Bob Sherlock
Curious about Wooden Canoes
Sharing the story of my newly restored 1925 Old Town 16’ HW CS grade #86225.
The Start
In 1970 or '71, I found this canoe in a Providence Journal classified ad. I was 15. My dad drove me to the sellers’ home near Narragansett Bay. We found it in water-ready condition though clearly older and banged up: reddish brown wood on the inside, with black-painted gunwales, thwarts, decks and seats, and a thick coat of red fiberglass. I bought it with $40 saved from my paper route. We stopped at a marina and bought paddles and life vests.
I sure enjoyed it. Along with plenty of paddling at a family lake place, I remember a couple of grand adventures with my friend Chris in the early 1970s. One was canoe camping on Maine’s Mooselookmeguntic Lake, where the long fetch built up waves three or four feet deep. That HW hull beneath our knees quartered over the waves beautifully. Another was paddling the 26-mile Great Canoe Race from Pawtucket down Narragansett Bay to Newport. The winds and waves weren't particularly bad that day, but at one point we had to paddle like mad to dodge a destroyer coming into the naval base. We could see sailors lined up on deck and heard an incredulous yell: “It’s a canoe!”
Letting It Get Away
Eventually it sat unused while I was away at college in Maine. My buddy Warren from Portland was very interested in buying the canoe from me and fixing it up properly. I needed money and sold it to him. Some years later Warren’s neighbor Chuck bought it from him and did considerable work – stripping off the red fiberglass, replacing the outwales, re-fiberglassing the hull, painting it blue green – and used it at his camp in Maine.
As the years went by, I missed it and wished I hadn’t sold. I’d tell Warren now and then that if Chuck would ever part with it, I’d like to be first in line. He’d call Chuck, but the answer stayed no.
Reunion
In December of 2024, I received an email from Warren that Chuck was ready to get rid of it and I could have it for free. Of course I said, “I’m in!” Warren picked it up for me a couple of days later. He assessed that “The old girl needs some work – new gunnels and keel, patching a 3-inch hole, and a new glass job. The inside woodwork still looks good for a canoe 100 years old. And for God’s sake, make her green – the color a canoe should be!”
I called Old Town Canoe Company to order replacement parts. A friendly customer service rep informed me that Island Falls Canoe had taken over the wood and canvas business and could make gunwales and other parts for me. She also sent me the scanned build record, which shows the original customer in Wakefield RI, right in the vicinity where I bought it about 45 years later. She also told me about the WCHA. I promptly joined.
In January last year, my partner Marlene and went to Warren’s in Maine and picked it up. Driving back to western Massachusetts through cold, snow-covered New Hampshire with the canoe on the roof drew double-takes – and teasing at a gas-n-go (“You know you have a hole in that thing??”).
Overhaul / Restoration
Concerned about what I could handle on my own, I decided instead to seek a professional restorer. One highly respected one thought it a dubious project that could run into five figures. Far from discouraged, I decided to tackle at least the woodwork phase myself. While not a skilled and equipped woodworker, I’m handy and knew I could learn from books, WCHA members, this Forum, and suppliers. With difficult-for-me-to-make parts such as upper stem replacements, decks and gunwales, keel and ribs to be made by Island Falls Canoe, it seemed doable. Fellow Western Mass WCHA members Tom Anderson and Alan Doty invited me along to the 2025 Norumbega Chapter meeting. They assessed the canoe when they came by to pick me up and assured me that many canoes in worse condition had been restored.
On a drive home from Northern Maine a few months later, I swung by Island Falls Canoe in Atkinson where I met Jerry Stelmok and received my order and his helpful advice. Caning the seats looked beyond what I could tackle. I sent the refinished frames to Dennis King at Maine Caning in Orono, who did a great job.
I stripped off the fiberglass and began woodwork in Summer 2025 at the fist-sized hole through the planking and rib near the stern seat. I soon discovered cracked ribs and weak planks. I replaced 12½ ribs and over 50 feet of planking by the end.
In time it became clear that dozens of the rib tips were in no condition to hold new fasteners, so I had to scarf or repair all the remaining originals. The original birch thwarts were decent. I repaired the ends and cut thin brass plates, modeled after the V-plates Old Town once used, to help the thwart bolts handle strain and serve as integrated washers. One of the original red brass diamond head bolts was missing, so I replaced it with a replica yellow brass one. The other bolts and nuts cleaned up well after soaking for a week in ketchup.
I very much wanted to keep the reddish-brown patina in the interior, just as I remembered from my youth. I brought pieces of new cedar plus old rib and plank to my local Sherwin-Williams manager Jillian, who was intrigued by the challenge. She custom-mixed a stain for a pretty good match. To get closer still, I wiped a little standard Red Mahogany stain over the custom one. Discerning eyes can tell new wood from the old, but casual observers don’t notice.
I kept working through the fall and winter and finished the hull woodwork in March of this year.
Originally I supposed that re-fiberglassing the hull would be the best option. Over time I learned the disadvantages and risks, and that canvassing is done for good reasons besides restoration purity. I hesitated at doing the canvas job on my own and reached out to Norumbega Chapter president Chuck Cossaboom for his advice on finding someone. Fortunately, he asked if I’d be open to a canvas party where the expertise and hands-on help of members would make things easy. Well, didn’t I jump at that! Chuck, Steve Lapey, Barry Goldberg, Paul Charos, Jeff Morrill, and Lawton Gaines helped Marlene and me put a beautiful canvas job on this Old Town.
In spring I filled the canvas and left it for eight weeks, then spent much of the summer on the remaining steps needed to get this 101-year-old into the water. Finished out, she’s slender and 69 pounds.
I’m grateful to past owners Warren and Chuck for getting the canoe back into my hands after all those years. My partner Marlene has been patient with this project, helped me at several crucial stages, and really enjoys the kind and generous community of people we’ve met through this canoe. I greatly appreciate the aforementioned folks from the Norumbega Chapter for advising, teaching, encouraging and helping me along the way. Ditto the WCHA Forum, Benson Gray and Tom Seavey. Thankful also to Jerry Stelmok and Rollin Thurlow for their advice, materials, hardware, and tools that enabled me to achieve my goal. I made several mistakes along the way, but no showstoppers.
Hope to see you on the water soon!
The Start
In 1970 or '71, I found this canoe in a Providence Journal classified ad. I was 15. My dad drove me to the sellers’ home near Narragansett Bay. We found it in water-ready condition though clearly older and banged up: reddish brown wood on the inside, with black-painted gunwales, thwarts, decks and seats, and a thick coat of red fiberglass. I bought it with $40 saved from my paper route. We stopped at a marina and bought paddles and life vests.
I sure enjoyed it. Along with plenty of paddling at a family lake place, I remember a couple of grand adventures with my friend Chris in the early 1970s. One was canoe camping on Maine’s Mooselookmeguntic Lake, where the long fetch built up waves three or four feet deep. That HW hull beneath our knees quartered over the waves beautifully. Another was paddling the 26-mile Great Canoe Race from Pawtucket down Narragansett Bay to Newport. The winds and waves weren't particularly bad that day, but at one point we had to paddle like mad to dodge a destroyer coming into the naval base. We could see sailors lined up on deck and heard an incredulous yell: “It’s a canoe!”
Letting It Get Away
Eventually it sat unused while I was away at college in Maine. My buddy Warren from Portland was very interested in buying the canoe from me and fixing it up properly. I needed money and sold it to him. Some years later Warren’s neighbor Chuck bought it from him and did considerable work – stripping off the red fiberglass, replacing the outwales, re-fiberglassing the hull, painting it blue green – and used it at his camp in Maine.
As the years went by, I missed it and wished I hadn’t sold. I’d tell Warren now and then that if Chuck would ever part with it, I’d like to be first in line. He’d call Chuck, but the answer stayed no.
Reunion
In December of 2024, I received an email from Warren that Chuck was ready to get rid of it and I could have it for free. Of course I said, “I’m in!” Warren picked it up for me a couple of days later. He assessed that “The old girl needs some work – new gunnels and keel, patching a 3-inch hole, and a new glass job. The inside woodwork still looks good for a canoe 100 years old. And for God’s sake, make her green – the color a canoe should be!”
I called Old Town Canoe Company to order replacement parts. A friendly customer service rep informed me that Island Falls Canoe had taken over the wood and canvas business and could make gunwales and other parts for me. She also sent me the scanned build record, which shows the original customer in Wakefield RI, right in the vicinity where I bought it about 45 years later. She also told me about the WCHA. I promptly joined.
In January last year, my partner Marlene and went to Warren’s in Maine and picked it up. Driving back to western Massachusetts through cold, snow-covered New Hampshire with the canoe on the roof drew double-takes – and teasing at a gas-n-go (“You know you have a hole in that thing??”).
Overhaul / Restoration
Concerned about what I could handle on my own, I decided instead to seek a professional restorer. One highly respected one thought it a dubious project that could run into five figures. Far from discouraged, I decided to tackle at least the woodwork phase myself. While not a skilled and equipped woodworker, I’m handy and knew I could learn from books, WCHA members, this Forum, and suppliers. With difficult-for-me-to-make parts such as upper stem replacements, decks and gunwales, keel and ribs to be made by Island Falls Canoe, it seemed doable. Fellow Western Mass WCHA members Tom Anderson and Alan Doty invited me along to the 2025 Norumbega Chapter meeting. They assessed the canoe when they came by to pick me up and assured me that many canoes in worse condition had been restored.
On a drive home from Northern Maine a few months later, I swung by Island Falls Canoe in Atkinson where I met Jerry Stelmok and received my order and his helpful advice. Caning the seats looked beyond what I could tackle. I sent the refinished frames to Dennis King at Maine Caning in Orono, who did a great job.
I stripped off the fiberglass and began woodwork in Summer 2025 at the fist-sized hole through the planking and rib near the stern seat. I soon discovered cracked ribs and weak planks. I replaced 12½ ribs and over 50 feet of planking by the end.
In time it became clear that dozens of the rib tips were in no condition to hold new fasteners, so I had to scarf or repair all the remaining originals. The original birch thwarts were decent. I repaired the ends and cut thin brass plates, modeled after the V-plates Old Town once used, to help the thwart bolts handle strain and serve as integrated washers. One of the original red brass diamond head bolts was missing, so I replaced it with a replica yellow brass one. The other bolts and nuts cleaned up well after soaking for a week in ketchup.
I very much wanted to keep the reddish-brown patina in the interior, just as I remembered from my youth. I brought pieces of new cedar plus old rib and plank to my local Sherwin-Williams manager Jillian, who was intrigued by the challenge. She custom-mixed a stain for a pretty good match. To get closer still, I wiped a little standard Red Mahogany stain over the custom one. Discerning eyes can tell new wood from the old, but casual observers don’t notice.
I kept working through the fall and winter and finished the hull woodwork in March of this year.
Originally I supposed that re-fiberglassing the hull would be the best option. Over time I learned the disadvantages and risks, and that canvassing is done for good reasons besides restoration purity. I hesitated at doing the canvas job on my own and reached out to Norumbega Chapter president Chuck Cossaboom for his advice on finding someone. Fortunately, he asked if I’d be open to a canvas party where the expertise and hands-on help of members would make things easy. Well, didn’t I jump at that! Chuck, Steve Lapey, Barry Goldberg, Paul Charos, Jeff Morrill, and Lawton Gaines helped Marlene and me put a beautiful canvas job on this Old Town.
In spring I filled the canvas and left it for eight weeks, then spent much of the summer on the remaining steps needed to get this 101-year-old into the water. Finished out, she’s slender and 69 pounds.
I’m grateful to past owners Warren and Chuck for getting the canoe back into my hands after all those years. My partner Marlene has been patient with this project, helped me at several crucial stages, and really enjoys the kind and generous community of people we’ve met through this canoe. I greatly appreciate the aforementioned folks from the Norumbega Chapter for advising, teaching, encouraging and helping me along the way. Ditto the WCHA Forum, Benson Gray and Tom Seavey. Thankful also to Jerry Stelmok and Rollin Thurlow for their advice, materials, hardware, and tools that enabled me to achieve my goal. I made several mistakes along the way, but no showstoppers.
Hope to see you on the water soon!
Attachments
-
First Paddle Post Restoration - IMG-20260824-WA0010.jpg -
My canoe and me - early 1970s.png -
SN - 86225 - Old Town Build Record.jpg -
Stern Seat Before - 20250406_132104.jpg -
Before - Seats Out 20250406_142118.jpg -
Planking and Rib Work - 20250830_135357.jpg -
Pre canvas - 20260409_130310.jpg -
WCHA Norumbega Chapter Canvas Party - 20260410_104157.jpg -
Marlene and Barry - Canvas Party - 20260410_100109.jpg -
Ready to Go - IMG-20260824-WA0011.jpg -
Back in my 1925 OT - IMG-20260824-WA0016.jpg
. And I plan to help with the Norumbega Chapter's annual restoration project for auction at Assembly.
