A decade of build record research

Benson Gray

Canoe History Enthusiast
Staff member
I was recently surprised to realize that I've been researching of old canoe records for over a decade. This seemed like a good time to reflect upon what I have learned from looking up over 5000 records (which works out to slightly less than one and a half records per day). Over 3800 of these requests were for Old Towns so that is the focus of this analysis.

The inquiries for records have not arrived at a uniform rate as shown in the blue chart below. The demand grew reasonably steadily until the peak 2014 and have been falling off since then. This may mean that we have reached the point where enough barns and boat houses have been searched for old canoes that new discoveries may now come at a decreasing rate.

Everyone expects newer canoes to be more common than older ones but the green chart below shows that the difference is less dramatic than anticipated. The bump at the low end up to the 20000 range is probably due to the overlap with the Carleton and Kennebec serial number ranges. People will frequently request a low Old Town serial number and then discover that they actually have a canoe from another builder when the Old Town build record doesn't match their canoe. The drop off after the 185000 range may reflect that far fewer wooden canoes were being built then and that plastic canoe owners are less interested in researching their build records.

I wonder how this will all change over the next ten years.

Benson
 

Attachments

  • Records-by-number.gif
    Records-by-number.gif
    95.5 KB · Views: 381
  • Records-by-date.gif
    Records-by-date.gif
    77.9 KB · Views: 383
Last edited:
Hopefully one day my wood strip canoes will show on these charts.Two went to France one to Italy,one is in Norway,One is hanging up in a real ale and pizza place in the middle of London,One is somewhere near Bath also in the UK another in wiltshire, and two are hanging up in the Seaview restaurant in Saltburn on Sea UK.

Oh and there's mine of course near Peterborough UK. :)

20160730_125645.jpgP1010067.JPGpelttraderlondon3-620x418.jpgP1010059.JPGinside view 2.jpg
 

Attachments

  • 20160723_120849.jpg
    20160723_120849.jpg
    149.9 KB · Views: 318
Impressive and worthy of thanks/recognition from the organization. Most new traffic through this site is from someone whom has recently acquired a wood and canvas canoe. At face value they are starting to explore the history of their acquisition but in many cases their interest overflows as they learn about the industry, the brands, the builders.
Providing the new owner serial number and builder information is always an impressive accomplishment.

Knowing that you are a data miner and thorough researcher (not to mention pretty good at compiling and sorting excel charts and pushing out related graphs) I am half expecting you to have already analyzed what the average ages of the boats that you researched has been through the years that you have been doing it. That was my thought as I looked at your charts... were you identifying more older boats in the 1990's than you have been throughout the last 5 years? If it were anyone I wouldn't ask but in all seriousness I half expect that you are already working on this.

Cheers,

Mike
 
Hopefully one day my wood strip canoes will show on these charts.

If you have been putting serial numbers in these wonderful canoes and keeping any records of them that you are willing to share then please send them along.


I am half expecting you to have already analyzed what the average ages of the boats that you researched has been through the years that you have been doing it.

This is an interesting question but I haven't been keeping any records of this information. The chart below shows my best guess. It was fairly easy to calculate the average serial number for each of the past ten years with significant research data (after removing the few modern ones in the 787000 range which would have badly skewed the averages). The data behind the charts at http://www.wcha.org/catalogs/old-town/oldtown_chart.html provided a rough way to convert the serial numbers to dates. There is no obvious trend and it appears to be more of a random walk.

Benson
 

Attachments

  • Average-dates.gif
    Average-dates.gif
    32 KB · Views: 366
If you have been putting serial numbers in these wonderful canoes and keeping any records of them that you are willing to share then please send them along.


Benson

Hi Benson
When I started I didn't put anything on them.Then on the third boat I put a green oval shaped paper label under the resin identifying it as Peterborough no 3 made by Alick Burt.
Then I moved on to brass plates calling them as before by design (Peterborough)followed by a number 4-5-6 etc.
As yet I have only built one Sunnyside Cruiser so that is Sunnyside Cruiser 1 and the same goes for the Guillemot Sea Kayak.
Here's a picture of one of my brass plates which are screwed and glued to the epoxy.
20151218_111357.jpg
 
Back
Top