Whessoe

Whessoe was once one of the largest employers at Darlington and on Teesside in the North East England. It was a leading supplier of chemical, oil and nuclear plant and an international instrumentation business and remains a leading low temperature storage specialist.

History

The Whessoe Company traces its origins back to an ironmongers shop founded by a Quaker, William Kitching, in the market town of Darlington, Co. Durham, England in 1791. The business grew, a small foundry was added to the shop and then a larger works was built on the outskirts of the town as the Kitching family supplied the developing railways and repaired and built locomotives and rolling stock. The business passed from the Kitchings to a relation through marriage, Charles Ianson in 1862/3. The term ‘Whessoe Foundry’ was first applied to Charles Ianson & Company in the 1860s, the name Whessoe being a locality name applied to the foundry [Wood R 'History of Whessoe' (unpublished MSS: 1954) DCRO] . Whessoe was a lost early English village the site of which is situated just north of the town.

In the 1890's Whessoe started designing and building gas plant, oil storage tanks and infrastructure for refineries. The company became listed on the London Stock Exchange in 1920 and Shell Transport & Trading purchased 51% of ordinary shares. The company was a leader in the design, fabrication and construction of pressure vessels and large-scale storage tanks, being the first to apply welding technology versus riveted construction.

In the 1960's, 1970's and 1980's the company split into various specialist divisions and then ultimately into Whessoe LGA Gas Technology Ltd which specialised in cryogenic and LT (low temperature) storage and capital construction projects and Whessoe Varec. Whessoe Varec focused on marine tanker and tank farm inventory management systems, providing complete solutions for inventory management, loss control, tank gauging and environmental safety, both onshore and offshore. Throughout this period the Heavy Engineering Divisions were major contractors in offshore construction, hydro-electric scheme penstocks and in nuclear power, being involved with the design and construction of reactor vessels for most British stations from Calder Hall to the AGR (Advanced gas-cooler reactors) at Hunterston B and Hinkley B. In a revolutionary step to reduce site construction these later AGR reactor vessels were fabricated at Darlington, constructed under cover at Dock Point on Teesside and floated to the construction sites on large barges. Many highly specialised products such as emergency coolers for nuclear submarines, submarine escape facilities, wind tunnels and nuclear fuel transportation flasks were also made on a 'jobbing' basis in the Darlington factory. Whessoe developed and supplied engineering software, especially pipe stress analysis programes, through its subsidiary Whessoe Computing Systems Ltd.

In the 1990's, the corporate headquarters of Whessoe Varec was moved to just outside Darlington, a few miles from the site of the original foundry. Whessoe LGA Gas Technology retained its headquarters in Darlington, no longer with a factory but with construction operations world wide. This company was owned by the German company Preussag Noell, it was then bought by Skanska and still operates (2008) now under Arabic ownership in the field of cryogenic and LT storage as Whessoe Oil and Gas.

In 1997 Endress+Hauser acquired Whessoe Varec. [ [http://www.ukbusinesspark.co.uk/whessoea.htm UK Business Park] ]

References

Other sources

* Whessoe Varec Website