Shipbuilding History

Decatur AL

Ingalls Iron Works was started in 1910, by Robert Ingalls, in Birmingham AL. In 1930, they started building barges and a few other small vessels, using their Birmingham plant for fabrication, the former Gulf Shipbuilding facility in Chickasaw AL for assembly and an unidentified facility in Mobile AL for outfitting and completion of the more complex hulls. #s were assigned sequentially, regardless of facility. In 1936, Ingalls built a new shipyard in Decatur AL which was capable of building all types of small vessels, and in 1938, they built a new shipyard in Pascagoula MS which was capable of building all types of large vessels. At this time, the Chickasaw yard was returned to its owners and the name of the company was changed to Ingalls Shipbuilding Corporation. In 1943, the hull numbering system was changed, with hull #s 400-499 assigned to Pascagoula for MARCOM contracts, hull #s 500-599 assigned to Pascagoula for other contracts and hull #s 600-999 assigned to Decatur. In 1955, after the Decatur yard overshot hull #999, hull #s 1000-1499 were assigned to Pascagoula and hull #s 1500-1999 were assigned to Decatur.

In 1957, Ingalls bought the Arnold V. Walker Shipyard, which was immediately north of their Pascagoula yard: this yard continued to operate under its own name until 1961, when it was merged into the Ingalls yard. In 1961, Ingalls sold the Pascagoula yard to Litton Industries and it became the Ingalls Shipbuilding Division of Litton Industries, while the Decatur yard became the Marine Division of Ingalls Iron Works. In 1975, the Decatur yard started farming out work to a facility called Seminole Steel, in Bainbridge GA and this continued until 1981, when Ingalls Iron Works was sold to Trinity Industries and Trinity almost immediately closed the Marine Division. The area in Decatur where the shipyard was is now called Ingalls Harbor. Altogether, Ingalls built over 2000 vessels. This table lists those built in yards other than Pascagoula: the list for Pascagoula is here.