Weeks Marine

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Originally founded by Francis Weeks in 1919, the Weeks Stevedoring Company started with two cranes in the Port of New York, handling bunker coal and dry ballast. By the beginning of World War II, they had purchased their seventh crane and were loading military equipment bound for Europe to support the Allied Forces. The workload of the war overseas had taken its toll on the Weeks fleet, so after WWII, the wooden hulls of the cranes were replaced with steel hulls, creating the Weeks #6 and #7. In the 1950s, the Weeks Stevedoring Company ventured into a number of marine projects outside the field of stevedoring. The company performed salvage and dredging work, installed navigational aids for the United States Coast Guard, and even constructed a breakwater to protect the air shaft leading from the Brooklyn Battery Tunnel to Governors Island. They also became the prime contractor assigned to remove abandoned wooden vessels for the Army Corp of Engineers, work still contracted today. In 1958, Weeks purchased their first crane to be used exclusively outside the field of stevedoring, the Weeks #500.

In 1960, Weeks brought their first vessels to the fleet as two 120’ x 38’ deck barges were built by Richmond Steel for the company. In 1962, they added their first dump scow, the Weeks #250, a 171’ x 43’ vessel. Also in 1962, the Weeks Contracting Company was formed to remove limitations which might restrict the company in ventures they would choose to pursue.

Over the next ten years, the Weeks barge fleet had grown proportionally, creating a vital infrastructural core of the Weeks operation today. During the 1970s, the first dredge, the “Venture,” a 169’ x 41’ x 30” hydraulic dredge, and the first large tug, the “William J. McPhillips,” a 105’ 2400 horse power single screw tug, were purchased in an effort to broaden the company even further.

In the 1980s and 90s, the Weeks organization grew by leaps and bounds by acquiring well respected marine companies. During that time, Weeks substantial acquisitions were M.P. Howlett, a New York based stevedoring company, in 1983, American Dredging Company, one of the most famous dredging companies in history, in 1993, and T.L. James, another dredging company based in Louisiana, in 1998.