as a special cargo vessel for the transport of fish, a role she retained until 1978. In that year she was acquired by Japanese interests and subsequently sold for scrap, bringing to an end a remarkably long career of 58 years.
West Cadron
SS Iowa (1920)
The SS Iowa was a steamship built by the Western Pipe and Steel Company of San Francisco, California in 1920 for the U.S. government and was known as the SS West Cadron. It served in the Quaker Line subsidiary of the States Steamship Co...
The worst peacetime disaster to befall a WPS ship occurred to West Cadron (WPS Hull No. 12). Launched in 1920, she was renamed the Iowa in 1928, and foundered and sank near Cape Disappointment
Cape Disappointment (Washington)
Cape Disappointment is a headland located at the extreme southwestern corner of Washington State on the north side of the Columbia River bar, at . The point of the cape is located on the Pacific Ocean in Pacific County, approximately two miles southwest of the town of Ilwaco...
at the mouth of the Columbia River
Columbia River
The Columbia River is the largest river in the Pacific Northwest region of North America. The river rises in the Rocky Mountains of British Columbia, Canada, flows northwest and then south into the U.S. state of Washington, then turns west to form most of the border between Washington and the state...
(site of the notoriously treacherous Columbia Bar
Columbia Bar
The Columbia Bar is a system of bars and shoals at the mouth of the Columbia River spanning the US states of Oregon and Washington. The bar is about wide and long....
) on 12 January 1936, with the loss of all 34 crew.
American Leader
Another ill-fated crew was that of American Leader (WPS Hull No. 58), who were collectively to endure no less than three ship sinkings during the Second World War.
One of the five Type C1 vessels built by Western Pipe & Steel for its initial Maritime Commission contract, American Leader was delivered in July 1941 but only made a handful of voyages before being sunk by the German
Nazi Germany
Nazi Germany , also known as the Third Reich , but officially called German Reich from 1933 to 1943 and Greater German Reich from 26 June 1943 onward, is the name commonly used to refer to the state of Germany from 1933 to 1945, when it was a totalitarian dictatorship ruled by...
auxiliary cruiser Michel
German auxiliary cruiser Michel
Michel was an auxiliary cruiser of the German Navy that operated as a merchant raider during World War II. Built by Danziger Werft in Danzig 1938/39 as the freighter Bielsko for Polish Gdynia-America-Line , she was requisitioned by the Kriegsmarine at the outbreak of World War II and converted...
off the Cape of Good Hope
Cape of Good Hope
The Cape of Good Hope is a rocky headland on the Atlantic coast of the Cape Peninsula, South Africa.There is a misconception that the Cape of Good Hope is the southern tip of Africa, because it was once believed to be the dividing point between the Atlantic and Indian Oceans. In fact, the...
in September 1942. Eleven crew members were killed in the engagement but the remaining 47 were rescued by Michel, who turned them over to the Japanese as prisoners of war.
In April 1944 eighteen survivors of American Leader were being transported on the Japanese hell ship
Hell Ship
A hell ship is a ship with extremely unpleasant living conditions or with a reputation for cruelty among the crew. It now generally refers to the ships used by the Imperial Japanese Navy to transport Allied prisoners of war out of the Philippines, Hong Kong and Singapore during World War II. The...
Tamahoko Maru when the vessel was torpedoed and sunk by the submarine . Only five of the eighteen former American Leader crewmen onboard survived the attack. In September of the same year, five of another party of nine former crewmates were killed aboard the Japanese hell ship Junyo Maru
Junyo Maru
The was a Japanese cargo ship that was sunk in 1944 by the British submarine , resulting in the loss of over 5,000 lives.The ship was built in 1913 by Robert Duncan Co. Glasgow. It displaced 5,065 tons, was long, wide, and deep. The engines were rated at...
when she was torpedoed and sunk by .
Other crewmembers died in Japanese captivity. Of the original 58-man crew of American Leader, only 28 returned home from the war.
West Kader
Another of the World War I-era WPS ships, West Kader (WPS Hull No. 11), found a niche in history as part of Britain's
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
disastrous Convoy PQ-17
Convoy PQ-17
PQ 17 was the code name for an Allied World War II convoy in the Arctic Ocean. In July 1942, the Arctic convoys suffered a significant defeat when Convoy PQ 17 lost 24 of its 35 merchant ships during a series of heavy enemy daylight attacks which lasted a week. On 27 June, the ships sailed...
in 1942.
PQ-17 set out from Iceland
Iceland
Iceland , described as the Republic of Iceland, is a Nordic and European island country in the North Atlantic Ocean, on the Mid-Atlantic Ridge. Iceland also refers to the main island of the country, which contains almost all the population and almost all the land area. The country has a population...
for the Russian port of Arkhangelsk
Arkhangelsk
Arkhangelsk , formerly known as Archangel in English, is a city and the administrative center of Arkhangelsk Oblast, Russia. It lies on both banks of the Northern Dvina River near its exit into the White Sea in the north of European Russia. The city spreads for over along the banks of the river...
in June 1942. When the convoy commander was informed the German battleship
Battleship
A battleship is a large armored warship with a main battery consisting of heavy caliber guns. Battleships were larger, better armed and armored than cruisers and destroyers. As the largest armed ships in a fleet, battleships were used to attain command of the sea and represented the apex of a...
was on course to intercept, he decided to split up the convoy with disastrous results. German U-Boat
U-boat
U-boat is the anglicized version of the German word U-Boot , itself an abbreviation of Unterseeboot , and refers to military submarines operated by Germany, particularly in World War I and World War II...
s and aircraft were able to easily pick off the isolated merchant vessels, sinking 25 of the convoy's 36 ships and putting PQ-17 into the history books as the greatest Russia-bound convoy loss of the war.
One of the victims of the debacle was West Kader, then operating under the name of Pan Kraft
Pan Kraft
Pan Kraft was a cargo ship built in 1919 by the Western Pipe and Steel Company of California. She was one of eighteen ships built by the company for the U.S. Shipping Board...
. Pan Kraft was disabled by bombing near-misses and forced to be abandoned, after which she exploded and sank. The PQ-17 disaster proved so costly that the British were subsequently compelled to totally revise their convoy strategy.
Warships
Some of the other warships built by Western Pipe & Steel which accumulated distinguished service records were , a destroyer escort
Destroyer escort
A destroyer escort is the classification for a smaller, lightly armed warship designed to be used to escort convoys of merchant marine ships, primarily of the United States Merchant Marine in World War II. It is employed primarily for anti-submarine warfare, but also provides some protection...
which won eleven battle stars during World War II, , an attack transport
Attack transport
Attack Transport is a United States Navy ship classification.-History:In the early 1940s, as the United States Navy expanded in response to the threat of involvement in World War II, a number of civilian passenger ships and some freighters were acquired, converted to transports and given hull...
which received four battle stars in World War II, four in the Korean War and two in the Vietnam War, and which received six battle honours for service with the Royal Navy in World War II.
Steel Artisan
Launched in September 1941 under Maritime Commission contract, Steel Artisan had almost been completed as a standard Type C3 cargo ship when word came through that she was to be converted into one of the newly designed Bogue class escort aircraft carriers. The conversion was subsequently carried out and Steel Artisan briefly became before being transferred under lend lease to the Royal Navy who dubbed her .
Attacker was to serve with distinction during the war, taking part in the invasion of Salerno
Salerno
Salerno is a city and comune in Campania and is the capital of the province of the same name. It is located on the Gulf of Salerno on the Tyrrhenian Sea....
and subsequently of Southern France. In 1944 she was transferred to the Pacific where she was part of the fleet that witnessed the surrender of the Japanese in August 1945. Shortly thereafter, Attacker sailed into Singapore
Singapore
Singapore , officially the Republic of Singapore, is a Southeast Asian city-state off the southern tip of the Malay Peninsula, north of the equator. An island country made up of 63 islands, it is separated from Malaysia by the Straits of Johor to its north and from Indonesia's Riau Islands by the...
to take the surrender of the Japanese garrison there.
After the war, Attacker was decommissioned and returned to the United States, where her flight deck was removed. Laid up for some years, she was eventually bought by Russian entrepreneur Alexander Vlasov whose company the Sitmar Line undertook another major conversion of the vessel, this time into an ocean liner
Ocean liner
An ocean liner is a ship designed to transport people from one seaport to another along regular long-distance maritime routes according to a schedule. Liners may also carry cargo or mail, and may sometimes be used for other purposes .Cargo vessels running to a schedule are sometimes referred to as...
.
Renamed Fairsky
Fairsky
Fairsky was a passenger ship managed by the Sitmar Line, best known for her service on the migrant passenger route from Britain to Australia from 1958 to the early 1970s. In her later career, she operated out of Australia as a popular cruise ship, until striking an unmarked wreck in 1977 which...
the ship was assigned to the migrant passenger route between Britain and Australia in 1958, a role she retained until the early 1970s when Sitmar lost the migrant contract. Subsequently, she was operated by Sitmar as a popular cruise ship
Cruise ship
A cruise ship or cruise liner is a passenger ship used for pleasure voyages, where the voyage itself and the ship's amenities are part of the experience, as well as the different destinations along the way...
.
In 1977 the ship was damaged in a collision and sold to a Philippine
Philippines
The Philippines , officially known as the Republic of the Philippines , is a country in Southeast Asia in the western Pacific Ocean. To its north across the Luzon Strait lies Taiwan. West across the South China Sea sits Vietnam...
consortium, who planned yet another major conversion for the vessel, into a casino ship named Philippine Tourist. The plans were dashed when the ship was tragically gutted by fire in 1978, after which the vessel was sold for scrap in 1980.
Sea Wren
Another WPS ship to undergo an interesting conversion was Sea Wren (WPS Hull No. 129). After serving during the war as attack transport (during which time she sustained casualties and damage from a Japanese kamikaze
Kamikaze
The were suicide attacks by military aviators from the Empire of Japan against Allied naval vessels in the closing stages of the Pacific campaign of World War II, designed to destroy as many warships as possible....
attack), the ship returned after the war to cargo service with the San Francisco-based Matson Navigation Company, operating under the name Hawaiian Citizen.
In 1959, Hawaiian Citizen underwent a major conversion into a container ship
Container ship
Container ships are cargo ships that carry all of their load in truck-size intermodal containers, in a technique called containerization. They form a common means of commercial intermodal freight transport.-History:...
, thus becoming the first all-containerized freighter operating on the West Coast of the United States
West Coast of the United States
West Coast or Pacific Coast are terms for the westernmost coastal states of the United States. The term most often refers to the states of California, Oregon, and Washington. Although not part of the contiguous United States, Alaska and Hawaii do border the Pacific Ocean but can't be included in...
. She was sold for scrap in 1981.
USS Cascade
American literature
American literature is the written or literary work produced in the area of the United States and its preceding colonies. For more specific discussions of poetry and theater, see Poetry of the United States and Theater in the United States. During its early history, America was a series of British...
and the Hollywood
Cinema of the United States
The cinema of the United States, also known as Hollywood, has had a profound effect on cinema across the world since the early 20th century. Its history is sometimes separated into four main periods: the silent film era, classical Hollywood cinema, New Hollywood, and the contemporary period...
film industry
Film industry
The film industry consists of the technological and commercial institutions of filmmaking: i.e. film production companies, film studios, cinematography, film production, screenwriting, pre-production, post production, film festivals, distribution; and actors, film directors and other film crew...
. During the Second World War, Typhoon Cobra devastated an American fleet in the Pacific led by Admiral Halsey
Admiral Halsey
Admiral Halsey may refer to:*U.S. Admiral William Halsey, Jr., b. 1882*British Admiral Lionel Halsey, b. 1872*The Paul McCartney song "Uncle Albert/Admiral Halsey"...
, killing 793 men and sinking three of the fleet's destroyers. In the aftermath, an inquiry chaired by Halsey heard allegations that the captain of one of the destroyers that sank, , had been negligent in his command. The inquiry was held on board Cascade.
American novelist Herman Wouk
Herman Wouk
Herman Wouk is a Pulitzer Prize-winning American author of novels including The Caine Mutiny, The Winds of War, and War and Remembrance.-Biography:...
later used this inquiry as the inspiration for his Pulitzer
Pulitzer Prize
The Pulitzer Prize is a U.S. award for achievements in newspaper and online journalism, literature and musical composition. It was established by American publisher Joseph Pulitzer and is administered by Columbia University in New York City...
-prize winning fictional work The Caine Mutiny
The Caine Mutiny
The Caine Mutiny is a 1952 Pulitzer Prize winning novel by Herman Wouk. The novel grew out of Wouk's personal experiences aboard a destroyer-minesweeper in the Pacific in World War II and deals with, among other things, the moral and ethical decisions made at sea by the captains of ships...
. The book was later turned into an Oscar-nominated film
The Caine Mutiny (film)
The Caine Mutiny is a 1954 American drama film set during World War II, directed by Edward Dmytryk and produced by Stanley Kramer. It stars Humphrey Bogart, José Ferrer, Van Johnson and Fred MacMurray, and is based on the 1951 Pulitzer Prize winning novel by Herman Wouk The Caine Mutiny. The film...
starring Humphrey Bogart
Humphrey Bogart
Humphrey DeForest Bogart was an American actor. He is widely regarded as a cultural icon.The American Film Institute ranked Bogart as the greatest male star in the history of American cinema....
.