THE SHIPYARD PLANT

The first Danube Steamship Company began building its main shipyard in Óbuda in 1835. The Óbuda shipyard was soon followed by several branch shipyards and ship repair sites. Before 1845, DDSG’s maritime business was supported by a ship repair site in Therapia (now the Tarabya district of Istanbul). In 1852, a shipyard was founded in Korneuburg to serve the Upper Danube shipping routes, and in 1854 in Turnu Severin, which was purchased by the Romanian state in 1893. It had ship repair sites in Passau, Zimony, and for a short time in Pancsova and Galati. Shipbuilding only took place in Óbuda and Korneuburg, while only smaller wooden ships were built in Turnu Severin.

The DDSG Óbuda shipyard was a well-equipped factory. In 1898, its machinery had a total of 820 horsepower. In comparison, the machinery of the MÁV machinery factory produced 1,244 horsepower, and the machinery of the Danubius-Schoenichen-Hartmann shipyard produced 560 horsepower. At that time, according to the DDSG ledger, the value of the shipyard site, including the company hospital and workers’ apartments, amounted to nearly 2.5 million crowns. Compared to the Óbuda Shipyard, the branch shipyards were much smaller sites: while Óbuda employed an average of 2,000 people, Korneuburg had 3-400, and Turnu-Severin 2-300 workers employed at that time. A foundry also operated in the Óbuda shipyard from the early 1840s, two of whose managers (Ábrahám Ganz and Ignác Schlick) later became significant figures in Hungarian manufacturing. Similarly, Péter Veruda, József Hartmann and Hermann Schoenichen, who played a key role in the establishment of shipbuilding in Angyalföld-Újpest, also worked in the Óbuda shipyard.