Background of the building:

The Lord Line building was just one of many buildings that made up St Andrews Dock. The Dock opened in 1883 and was originally designed for the coal trade, but was almost exclusively used for the fishing trade/industry. The Docks had almost everything including: shops, cafes and a police station. The Lord Line building officially opened in 1949 for the Hull trawling industry. This trawling industry later declined as there was a 200 mile limit for fisherman to fish. This then lead to the dock closing in 1975. In a 1954 survey it said for every fisherman working at sea, there where up to three people working ashore in associated jobs. This totalled almost 50,000 workers.The Lord Line  building is now owned by North Ferriby and has now be derelict for several years. There has been many plans to make things in its place. For example hotels or restaurant's. All of these plans have been rejected so far.

 

The history of St. Andrew's Dock is very closely associated with the history of the deep-sea trawling industry, and as the dock itself began to disappear through the development of the site for retail and leisure uses, many Hull people felt that a part of their history was also disappearing, a history with which many of them had close family ties. A strong campaign was therefore launched to save something of the dock and its surroundings, both to explain to future generations what the industry was about and to preserve the memory of the many people who had sacrificed their lives to it