During the year 1861, the company Harland and Wolff was established. Mr. Gustav Wilhelm Wolff, born within Hamburg during 1834, and Mr. Edward James Harland born during the year 1831, established the company. During the year 1858 Harland, who was the general manager at the time, bought the small shipyard on Queen's Island. He bought the property from his employer, Richard Hickson.
Harland at one time purchased Hickson's shipyard and made his assistant Wolff a partner in the company. Gustav Wolff was Gustav Schwabe of Hamburg's nephew. He has invested mainly in the Bibby Line. The initial 3 ships which were constructed by the brand new shipyard were for that line. By being inventive, Harland made the business a successful venture. Among his well-known suggestions was increasing the ship's overall strength by utilizing iron for the upper wodden decks. What's more, he was able to increase the ship's capacity by giving the hulls a squarer cross section and a flatter bottom.
Harland and Wolff were eventually faced with competitive pressures in regards to building ships. They sought to shift their focus and broaden their portfolio. They decided to concentrate less on shipbuilding and more on structural design and engineering. The business even diversified into the fields of offshore construction projects, ship repair and competing for additional projects that had to do with metal engineering or construction.
These other interests led to Harland and Wolff constructing a series of bridges in Britain and in the Republic of Ireland. These bridges comprise the restoration of Dublin's Ha'penny Bridge and the James Joyce Bridge. During the 1980s, their initial foray into the civil engineering sector took place with the construction of the Foyle Bridge.
The MV Anvil Point was the last shipbuilding job of Harland and Wolff to date. This was one of six almost identical Point class sealift ships that was built for use by the Ministry of Defense. The ship was launched during 2003, after being built under license from German shipbuilders Flensburger, Schiffbau-Gesellschaft.