User:Gatoclass/SB/Ariel Patterson

Ariel Patterson
Ariel Patterson
Born	September , 1807; Brockville, Canada
Nationality	Canadian American
Occupation	Shipbuilder
Years active	ca. 1825–ca. 1867
Spouse	Helen Ayers
Children	7
Relatives	William Perine (brother-in-law)

Life and career

Ariel Patterson was born in September 1807 in Brockville, Canada, a village on the north shore of the Saint Lawrence River. Patterson moved to New York at the age of sixteen, where he commenced training as a shipbuilder.

In 1845, Patterson joined forces with two other shipbuilders, William Perine and Thomas Stack, to establish the firm of Perine, Patterson & Stack. In its brief eight years of existence, this firm would rise to the front rank of New York-based shipbuilding companies, with output rivalling that of the state's two most prolific shipbuilders, William H. Webb and J. A. Westervelt.[1] Perine, Patterson & Stack was noted for its clippers, steamships and transatlantic packet ships, and it also built a substantial number of ferryboats. With more than 60 ships built in the course of its history, the company's record accounts for the bulk of Patterson's output as a shipbuilder.

During the "boom" year of 1853, Perine, Patterson & Stack was dissolved, with the three former partners each subsequently establishing their own independent shipyards. Patterson's new shipyard was in Williamsburg, just north of the former yard. In 1854, his first full year of operation as an independent shipbuilder, he attracted a large business, his yard completing seven vessels, including five full-rigged ships, for a total in excess of 7,000 register tons. Before the year was out, however, the U.S. shipbuilding industry had entered a slump. Patterson built only one vessel in 1855—a small lighter—and he came to focus on ship repairs rather than ship building. He also became a timber merchant, specializing in the supply of custom timber to other shipbuilders.

Although Patterson built few ships during the American Civil War, he nonetheless "did a great deal of shipbuilding for the United States government", one given example being his reported supervision of all the woodwork for the monitor USS Dictator. In 1863, he attempted to organize the construction in Brooklyn of a new $750,000 sectional dock, with the financial backing of Cornelius Vanderbilt and others, but the project was eventually shelved indefinitely due to high wartime inflation.

Patterson evidently made a substantial investment in his shipyard during the war. In 1864, he completed "a sawing and planing mill for ship work exclusively". The mill included steam-powered lifting equipment, composed of chains and pulleys, that enabled a team of two men to "lift ... with ease a weight of two or three tons", leaving his workforce with "but little manual labor to perform". A "fearful" planer was used to plane ship knees which were "fed along by the engine", while another planer "of very superior make and of the newest pattern ... polishes off an almost incredible amount of lumber daily". "Large and small circular and other saws" were also installed. Power for the whole was supplied by a steam engine plant "on the opposite side of North 3d Street, the shaft passing under the roadway." The mill itself was designed by Patterson, using "an inverse system of bracing" said to be stronger, and cheaper to build, than common methods. Patterson's yard also had facilities for the "planing, turning, punching and cutting" of metal.

Patterson reportedly "retired from business" in 1867, during the prolonged postwar shipbuilding slump that devastated the industry in New York.

Personal details

Ships of note

Production table

*Ships built by Ariel Patterson, 1854–65*
Name^[a]	Type ^[b]	Built ^[c]	Ton. ^[d]	Ordered by^[e]	Intended service	Notes
Lady Jane	Schooner	1853	210	J. K?shan et al	California
William Layton	Ship	1854	1000
David Hoadley	Ship	1854	975	Post, Smith & Co.^[f]		mystic58
Francis B. Cutting	Ship	1854	970	Russell H. Post & Co	Transatlantic	mystic58
Jeremiah Thompson	Ship	1854	1904	Thompson & Stephens	Transatlantic	mystic58
Emily Keith	Schooner	1854	240	M. H. Keith	General freighting
City of New York	Ship	1854	1815	Kingston & Sutton	Transatlantic	mystic1858 Last entry in shipping registers 1876
	Lighter	1855	70			Only vessel launched by Patterson in 1855
	Lighter	1864		Stearns & Lowber		Experimental design using Patterson's patented compressed trenails.
Ariel Patterson	Pilot boat	1864
Sub Marine Explorer	Submarine	1865		Pacific Pearl Co

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