Shipbuilder Clement Littlefield was a very young man when he established The Emmons & Littlefield Shipyard in Kennebunk Lower Village in the 1840s. Biddeford Journal correspondent, Jules Righter made his acquaintance in 1887 on a grassy knoll adjoining Littlefield’s home on Chase Hill Road.

“I came here [from Wells] when I was sixteen years old and went to work, learning my trade, at the Landing up there,” the retired shipbuilder said, pointing upriver. “We worked from sunrise up to sunset in those days.”… “When I was twenty-one years old, I had acquired sufficient proficiency in my trade so that I was made foreman of the yard, where I was at the time. Shortly after that I bought this field down here and had a shipyard of my own. This was a splendid place, you see. We could haul our lumber over to this high ground and then chuck it right down over the bank to the craft we happened to be working on. I had a steam mill where we used to cut all of our lumber.”

The reporter then inquired about the workmen hired by the various yards. “You used to employ more men down here than at the Landing, didn’t you?” “Oh yes;” was his response. “Up there we only had about twenty men at work on a vessel at a time. Down here we used to employ over 100. Sometimes we built two or three vessels at a time.”

1856 was a tough year for area shipbuilders. Emmons & Littlefield Yard was assigned in October of 1856. Landing shipbuilder, Nathaniel Lord Thompson, who had contracted the Littlefield yard to build ships for him since 1854, purchased what was left of the failed business in 1858 and sold part of the property to the Clark brothers, David and Abner, who had each married one of Clement Littlefield’s daughters. As Master Carpenter, Clement Littlefield continued building ships for N.L. Thompson. He also built for his son in-law before David Clark moved across the river to the old D&S Ward shipyard in Kennebunkport in 1880.