The Carleton, Norwood & Co. Records document the business activities of Carleton, Norwood & Co., a shipbuilding company and lime manufacturer based in the Camden-Rockport area of Maine. The collection thoroughly documents the firm’s management of a fleet of vessels, their lime business, and their various building projects around Camden and Rockport. Not included in this collection are records from their shipyard, although materials throughout the series do provide some documentation of the firm's shipbuilding activities. Materials include ships’ papers, business correspondence, financial records, personal papers, and bound volumes. The bulk of materials were created by Carleton, Norwood & Co., the firms’ business associates, and ships’ captains. The collection is divided into four series.

Series I. Ships' Papers contains ships’ papers for vessels owned or managed by Carleton, Norwood & Co.. Many of these materials document the activities of vessels built in Carleton, Norwood & Co.’s own shipyard, with particularly strong focus on Adelia T. Carleton (Schooner), Edgar W. Murdock (Schooner), Emma Knowlton (Schooner), Hattie C. Luce (Schooner), Jennie Harkness (Bark), S. D. Carleton (Ship), and William H. Macy (Ship). Materials include telegrams, bills and receipts, protests, shipping articles, charter parties, manifests, and accounts of sales. Ships’ papers are arranged alphabetically by vessel name and chronologically within each folder. A complete list of vessels named in the collection is available in Appendix I. Ship Index.

Series II. Correspondence contains correspondence created by or sent to Carleton, Norwood & Co., with the bulk of materials created by business associates and ships’ captains and sent to the firm. Materials include letters, telegrams, and advertisements. The series is divided into two subseries. Subseries I contains materials created by correspondents who wrote a substantial number of letters to the firm or who hold particular research interest in relation to the content and context of their correspondence, and materials are arranged alphabetically by correspondents’ names, then chronologically within each folder. Subseries II contains all other correspondence and is arranged chronologically.

When taken together, the ships’ papers and correspondence provide an in-depth view of shipping activities in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, with the bulk of materials dating from the 1880s through the end of World War I. Carleton, Norwood & Co. worked closely with several shipping firms over the course of their business activities, particularly J.F. Chapman & Co., Charles Hunt & Co., Johnson & Higgins, Snow & Burgess, and W.R. Grace & Co.. The company’s correspondence with these firms was frequent and thorough, and the information in each letter offers narrative connections that link the ships’ papers together. A core strength of the collection lies in the rich correspondence from the ships’ captains, many of whom worked with Carleton, Norwood & Co. for a number of years and sometimes on several different vessels. The captains whose correspondence is of particular interest are Simon H. Wall, Forrest K. Torrey, James Allen Hudson, J.O. Farrow, David S. Kent, Frank A. Magune, F.H. Cooper, and Lucien P. Heal. Their letters form the heart of the collection and offer not only detailed information about each voyage and vessel, but also insight into the professional relationships and personal friendships between the captains and the members of the firm.

Series III. Financial Records contains materials documenting the financial activities of the firm, including account books, bills and receipts, banking records, estate documents, insurance on non-vessel properties, and pay stubs from their lime quarry. Account books form the bulk of the firm’s financial records. The cash books, day books, and ledgers in particular document every aspect of the business through the daily and yearly transactions of the company throughout most of its existence, beginning in 1849 only five years after the firm had built their first vessel and ending in 1927 after the death of co-partner Ralph W. Carleton. Also of interest are documents from the estate of founding member S.D. Carleton, which provide insight into a major shift in the firm’s management after his death in 1892. Materials in this series are arranged by type of record, then chronologically.

Series IV. Family Papers and Records includes records from other businesses run by the Carleton family, as well as personal papers from Carleton, Norwood & Co.'s partners. The business records in this series include ledgers from Carleton Brothers & Company, an inventory from the Carleton House hotel, and S.D. Carleton's account ledger for the Knox County Lime Association, in which he served as a trustee. The personal papers offer a brief insight into P.J. Carleton's substantial involvement with the Masons and other fraternal organizations, and also include materials from his sons Ralph W. and Frank P.J. Carleton.