Ships for the Seven Seas: Philadelphia Shipbuilding in the Age of Industrial Capitalism(12 Studies in Industry and Society)

Between the Civil War and World War I, Philadelphia emerged as the vital centre of American shipbuilding. This work explores this complex industry, from the workshop level to subcontracting networks spanning the Delaware valley. It describes entrepreneurial strategies and industrial change that facilitated the rise of the major shipbuilding firms; how naval architecture, marine engineering, and craft skills evolved as iron and steel took over wood as the basic construction material; and how changes in domestic and international trade and the rise of the American steel navy helped generate vessel contracts for local builders. The book also examines the military-industrial complex in the context of naval contracting. Contributing to the current debates in business history, this text explains how proprietary ownership and batch production strategies enabled late 19th-century builders to supply volatile markets with custom-built ships. But large-scale naval construction in the 1920s eroded production flexibility, the author argues, and since then, ill-conceived merchant marine policies and naval contracting procedures have brought about a structural crisis in American shipbuilding and the demise of the venerable Philadephia shipyards.

Table of Contents:
Acknowledgements Prologue Chapter 1: "Ship Building as Much as Possible Advanced": The Rise and Decline of Wooden Shipbuilding, 1640-1870 Chapter 2: "A Small Margin": Ironclads and the Transition from Wooden to Iron Shipbuilding Chapter 3: The American Clyde: Corporate and Proprietary Capitalism in the Philadelphia Maritime Economy, 1865-1875 Chapter 4: Workshop of the World: Commerce, Crafts, and Class Conflict, 1875-1885 Chapter 5: A Vicious Quality: Cramp and the Origins of the Military-Industrial Complex, 1885-1898 Chapter 6: New Departure: Growth and Crisis, 1898-1914 Chapter 7: This Machine of War: World War I Chapter 8: What Next? The Postwar Depression, 1919-1929 Epilogue Abbreviations Notes Essay on Sources Index

About the Author :
Thomas R. Heinrich is senior historian at the History Factory in Washington, D.C.

Review :
"Heinrich has written a detailed, compelling account of iron and steel shipbuilding...This is a finely crafted book on a fascinating period when technical transformations, political compromises, broad economic changes, and world power aspirations reconfigured American shipbuilding...Well-designed and nicely illustrated."--John K. Brown, 'H-Business' "A comprehensive study of Philadelphia shipbuilding in its entire historical, economic, and entrepreneurial context."--'Lloyd's List'