Machinefabriek en Scheepswerf van P. Smit Jr.

Launching of the Cunard Ambassador P. Smit Jr.

The Dutch shipbuilding company Machinefabriek en Scheepswerf van P. Smit Jr. , briefly P. Smit Jr. existed from 1872 to 1987. At times, were employed more than 2600 employees.

history

Founding years

The company goes back to Piet Smit junior (* July 31, 1848 - July 22, 1913). Piet Smit junior lost his parents at an early age and grew up with his uncle Piet Smit. Together with his cousin Arie Smit, he learned the trade of shipbuilder. In 1868 Piet moved to the United States to gain work experience.

On August 31, 1871, he acquired the shipyard operated by his uncle Joost Pot (1811-1888) in Slikkerveer since 1856 and founded the Machinefabriek en Scheepswerf van P. Smit Jr. there on January 2, 1872. It was one of the first Dutch shipyards to built the iron ships. An iron pilot schooner was built in 1873, and from 1881 the shipyard built iron seagoing vessels with steam drives. In 1875 Smit moved to Rotterdam , in whose district Varkenoord he first bought a plot of land in the 1880s. In 1890, Smit converted his shipyard into the NV Scheepsbouw en Machinefabriek “De Industrie” .

Move to Varkenoord

In 1891, Smit received permission to dig its own operating harbor in the Varkenoord polder, with the excavation of earth increasing the port area. The new shipyard with a machine factory was built here. In 1893 the shipbuilding company moved to the Varkenoord polder. The company began with 120 employees under the name Scheepstimmerbedrijf "De Industrie" , in 1899 400 people were employed there. The actual shipyard later traded as Scheepswerf en Machinefabriek "De Industrie" , where mainly passenger and cargo ships and tugs were built in the period that followed. A crisis in 1904 led to a partial shutdown and temporarily reduced the number of employees to 80. Piet Smit founded a new company on April 4, 1906, NV Machinefabriek en Scheepswerf van P. Smit Jr., in which "De Industrie" was merged. As early as 1910, however, the shipyard was flourishing so well that new land had to be purchased for an expansion of the operation with a transverse slipway by another slipway for ships up to 130 meters long. The following year Smit sold his shares in the company to the Rotterdam businessman Daniël George van Beuningen. Smit died on July 22, 1913 at the age of 65.

Expansions and crises

At the beginning of 1914 420 shipyard workers were employed and the next extensions to include a new carpenter's hall, a wood store and factory canteens were on the plan. From 1918 a new extension was carried out, to which the dike was relocated by 80 meters. The area called Kreekweg was occupied by the companies Piet Smit, Burgerhout and Van der Lugt. In general, the first two years after the end of the First World War brought a wedding for the shipyards, as war losses had to be compensated.

In the 1920s, the shipyard had to endure poor economic times. A wage cut led to the stoppage of around 1250 employees in 1921. All strikers were initially dismissed, but were reinstated after they gave in. From 1923 cannons were also produced by Piet Smit and from 1925 the situation of the shipyard improved. The crisis years from 1930 to 1940 saw the workforce decrease from 868 at the beginning to 541 at the end. In 1938, the Rotterdamsche Droogdok Maatschappij (RDM) acquired the competitor P. Smit Jr. from DG van Beuningen together with the neighboring Wilton-Fijenoord shipyard . However, the shipyard was continued as an independent company.

In World War II

During the occupation by Germany, the shipyard was forced to cooperate. In July 1940, the Kriegsmarine planned to convert several thousand inland vessels to carry out the Seelöwe operations. 130 ships were converted by Piet Smit. Furthermore, two multi-purpose ships, which were already under construction before the German occupation, were completed as gunboats for the Navy . Even after that, the shipyard was fully utilized until Dolle Dinsdag on September 6, 1944. As a result, a large part of the machines and materials were brought to Germany and the systems that had been left behind were destroyed.

post war period

After the end of the war, clearing up and rebuilding work began before the shipbuilding industry began again in 1946. A contract signed in March 1948 for the construction of four tankers for Argentina ushered in a long period of large shipbuilding. The flood disaster of 1953 also caused damage to the shipyard, but shipbuilding continued steadily. The 1950s and 1960s brought a phase of boom, as a result of which the workforce rose to well over 2,000 employees.

On March 4, 1966, the RDM merged with the shipyard Koninklijke Maatschappij De Schelde (KMS) and the Motorenfabriek Thomassen to form the Rijn-Schelde Machinefabrieken en Scheepswerven (RSMS) and in 1968 the RDM took over full control of Smit. Under pressure from the government, Verolme Verenigde Scheepswerven (VVSW) from Rotterdam , which had got into financial difficulties, joined the group on January 1, 1971, which then traded as Rijn-Schelde-Verolme Machinefabrieken en Scheepswerven (RSV).

The 100th anniversary in August 1971 was not celebrated because the RSV group was in the midst of a crisis. A construction contract from the Algerian government for a floating dock became the last new construction of Piet Smit's shipyard in 1976. The following year, the shipyard's employees fought for their jobs with a Piet Smit moet blijven campaign . In 1978 there was no further aid from the Dutch government. Shipbuilding was finally stopped and 325 employees lost their jobs.

On April 6, 1983 the RSV and with it the RDM went bankrupt, but the bankruptcy proceedings of the Machinefabriek en Scheepswerf van P. Smit Jr. did not follow until September 1987. After an auction of the shipyard's inventory in De Kuip in February 1988 , the story of the Shipyard.

The shipyard was finally built on in the 1990s with the new residential and business district Veranda . The Piet Smitkade street that runs along the river is a reminder of the former shipyard and its founder.

Web links

• The history of the shipyard at ijsselmondetoenennu (Dutch)
• Gemeentearchief Rotterdam (Dutch)
• Construction list at nedships (Dutch)
• View of the Piet Smitkade near nederland-in-beeld (Dutch)

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Shipyard entry of the Scheepswerf Gebr. Pot at nedships ( Memento of the original from May 18, 2010 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. (Dutch) 

Coordinates: 51 ° 53 ′ 51.9 "  N , 4 ° 31 ′ 26.2"  E