Thomaston built more ocean-going sailing vessels than any other place in the country, and its ships crossed the oceans and returned with goods from ports around the world, including silks from France, crystal chandeliers from Austria, and table china from England, often sought on the shopping lists of wives for their husbands and brothers. In 1870, the full-rigged ship Samuel Watts was shown rounding the beacon while the schooner Charles F. Heyer was under construction on the stocks at the Walker Dunn Shipyard. The four-masted schooner Joseph G. Ray, built in 1901, was 204 feet long, 40.3 feet in the beam, had a depth of 19 feet, measured 1,062 tons, and sailed with a crew of nine.