rbandy
Curious about Wooden Canoes
I picked up a boat in Mystic that caught my eye. I thought it was an old hunting boat. When I got it home and began to look at it several things peeked my interest. It has seven, wide, clear, red cedar planks per side. The planks are butt edged and backed up with a full length batten, clench nailed or tacked in copper. There are oak ribs ~1" by 1/2" with slightly rounded edges on 10 inch centers that are copper fastened. The stem was sawn. There were no decks. There are copper slotted screws holding the heavier pieces together. The planking is 1/4" thick. The boat has a canoe stem to me and it appears the rear was cut off for the transom. If the rear wasn't removed the boat would be 16' long, 40" wide and 12.5" depth. There were some butternut pieces as well, but I don't know if they were original. The gunnels are oak and have small holes along the top every two inches like it had a canvas deck(?) or a gunnel cap of some sort. I've read that the wide plank batten seam and ribbed stuff was an early form of construction. It would be nice to know when this technique fell out of favor? There are no makers markings that I have found. Thanks
