Bremer Vulcan

Bremer Vulkan AG was a prominent German shipbuilding company located at the Weser river in Bremen-Vegesack. It was founded in 1893 and closed in 1997 because of financial problems and mismanagement.

Altogether the Bremer Vulkan built about 1100 ships - including the ships of the predecessor Johann Lange Shipyard - of different types. It is remarkable that the Bremer Vulkan with the exception of both World Wars only built civilian ships; production of naval ships except war times started first in the 1980s.

Bremer Vulkan AG was founded 1893 in Vegesack - a suburb of the city of Bremen – by a group of investors and Bremen merchants and by overtaking the 1805 founded Johann Lange Shipyard. Two years later the Bremer Vulkan bought the Bremer Schiffbaugesellschaft – former H. F. Ulrichs Shipyard which launched the first ship in 1839 - including all its modern shipbuilding facilities. First director of the Bremer Vulkan became the engineer Victor Nawatzki (1855–1940).

In the following years the Bremer Vulkan increased rapidly. By 1908 it already had an area of about 80 acres and a water frontage of 1500 meters. Six slips equipped with modern electric travelling cranes were capable of building the largest vessels of that time. With an average annual delivery of about 40000 BRT it became the greatest civilian shipbuilding company in the Deutsches Kaiserreich (German Empire), followed by Flensburger Schiffbaubetriebe in Flensburg, Tecklenborg in Bremerhaven and Vulcan Stettin in Stettin. The number of co-workers had increased from about 60 at the beginning up to about 3300 in 1912.

During World War I the Bremer Vulkan built warships by force. Altogether 11 minesweepers (M 39 – M42 and M 54 – M 56, M71 – M 74) and in cooperation with the Germaniawerft in Kiel some submarine hulls and 6 complete submarines (U 160 – U 163) were built for the Kaiserliche Marine (Imperial German Navy).

After the world war Bremer Vulkan continued its successful development. Different types of ships were built first mainly for German ship owners and with an increasing amount also for foreign ship owners later. An important progress was the change of ship propulsion from steam engines to diesel engines. In cooperation and under licence from MAN the Bremer Vulkan started the production of Diesel ship-engines.