Royal Sealift Company: Difference between revisions

The Royal Sealift Company was one of many shipbuilding enterprises opened during the reign of [[King Aedanicus VIII]], who started a massive project of construction and modernization of the [[Royal Navy (Urcea)|Royal Navy]]. Michael Grathal Scarra, an engineer and one-time manager at a whaling shipyard in [[Carolina]], saw the potential profits to be made from Royal Navy contracts and quickly purchased land to build drydocks as quickly as possible. After acquiring the land, Scarra reached out to his network of naval engineers and managers to form the Royal Sealift Company in 1861. The diversity of experience and backgrounds of his network of contacts proved invaluable, as the Royal Sealift Company's corps of engineers were soon considered to be one of the most pioneering in [[Urcea]]. This reputation allowed it to survive the end of the shipbuilding boom in the 1870s as the market began to contract to a few companies. Briefly doing business as the ''Regal Sealift Company'' during the regency of [[Gréagóir FitzRex]], the company was in contact with the Legitimist movement during the [[Red Interregnum]] and intentionally slowed production of ships for the Regal Navy. Scarra, a committed monarchist, also provided details of orders and the specifications of the ships he constructed during the conflict to the Legitimists and their allies. Receiving a full pardon from [[King Patrick III]] for any collaboration with the Regency, Scarra received several decorations from the King before his death in 1904. Scarra's son, Lucás Scarra, became the head of the company on his father's death, and he began to work closely with many of the radical naval theorists from [[Burgundie]] that the King kept close by. The second shipbuilding boom lead to a massive expansion of the company as it became one of the largest shipbuilding firms in [[Levantia]]. The "golden era" of the company, the Royal Sealift Company designed and constructed Urcea's first [[Archduchy-class battleship|dreadnought]], the HMCMS ''Royal Hound'', earning it international fame. The Royal Sealift Company eclipsed its competitors to become the largest naval contractor in [[Urcea]] by 1915, and it had an initial public offering in 1923. The Royal Sealift Company played an instrumental role in the expansion of the Royal Navy just prior to the [[Great War]] and was responsible for producing hundreds of ships during the conflict, earning it the admiration of the public and the [[Government of Urcea]]. During the war, it became one of Urcea's largest corporations, a position it maintains through the present.