The great shipyards of the River Tyne have been all but erased by the passage of time. The ships, cranes, dry docks, and workers have passed into history.
The river is quieter today, no longer the banging, clanking hive of industrial activity that helped power the North East’s economy for well over a century. Hundreds of ships of every kind were built at yards in Scotswood, Elswick, Newcastle, Gateshead, St Peters, High Walker, Low Walker, Hebburn, Jarrow, Willington Quay, Howdon, Coble Dean, North Shields, South Shields, Bill Quay and, perhaps most famously, here at Wallsend.
Our two photographs from the ChronicleLive archive show the launch of the 115,000-ton tanker Nacella 55 years ago in March 1968 at the renowned Swan Hunter yard. Shipbuilding had come to define the river across many decades and was a way of life for people in our region.
