Hog Island, Philadelphia

{{Use mdy dates|date=February 2025}} {{Use American English|date=January 2025}} {{Infobox settlement | background_color=    |image_skyline=Reading the Hog Island News.png |imagesize= |image_caption=Workers reading ''The Hog Island News'' in 1918 |image_flag= |name=Hog Island |settlement_type = Neighborhood of Philadelphia   |subdivision_type = Country |subdivision_name = United States |subdivision_type1 = State |subdivision_name1 = Pennsylvania |subdivision_type2 = County |subdivision_name2 = Delaware |subdivision_type3 = City |subdivision_name3 = Tinicum Township  | mapsize = 300px | map_caption = | pushpin_map = Philadelphia | pushpin_label_position = | pushpin_map_caption = | pushpin_mapsize = | coordinates = {{Coord|39.871944|-75.241111|format=dms|display=title,inline}}  |postal_code_type= |postal_code= |area_codes=215, 267 and 445 }}

'''Hog Island''' is the historic name of an area southeast of Tinicum Township, Pennsylvania, United States, along the Delaware River, to the west of the mouth of the Schuylkill River. Part of Philadelphia International Airport now occupies Hog Island and the infilled channel behind it. It was the site of a major shipyard during World War I; sandwiches made for workers there may be the origin of the name "hoagie".

==History== European settlers purchased Hog Island from the Lenape (Delaware) tribe in 1680. The settlers gradually developed the island by building log and earthwork dikes to minimize storm damage and convert the marshes into meadows for grazing. Hog Island supposedly got its name from the pigs which local residents left to roam free, as no fencing was needed.{{cn|date=May 2026}}

thumb|Aerial view of Emergency Fleet Corporation's Hog Island yard 1920.

In 1917, as part of the World War I effort, the U.S. government contracted American International Shipbuilding Corp. to build ships and a shipyard at Hog Island. At the time, Hog Island was the largest shipyard in the world, with 50 slipways.{{cn|date=May 2026}}

In 1918, a 4.5-mile (7.2 km) rail line was built to connect Hog Island with Philadelphia: the 60th Street Branch of the Pennsylvania Railroad.<ref name="Netzlof">{{cite web | url=http://rnetzlof.pennsyrr.com/corphist/pb_w.html | title=Corporate Genealogy Philadelphia, Baltimore & Washington | publisher=Robert T. Netzlof | date=7 March 2001 | access-date=7 October 2019 | author=Netzlof, Robert T. | archive-url=https://archive.today/20120722124323/http://rnetzlof.pennsyrr.com/corphist/pb_w.html | archive-date=22 July 2012 | url-status=dead | df=dmy-all }}</ref>

The first ship, named {{SS|Quistconck}} for the Lenape name for the site, was christened August 5, 1918, by Edith Bolling Wilson, wife of U.S. President Woodrow Wilson.<ref>{{cite web |last1=Worcester |first1=Kimball |title=The Great War's Largest Shipyard: Hog Island, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania |date=7 February 2015 |url=http://roadstothegreatwar-ww1.blogspot.com/2015/02/the-great-wars-largest-shipyard-hog.html |publisher=roadstothegreatwar-ww1.blogspot.com |access-date=4 October 2018 |archive-date=October 4, 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20181004144943/http://roadstothegreatwar-ww1.blogspot.com/2015/02/the-great-wars-largest-shipyard-hog.html |url-status=live }}</ref> The shipbuilding process practiced on Hog Island was an early experiment in standardized construction of ships. The ships built there, known as "Hog Islanders", were considered ugly but well-built. In all, 122 craft were built, mostly cargo ships, and a few troop transports. The shipbuilding continued until 1921, after which the facility was rapidly demolished. None of the ships were ready in time to participate in World War I, but many of them were involved in World War II.{{cn|date=May 2026}} Two of the locomotive steam gantry cranes were sold as surplus to the city of Trenton, New Jersey, where they remain today as the Hog Island Cranes, listed on the National Register of Historic Places.<ref>{{cite web|last1=Kardas|first1=S.|last2=Larrabee|first2=E.|title=Hog Island Cranes|url=https://npgallery.nps.gov/NRHP/GetAsset/NRHP/80002500_text|department=National Register of Historic Places|publisher=National Park Service|access-date=March 10, 2016|archive-date=May 15, 2023|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230515212930/https://npgallery.nps.gov/NRHP/GetAsset/NRHP/80002500_text|url-status=live}}</ref> Another crane, a 20-ton industrial locomotive crane, was sold to the Hyde, McFarlan & Burke contracting company.<ref name="ironage1921">{{cite journal | title=Machinery Markets and News of the Works | url=https://books.google.com/books?id=UydKAQAAMAAJ&q=%22Hyde%2C+McFarlan+%26+Burke%22&pg=PA1151 | journal=The Iron Age | date=April 28, 1921 | volume=107 |issue=17 | page=1151}}</ref>

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers filled in the creek separating Hog Island from the mainland with silt dredged from the shipping channels, making Hog Island part of the mainland.{{cn|date=May 2026}}

alt=Sepia drawing of Hog Island from overhead with planes and a zeppelin.|thumb|339x339px|Hand-drawn site plan of future Philadelphia airport, date unknown.

Air operations began on Hog Island in 1925, when the Pennsylvania Air National Guard used a small part of it as a training field for its pilots. In 1927, the site was dedicated as the "Philadelphia Municipal Airport" by Charles Lindbergh, who flew in on the ''Spirit of Saint Louis''. More than a decade would pass before the airport would become the region's main air hub. The city of Philadelphia bought Hog Island from the Federal government in 1930 for $3 million, but the Great Depression delayed work until 1937. In the meantime, Camden Central Airport, opened in 1929 in New Jersey, served as the city's main airport until Philadelphia Municipal Airport opened on June 20, 1940.{{cn|date=May 2026}}

==In popular culture== One legend of the origin of the hoagie sandwich is tied to Hog Island. Domenic Vitiello, professor of Urban Studies at the University of Pennsylvania, asserts that Italians working on Hog Island in the old Navy Yard introduced the sandwich, by putting various meats, cheeses, and lettuce between two slices of bread. This became known as the "Hog Island" sandwich; hence, the "hoagie".<ref>"[http://www.34st.com/article/2007/04/node-3965 Philly Via Italy] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170113101609/http://www.34st.com/article/2007/04/node-3965 |date=January 13, 2017 }}", ''thirtyfourthstreetmagazine'', April 17, 2007, page 9.</ref>

==See also== * Fort Mifflin * Hog Islander * Hog Island Cranes

==References== {{Reflist}}

== External links == * [https://web.archive.org/web/20160714210448/http://www.shipbuildinghistory.com/history/shipyards/4emergencylarge/wwone/aisc.htm List of ships built by the Hog Island Shipyard] * [https://web.archive.org/web/20050128083534/http://tmh.floonet.net/articles/hogisle.shtml Controversy about the shipbuilding operation] * [http://findingaids.hagley.org/xtf/view?docId=ead/0884.xml Frederick W. Wood papers] at Hagley Museum and Library. Wood was vice president of the American International Shipbuilding Corporation and played a major part in the construction and operation of the shipyard at Hog Island. * [https://web.archive.org/web/20131107132035/http://tmh.floonet.net/articles/hogisle.shtml "The Saga of Hog Island, 1917–1921: The Story of the First Great War Boondoggle"], James J. Martin

Category:Neighborhoods in Philadelphia Category:Southwest Philadelphia Category:Shipyards of the United States Category:Philadelphia International Airport