page_title: Fore River Shipyard
section_title: World War II
hierarchical_section_title: Fore River Shipyard / History / Bethlehem Shipbuilding Corporation, Ltd. / World War II
caption_attribution_description: English: Engraving of Kilroy on the WWII Memorial. Wanna know more about this phrase? Check here.
context_page_description: Fore River Shipyard was a shipyard owned by General Dynamics Corporation located on Weymouth Fore River in Braintree and Quincy, Massachusetts. It began operations in 1883 in Braintree, and moved to its final location on Quincy Point in 1901. In 1913, it was purchased by Bethlehem Steel, and later transferred to Bethlehem Shipbuilding Corporation. It was sold to General Dynamics in 1963, and closed in 1986. During its operation, yardworkers constructed hundreds of ships, for both military and civilian clients.
  Most of the ships at the yard were built for the United States Navy, with its first government contract for the destroyer USS Lawrence. The yard also built early submarines for Electric Boat, including USS Octopus and USS Sunfish. Fore River also constructed the battleship USS Massachusetts, and the cruisers USS Springfield and USS Salem as well as the Navy's first carrier USS Lexington and its successor USS Lexington. Fore River produced multiple foreign ships for various navies around the world including five Type 1 submarines for the Imperial Japanese Navy, ten submarines for the Royal Navy, and the battleship ARA Rivadavia, for the Argentine Navy.
context_section_description: The Naval Act of 1938 brought increased shipbuilding to the yard, as it mandated a 20% increase in the strength of the nation's Navy. This brought an expansion of business to the yard, with 17,000 employees working in December 1941 and 32,000 in 1943, including 1,200 women. Payroll reached $110 million (equivalent to $1.63 billion in today's dollars) around this time, and contracts amounted to around $700 million (equivalent to $10.3 billion in today's dollars).
  The speed of construction at the yard increased, as the keel of USS Vincennes (CL-64) was laid immediately after USS Massachusetts (BB-59) was launched. The speed of the construction ran in line with the building of more ships. USS San Juan (CL-54) was cut up and relocated three times in order to accommodate the construction of other ships. Much like World War I, the yard expanded, and built the Bethlehem Hingham Shipyard in order to accommodate the increased construction demands. Sixteen ways were constructed on over 96 acres (39 ha; 0.150 sq mi), and 227 ships were produced with 23,500 workers.
  The yard produced USS Hancock (CV-19) in fourteen and a half months, and USS Pasadena (CL-65) in a record of sixteen and a half months. The yard built ninety-two vessels of eleven classes during the war, and earned the Army-Navy "E" Award for excellence of construction of vessels, which was awarded on 15 May 1942, with four stars being added during the course of the war. Additionally, the yard produced USS Lexington (CV-16), which was renamed from USS Cabot after the sinking of USS Lexington (CV-2) when yard workers petitioned for a renaming of the ship.
  During the war, the yard was possibly the origin of the popular expression "Kilroy was here." Although it was not known originally where the phrase came from, the American Transit Association ran a contest trying to find the origin of the phrase in 1946. Welding inspector James J. Kilroy ended up sending his account in, and was deemed the winner. In an attempt to make sure that riveters would be prevented from defrauding the shipyard of their accurate workload, he scrawled the phrase in chalk on the ships that he was inspecting. Ships that the phrase was printed on included USS Massachusetts, USS Lexington, USS Baltimore (CA-68) and various troop carriers.
  While the shipyard was at its peak of operations during the war, it was not uncommon for German U boats to stalk ships leaving the yard and engage them once offshore.
caption: Engraving of Kilroy on the National World War II Memorial in Washington, D.C.
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