Newport News Shipbuilding

The newly constructed USS Birmingham is launched from the Newport News yards in 1942

Northrop Grumman Shipbuilding (NGS), formerly called Northrop Grumman Newport News (NGNN) or Newport News Shipbuilding and Drydock Company (NNS&DD or simply NNS), is the largest privately owned shipyard in the United States. Northrop Grumman Shipbuilding is one of two shipyards that produce and service all types of nuclear powered submarines (the other is the Electric Boat Corporation), and at present is the only shipyard that can build Nimitz-class supercarriers. NGS is also home to the largest crane in the western hemisphere. NGS is located in Newport News, Virginia, and often participates in projects with the Norfolk Naval Shipyard in Portsmouth, Virginia, also located adjacent to Hampton Roads.

History

Main Gate, 37th st. and Washington Ave.

Industrialist Collis P. Huntington (1821 – 1900) led the efforts to complete the Chesapeake and Ohio Railroad (C&O) from Richmond, Virginia to the Ohio River in the early 1870s. Although originally built for general commerce, the C&O soon was also used to transport bituminous coal from the previously isolated coalfields adjacent to the New River and the Kanawha River in West Virginia. In the 1880s, an extension of the C&O was built from Richmond down the Virginia Peninsula to reach a new coal pier on Hampton Roads in Warwick County near the small unincorporated community of Newport News. However, building the railroad and coal pier was only the first part of Huntington's dreams for Newport News.

In 1886, he built a shipyard to repair ships servicing this transportation hub. In 1891, Newport News Shipbuilding and Drydock Company delivered its first ship, a tugboat named Dorothy. By 1897, NNS had built three warships for the U.S. Navy: Nashville, Wilmington, and Helena.

In 1906, the revolutionary HMS Dreadnought launched a great naval race worldwide. Between 1907 and 1923, Newport News built six of the U.S. Navy's total of 22 dreadnoughts -- Delaware, Texas, Pennsylvania, Mississippi, Maryland, and West Virginia -- and all but the first would still be in active service in World War II.

In 1907, President Theodore Roosevelt sent the Great White Fleet on its round-the-world voyage. Seven of its 16 battleships were built by NNS. In 1914, NNS built the SS Medina for the Mallory Steamship Company; as the MV Doulos she is now the world's oldest active ocean-faring passenger ship.

Between 1918 and 1920, NNS delivered 25 destroyers, and after World War I, NNS began building aircraft carriers. Ranger was delivered in 1934, and NNS went on to build Yorktown and Enterprise.

By 1940, the Navy had ordered seven more aircraft carriers and four cruisers. During World War II, it built ships as part of the U.S. Government's Emergency Shipbuilding Program, and swiftly filled requests for "Liberty ships" that were needed during the war. It founded North Carolina Shipbuilding Company, an emergency yard on the banks of the Cape Fear River and launched its first Liberty ship before the end of 1941, building 243 ships in all, including 186 Libertys. For its contributions during the war, the Navy awarded the company its "E" pennant for excellence in ship construction.

In the post-war years, NNS built the famous passenger liner SS United States, which set a transatlantic speed record that still stands today. In 1954, NNS, together with Westinghouse and the Navy, developed and built a prototype nuclear reactor for a carrier propulsion system. NNS designed the Enterprise in 1960. In 1959 NNS launched its first nuclear-powered submarine, Shark as well as the ballistic missile submarine Robert E. Lee.

In the 1970s, NNS launched two of the largest tankers ever built in the western hemisphere and also constructed three liquefied natural gas carriers -- at over 390,000 deadweight tons, the largest ever built in the United States. In the 1980s, NNS produced a variety of Navy products, including Nimitz-class nuclear aircraft carriers and Los Angeles-class nuclear attack submarines. The original ship in its class, the USS Nimitz was already well under construction by the early '70's, being built in a drydock at 42nd Street in Downtown Newport News, in full view of most of the downtown area.

Merger with Northrop Grumman

The combination created a $4 billion shipyard called Northrop Grumman Shipbuilding. The shipyard is a major employer not only for the lower Virginia Peninsula, but portions of Hampton Roads south of the James River and the harbor, portions of the Middle Peninsula region, and even some northeastern counties of North Carolina.

On 28 January 2008, Northrop Grumman Corporation realigned its two shipbuilding sectors, Northrop Grumman Newport News and Northrop Grumman Ship Systems, into a single sector called Northrop Grumman Shipbuilding.[1]

• 
  Ronald Reagan Christening
• 
  North Yard Crane
• Super lift aboard George H.W. Bush
  Super lift aboard George H.W. Bush
• Gerald R. Ford-class aircraft carrier
  Gerald R. Ford-class aircraft carrier

Ships built

Ships built at the Newport News yard include:

Tugboat Dorothy

• Tugboat Dorothy, the shipyard's first vessel delivered, in 1891
• SS Georgia a crude oil tanker built in 1908
• USS Virginia, lead battleship of its class, launched in 1904
• USS Texas, battleship of the New York-class, launched in 1912, the only surviving dreadnought battleship.
• Ocean liner SS Medina for the Mallory Steamship Company in 1914, currently the oldest serving passenger ship in the world
• Wickes class destroyers (Lamberton; Radford; Montgomery; Breese; Gamble; Ramsay) for the Navy in 1918
• USS Ranger, the first purpose-built aircraft carrier of the United States Navy, launched in 1933
• Yorktown class aircraft carriers:
  • USS Yorktown, launched in 1936
  • USS Enterprise, launched in 1936
  • USS Hornet, launched in 1940
• Essex class aircraft carriers:
  • USS Essex, launched in 1942
  • USS Yorktown, launched in 1943
  • USS Intrepid, launched in 1943
  • USS Hornet, launched in 1943
  • USS Franklin, launched in 1943
  • USS Ticonderoga, launched in 1944
  • USS Randolph, launched in 1944
  • USS Bennington, launched in 1944
  • USS Boxer, launched in 1944
  • USS Leyte, launched in 1945
• Liberty ship transports for the Allies during World War II
• Midway class aircraft carriers:
  • USS Midway, launched in 1945
  • USS Coral Sea, launched in 1946
• Ocean liner SS United States, holder of a transatlantic speed record
• Forrestal class aircraft carriers:
  • USS Forrestal, launched in 1954
  • USS Ranger, launched in 1956
• Submarine USS Shark in 1959, the yard's first nuclear-powered submarine
• Ballistic missile submarine Robert E. Lee, launched in 1959
• USS Enterprise, launched in 1960, the first nuclear-powered aircraft carrier
• USS America, launched in 1964
• USS John F. Kennedy, launched in 1967
• All ten Nimitz class nuclear-powered aircraft carriers:
  • USS Nimitz, launched in 1972
  • USS Dwight D. Eisenhower, launched in 1975
  • USS Carl Vinson, launched in 1980
  • USS Theodore Roosevelt, launched in 1984
  • USS Abraham Lincoln, launched in 1988
  • USS George Washington, launched in 1990
  • USS John C. Stennis, launched in 1993
  • USS Harry S. Truman, launched in 1996
  • USS Ronald Reagan, launched in 2001
  • USS George H. W. Bush
• Los Angeles class nuclear-powered submarines
• Virginia class nuclear-powered submarines
• Virginia class nuclear-powered cruisers
  • USS Arkansas, launched in 1980

Creed

"We shall build good ships here. At a profit - if we can. At a loss - if we must. But always good ships".

Collis Potter Huntington

External links

• Northrop Grumman Shipbuilding