Union Iron Works

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Union Iron Works, located in San Francisco, California, built a number of ships for the United States Navy. These ships include the USS Oregon (BB-3) laid down in 1891, and Plunger-class submarines Grampus and Pike which were launched in 1902 and 1903, respectively.

The Donohue Brothers, Scots-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. The company also owned the Alameda Works Shipyard, located across the San Francisco Bay in Alameda.

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 one million dollar 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 two and four million. by the turn of the century, the area had increased and employment double to three thousand-five hundred workers. These industrial facilities used five types of power, distributed throughout; electricity, compressed air, steam, hydraulic and coal or gas fire.

In 1902, the Union Iron Works was absorbed into a combine called the United States Shipbuilding Corporation and was mired in three years of litigation. In 1905, the entire forty acre shipyard was purchased by Bethlehem Steel Corporation for one million dollars. Charles Schwab stood on the steps of the UIW office building on twentieth street during the auction. 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 benefitted from the collapse of the US Shipbuilding combine. In 1908, Bethlehem Shipbuilding Corporation bought the Hunter's Point 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; Commadore Dewey's flagship the Olympia. After 1905, the shipyard operated as part of Bethlehem Steel, and produced both warships and merchant ships.