Northwest Steel

Northwest Steel was a small shipyard in Portland, Oregon. Little is known of its background or owners, but during World War I the yard built cargo ships for the United States Shipping Board (USSB). Some 37 of the 46 ships ship built at Northwest Steel were the "West" boats, a series of steel-hulled cargo ships built for the USSB on the West Coast of the United States as part of the World War I war effort.
It was headed by Joseph R. Bowles, who was indicted for bribing a government official in about 1918 and then convicted of contempt of court. He was later described as a "greedy, domineering and difficult person, with no sense of civic responsibility."
The first ship built at Northwest Steel was the cargo ship , originally launched on March 31, 1917 as the Cunard Line ship "Vesterlide", a British-flagged ship sunk by German submarine "U-55" in January 1918. The final ship built was the tanker "Swiftwind", completed in June 1921.