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Drawing of the figurehead for the Ocean King; ink and watercolor on paper, 1873. Said to be the largest sailing vessel at the time of her launching on October 26, 1874, the Ocean King was a four-masted, 2516-ton, square-rigged ship commissioned by Captain Nathaniel Lord Thompson (1811-1889) and built in his shipyard in Kennebunk Lower Village. The Ocean King was so large that when it was launched, it went completely across to the opposite shore--a distance of over 400 feet--and the stern became grounded in the mud. A high tide three weeks later finally freed the vessel. This print is reproduced from the original 1873 pen, ink and watercolor rendering done for the Ocean King’s figurehead. The drawing of a trident-bearing Poseidon was presented to the ship’s owners for approval, and the resulting nine-foot figurehead was created by Messrs. Littlefield of Portland. The figurehead was heralded in a local newspaper of the day as being “the largest and best piece of wood carving ever done in Maine.” Because the Ocean King sank off Oregon’s Cape Arago en route to San Pedro in 1887, the magnificent figurehead is lost to history, but the drawing was donated to The Brick Store Museum by descendants of Captain Thompson. # # # |
