Gladding-Hearn Shipbuilding is a
shipyard
A shipyard, also called a dockyard or boatyard, is a place where ships are built and repaired. These can be yachts, military vessels, cruise liners or other cargo or passenger ships. Dockyards are sometimes more associated with maintenance a ...
located in
Somerset, Massachusetts
Somerset is a town in Bristol County, Massachusetts, United States. The population was 18,303 at the 2020 census. It is the birthplace and hometown of Clifford Milburn Holland (1883–1924), the chief engineer and namesake of the Holland Tunnel ...
on the
Taunton River
The Taunton River (historically also called the "Taunton Great River"), is a river in southeastern Massachusetts in the United States. It arises from the confluence of the Town River and Matfield River, in the town of Bridgewater. From the ...
.
It primarily builds
pilot boat
A pilot boat is a type of boat used to transport maritime pilots between land and the inbound or outbound ships that they are piloting. Pilot boats were once sailing boats that had to be fast because the first pilot to reach the incoming ship ...
s and high-speed catamaran ferries.
Gladding-Hearn was founded in 1954 by Preston Gladding and Richard Hearn, and delivered its first vessel, a fishing boat, in 1956.
The company built largely tugboats, pilot boats, and fishing vessels for the next several decades.
In 1977, Gladding-Hearn was the first American shipyard to launch a tug equipped with a
Z-drive
A Z-drive is a type of marine propulsion unit. Specifically, it is an azimuth thruster. The pod can rotate 360 degrees allowing for rapid changes in thrust direction and thus vessel direction. This eliminates the need for a conventional rudder.
...
propulsion system,
and in 1978 built the first pilot boat to a deep-V hull design by naval architect
C. Raymond Hunt
C. Raymond Hunt Associates (doing business as Ray Hunt Design) is an American naval architecture design firm, based in New Bedford, Massachusetts. The company specializes in the design of fiberglass sailboats and powerboats.
The company was f ...
that became the industry standard in following years.
In 1983, company vice president George Duclos bought out Gladding and Hearn and established the shipyard as a subsidiary of his family company, the Duclos Corporation.
In 1984, Gladding-Hearn became a licensee of designer Incat (now
Incat Crowther
Incat Crowther is an Australian Company, headquartered in Belrose, a suburb of Sydney specializing in Marine engineering design. Incat Crowther has offices in Lafayette, Louisiana, United States and Romsey, UK.
The company has a diverse produc ...
), giving it access to designs for high speed catamaran vessels.
It has since built the majority of such vessels in service on the Eastern seaboard and Great Lakes.
As of 2016, Gladding-Hearn had built more than 400 ships, with 120 in active service for 38 operators.
References
{{reflist
Shipyards of Massachusetts
Companies based in Massachusetts
1954 establishments in Massachusetts