Earle's Shipbuilding

Earle's faced difficulties when Charles died and William was taken ill. In the latter part of the 1890s, the firm suffered both cash-flow problems and a labour shortage, and in 1900, it entered voluntary liquidation. However, Charles Wilson bought the firm for about £170,000, keeping the Earle's name, but making it a wholly owned subsidiary of Wilson Line.

In 1904, Earle's built SS Inca for the Peruvian Corporation, a UK-owned company that ran Peru's railways. She was built as a "knock down" ship; that is, she was bolted together at Earle's shipyard, then all her parts were marked with numbers, unbolted and packed into crates, and then shipped in kit form to Peru, where they were transported inland, reassembled with rivets, and in 1905 launched on Lake Titicaca, the highest navigable lake in the world. In the 1920s Inca needed a new bottom, so Earle's made one in kit form and shipped that to Peru as well.

In 1929, Earle's built a larger "knock down" ship for the Peruvian Corporation, SS Ollanta, which was launched on Lake Titicaca in 1931. By now, manufacturing in the UK was declining in the Great Depression and after Ollanta, Earle's built only three more ships. The UK government sponsored a rationalisation of the shipbuilding industry, and in 1932, the National Shipbuilders Securities (NSS) took over Earle's. NSS sold Earle's tools and machinery, shipping the yard's large crane and other equipment to Kowloon in Hong Kong. The terms of Earle's closure included a restrictive covenant on the site of the yard proscribing any shipbuilding there for the following 60 years.