Ira S. Bushey & Sons

Theme curated by: The Red Hook WaterStories Team

Ira S. Bushey and Sons, for three generations was a nationally significant business located in Brooklyn’s Red Hook. Moreover, the tanker MARY A. Whalen, homeship of PortSide NewYork was built for Ira S. Bushey. Ira S. Bushey was born in 1862. He…

Ira S. Bushey & Sons'was a shipbuilder and oil company based in Red Hook, Brooklyn. Remarkably, the company combined three different endeavors: a shipyard, a fuel terminal, and a fleet of vessels that moved fuel. Busheys built around 200 vessels…

Starting out as a caulker of wooden ships, Ira S. Bushey, by dint of hard work, was the owner of the biggest shipyard constructing wooden ships in the country in 1920 - located in Red Hook, Brooklyn. Ira S. Bushey was the first builder and operator…

In 1920, the New York Tow Boat Exchange represented 34 independent tow boat companies. In their advertisement in the Port of New York Annual, the Exchange boasted that their fleet of 200 boats could handle anything "from the docking and shifting of a…

In Ira Bushey vs. USA (1968) the US Government was held liable for the conduct of a drunken sailor. After returning to the United States, a sailor on the Coast Guard cutter TAMAROA, then docked in a floating drydock in Bushey’s shipyard, turned some…

Gary Shiflett, currently a fleet manager, used to work for Ira S. Bushey and Sons and Eklof Marine. In 2016, while standing in the galley of PortSide NewYork's MARY A. WHALEN-a "Bushey boat" - he told of some of his memories of working on ships. His…

Jim Perkins recounted his experience of working on the TAMAROA, a Coast Guard cutter located in the Bushey Shipyard in Red Hook in an article published on the (now gone) website Jack's Joint, which called itself an unoffical Coast Guard Library.…

Court Street, from Bryant Street to Gowanus Canal, showing in the background the Ira S. Bushey and Sons boat building plant. October 8, 1937. P. L. Sperr. PortSide note: Ira S. Bushey & Sons was more than a shipyard. They also were a fuel…

Vane Line Bunkering (sometimes called Vane Brothers) at the foot of Red Hook’s Court Street in the Gowanus Bay, occupies part of the site of the former Ira S. Bushey & Sons facility. The property is owned by Buckeye who also owns and operates the…

A PDF guide to MARY A. WHALEN inEnglish,French,German,Spanish,Italian The oil tankerMARY A. WHALENwas launched May 21, 1938.The ship is PortSide NewYork's ambassador to theBLUEspaceand site of our offices and many programs. Why she is…

Photograph of an able-bodied seaman working in snow flurries at Ira S. Bushey and Sons' old shipyard. The end of the line he is working on has been folded back and braided into itself to form a loop. He is inspecting and tightening that splice.…