John Lewis and Sons
The shipbuilding company John Lewis and Sons Limited operated shipyards in Aberdeen and Montrose . It is best known for the construction of fishing vessels.
history
The company was founded in 1886 by wooden boat builder John Lewis from Cove. Initially, Lewis operated a coal importer on Albert Quay on the south side of the port of Aberdeen and managed trawlers, soon afterwards he began with ship engineering and ship repair. After the company's founder died in 1907, his son Andrew continued the business. Favored by the demand during the First World War, the company was expanded to four building sites. During the war, the shipyard built eleven standard coastal freighters and some larger colliers. The latter also formed the main field of work in the 1920s. In the following 1930s, Lewis and Sons expanded its program to include conventional cargo steamers, a number of which were built for Australian clients, steam trawlers mostly destined for the Aberdeen fishing fleet, tugs, coastal cargo steamers and the first coasters .
In addition to the continued construction of civil trawlers, numerous Admiralty trawlers and small naval units were built during the Second World War . In the post-war period, besides coastal freighters that were built again and again, mainly trawlers. One of the shipyard's most famous ships was the Fairtry in 1954 , the first stern catcher designed and built as such with a complete fish processing and freezing system on board. The frozen fish fillet plates were at the then newly introduced to the market fish sticks processed. In 1960 two Lewis trawlers were built on the former Montrose Shipbuilding and Repairing Company . Until the 1960s, the shipyard continued its construction program with numerous trawlers and individual kosmos. The sailing training ship Malcolm Miller , which is still known today, was built in 1968 . In 1969, Lewis finished building freighters. In the summer of 1972 the yard was taken over by the John Wood Group from Aberdeen. Under her leadership, the construction of trawlers continued until 1976, but shipbuilding was then almost completely ended and the shipyard was converted into a repair and service shipyard for Wood's offshore activities, including the construction of a 1,600-tonne slip -Group around. Until the 1980s, a few new buildings were built for Wood.