Shipbuilding History

Long Beach CA

In 1906, John F. Craig moved from Toledo OH, where he and his father had been building ships for many years, to Long Beach CA. There he established a new Craig Shipbuilding Company on the south side of Channel 3, where Pier 41 is today. By doing this, he became the first tenant of the Port of Long Beach and consolidated this position by also becoming the new port's dredging contractor. When World War I loomed, Craig sold his yard to a new organization, California Shipbuilding Company, and started another operation next door, which he called Long Beach Shipbuilding Company, designed for the construction of cargo ships. Meanwhile, California Shipbuilding, which had taken over Craig Shipbuilding's contracts for two submarines and a lighthouse tender and which had secured contracts in its own name for six additional submarines, began experiencing difficulties, so Craig bought back his original yard and began operating both yards as one company under the Craig Shipbuilding name. This company continued in business after the war, primarily as a ship repair yard, but also building a number of yachts for local customers. Then, when MARCOM began its shipbuilding program in 1939, Craig leased the Long Beach Shipbuilding yard to Consolidated Steel Corporation, which used it to build merchant ships, and concentrated on repair and conversion projects in the original yard. After the war, the Consolidated yard closed, while the Craig yard continued, under the name Long Beach Marine Repair, until about 1970. Note that the hull numbers used by the Craigs in Long Beach were a continuation of the series they had used in Toledo and elsewhere, going back to John Craig's very first ship, built in 1864. And, although Consolidated Steel started two more large shipyards and at least two small yards, they too continued the same series.