The 3 boats you mentioned are as follows
54298 was assigned to a 17' Charles River in CS (common sense) grade with spruce rails and birch seats, decks and thwarts. It was painted Light Green and delivered to Hartford CT in June of 1919.
119987 was assigned to a 17' Otca in CS grade with spruce rails, oak seats,decks and thwarts and it had a keel and a floor rack. It was painted dark green and delivered to New Haven CT in April of 1937.
137730 was assigned to an 18' Otca in CS grade with spruce rails, Ash Seats, decks and thwarts, a keel and outside stems. It was painted dark green and delivered to Washington DC in 1943. This boat had damaged planking, but was repaired "Good as new"
Scans of all three boats are attached.
Why dark green? According to the build records project almost half (48%) were painted dark green. This and other useful information about the build records project can be found at
http://www.wcha.org/catalogs/old-town/records/index.html As far as designs go, look at
http://www.wcha.org/catalogs/old-town/designs/thumbnal.html for thumbnails of the many paint schemes Old Town offered over the years.
Scans of approximately 210,000 records were created with substantial grants from the Wooden Canoe Heritage Association (WCHA) and others. Additional information about the project to preserve these records is available at
http://www.wcha.org/catalogs/old-town/records/ if you want more details. Please join WCHA or make a tax deductable contribution 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. If you are already a WCHA member, THANK YOU!
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.
