Shipbuilding on Film

Shipwrights, plate-fitters and riveters support the war effort as their ships take majestic shape in this tour of British shipyards.

The precision and beauty of shipbuilding in Britain.

See naval architects craft new designs for maximum bulk capacity in modern shipping.

10,000 tons of steel slides into the Clyde in the form of HMAS Australia, a ship that would serve the Australian Navy well in WWII.

Glasgow shipbuilders organise a "work-in" in response to being laid off by the liquidators of the Upper Clyde Shipbuilders (UCS).

Shipbuilders admire their craft as the SS Princess Margaret launches in picturesque Dumbarton.

The spectacular story of the building of a massive ocean liner.

The steamship Princess Elizabeth glides down the slipway at Fairfield, Glasgow.

"The Clydesiders are still a tough lot" - as evidenced in this behind-the-scenes tour of a 1960s Clydeside shipyard.

The "drunken" Duchess of Richmond is launched at Clydebank - the place that launched a thousand ships.

From the Norfolk Broads to Cowes, more and more people discover they were born to boats.

A genuinely fascinating businessman, with workman’s hands, an old battered Austin, still labouring at 77, and keeping many a church going.

Bideford Shipbuilding

Enter the spectacular slipways of Harland & Wolff, explore the shipyard that built the Titanic and her sister ships.

From luxury liner to 60s super-tanker, Britain's shipbuilders big up their export business in a funky and slightly bizarre promotional film.

Hometime for thousands of Teesside shipbuilders.

A construction project looks to the future at a Swan Hunter’s Tyneside shipyard in the 1930s.

Experience luxury afloat as the Duke of Lancaster embarks on its maiden voyage. Behold the splendour of the ill-fated Funship during it’s heyday with the British Railways fleet.

Hard graft and champagne at the successful launch of a Portuguese cruise liner, built by Swan Hunter & Wigham Richardson.

The Swan Hunter shipyard celebrates the launch of a tanker built to serve the Come By Chance oil refinery in Newfoundland.

Explore the gleaming new interiors of the Tyne-built cargo ship Innesmoor.

The Tyne river front is at its bustling peak in this record of sea trials for the Ceres container ship.

A Tees-built ship embraces new surveillance technology on its sea trial.

The casual heroes of the shipyards – workers and the ships they build on Tyneside are captured in beautiful monochrome by an early cine club.

Edwardian workers file out of a naval shipyard at Barrow-in-Furness.

Revolutionary Sail inspired by Plane

A brass band serenades guests in the rain at aTyneside launch of the towering MS Manora cargo ship from Swan Hunters shipyard in Wallsend.

The industry where the waves meet the shore

The Queen visits a magnificent maritime spectacle on the Tyne as Newcastle hosts the Cutty Sark Tall Ships regatta.

Princess Louise comes to Edwardian Barrow in Furness to christen the battleship HMS Dominion.

A heart-warming tale about a Tyneside shipyard worker who dreams of a cruise on the luxury ocean liner he helps to build.

Unruly shipworkers defy direction from Mitchell and Kenyon's showmen partners.

Grandeur, excitement and pride for a Middlesbrough crowd at the Smiths Dock launch of a ship for the Sugar Line.

The yacht, Genetta IV, takes to the water at Dickies Bangor, where she was made, bedecked with bunting, cheered by crowds and launched by a woman in a flowery hat.

The launch of a majestic liner, and a triumph for British shipbuilding skills.

Join a family of 1960s holiday makers as they tell the story of their colourful adventure on the high seas of Scotland, steaming around the Firth of Clyde and beyond.

HMS Thunderer is launched by the Archbishop of Canterbury's wife, in a ceremony attended by thousands of dignitaries and most of East London.

Royal Navy top brass at the launch of the HMS Exeter destroyer from the world famous Swan Hunters shipyard on Tyneside.

A large liner draws away from the quay, but where is she headed?

The growth of Cornwall’s Steel and Shipbuilding Industries

On the brink of war, Royal Navy destroyers assemble ominously on the Tyne - and a chain of ship launches are celebrated from Glasgow to Newcastle.

Is that a dinosaur in the shipyard? A new Jurassic-looking crane arrives on the Clyde, plus a look at tyre making and a Scottish regatta.

The construction and launch of the S.S. Olympic, the sister ship of the Titanic.

RMV Scillonian Ferry III launches

A ship off the old chocks! White Star's third liner to bear the name Britannic launches from Harland & Wolff's shipyard in Belfast

Tyneside shipyard Swan Hunter & Wigham Richardson turns out a beast of a tanker for the Argentine Navy

Cloth caps at the keel blocks, bowlers on the platform, tug boats at the ready for the launch of the British Cavalier tanker on the River Wear at Sunderland.

From US colonialism to UK shipbuilding via anti-strikebreaking measures - this issue of the American newsreel has it all.

An atmospheric film of a dry dock, the welding of the hull, primitively held by timber supports, before the ship plunges sideways into a river.

Join the greeting party on Tilbury dock to wave home relatives disembarking from a trans-Atlantic cruise

A party of children take an eye-opening tour of John Brown's Shipyard in Clydebank.

The story of an oil tanker, rebuilt to fight back during WWII.

A lovingly crafted home movie charting the maiden voyage of the Brown family's new yacht.

Tynesiders speak up - three talk on camera about their lives.

The history of the lightship, including the recollections of retired mariner Charlie Moll, and archive footage of fisher girls at Yarmouth.

HMS Eagle receives its fifth commission with RAF 899 Squadron assigned to it.

The aircraft carrier HMS Eagle sets out on its final journey to the breakers yard.

The Ark Royal journeys towards its audacious end.