Old Town ?

[rockaway]

Can anyone help me, I just purchased a 17 ft.canoe from an elderly neighbor who was cleaning out his garage. Its a great looking canoe in dusty shape with no broken ribs. He said the canvas was replaced in 1978 & the canoe was used only twice since then. It came from his family's lake house & he believes it's a 1942 Old Town. The serial number is 81042 17. Any help would be appreciated.
Thanks.

 

[Benson Gray]

The Old Town canoe with serial number 81042 is a 17 foot long, CS grade, Charles River model with Western red cedar planking, open spruce gunwales, birch decks, birch trim, and a keel. It was built between October and December, 1923. The original exterior paint color was Br. (bright?) red with a black stripe. The original exterior paint design was probably similar to the image at http://www.wcha.org/catalogs/old-town/designs/design20.gif or one of the other simple single stripe designs shown at http://www.wcha.org/catalogs/old-town/designs/thumbnal.html with two colors. It shipped on April 14th, 1924 to Washington D. C. A scan of this build record can be found by following the link at the attached thumbnail image below.

This scan was 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 join or contribute to the WCHA so that services like this can continue. See http://www.wcha.org/wcha/ to learn more about the WCHA and http://www.wcha.org/join.html to 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

 

[rockaway]

Thank you for your help it's much appreciated! Based on your research I'm tempted to paint the canoe to match the build description.

Mike