Bought my First Old Town Canoe and I'm Looking for Information on it

HCharles

New Member
Hello,

I just bought my first Old Town Canoe and I'd like any information on it that might be available. The serial # is 88831 and it's 18' in length. I think it was made between 1923 and 1926.
 

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Welcome and congratulations, the Old Town canoe with serial number 88831 is an 18 foot long, CS (common sense or middle) grade, Otca model with red western cedar planking, open spruce gunwales, ash decks, ash thwarts, ash seats, a keel, and outside stems. It was built between November, 1925 and July, 1927. The original exterior paint color was dark red. It shipped on June 20th, 1928 to Cooperstown, New York. A scan of this build record can be found below.

This scan and several hundred thousand more were created with substantial grants from the Wooden Canoe Heritage Association (WCHA) and others. A description of the project to preserve these records is available at http://www.wcha.org/catalogs/old-town/records/ if you want more details. I hope that you will donate, join or renew your membership to the WCHA so that services like this can continue. See https://www.woodencanoe.org/about to learn more about the WCHA and https://www.woodencanoe.org/shop to donate or join.

It is also possible that you could have another number or manufacturer if this description doesn't match your canoe. Feel free to reply here if you have any other questions.

Benson



88831.gif
 
Hello Mr. Gray, Thank you for this information. It provides tremendous satisfaction in knowing the provenance of the canoe.
I'll be doing some restoration to it in the spring but not a full restoration because I like the patina on an old canoe.
I'm looking forward to becoming more involved with wood/canvas canoes and have a background in boat repair.

Sincerely,
HCharles
DuBois, Pa.
 
Looking at the gunnel construction. I'm thinking it says spruce but does anyone know what the first word is?
The canoe was essentially built in 1925 but not shipped until 1928. Would this be classified as a 1925 or 1928 Canoe?
 
Looking at the gunnel construction. I'm thinking it says spruce but does anyone know what the first word is?

The first word written on the gunwale line is "Open" which distinguishes it from the older closed style gunwales. See http://www.wcha.org/catalogs/old-town/specific.gif where the top rail in the diagram shows an open gunwale and the bottom one shows a closed gunwale. The shipped date is the 'birthday' most commonly used for classification purposes. See https://www.wcha.org/forums/index.php?threads/16294/ for more on this topic.

Benson
 
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