History

[John Tedstrom]

We just restored an old town canoe that I inherited from a friend of my grandparents. The serial number is 159212 - and it is 13' long. We think the middle number is a 2, but it could be a 7. The restoration guy said it was pretty unique. He had not seen one like it.

 

[Benson Gray]

Welcome and congratulations, the Old Town canoe with serial number 159712 is a lapstrake motor boat so that isn't a good match. My guess is that you have the one with serial number 159212 as you thought. This is an 13 foot long, CS (Common Sense or middle) grade, fifty pound model with a keel. It was built between January and June, 1953. The original exterior paint color was dark green. It was shipped on July 14th, 1953 to Minocqua, Wisconsin. A scan showing this build record is attached below.

This scan and several hundred thousand others were 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/ot_records/ if you want more details. I hope that you will donate, join or renew your membership to the WCHA so that services like this can continue. See https://www.woodencanoe.org/about to learn more about the WCHA and https://www.woodencanoe.org/shop to donate or join.

It is also possible that you could have another number or manufacturer if this description doesn't match your canoe. The estimations at http://www.wcha.org/catalogs/old-town/models.html indicate that about 1587 of these were built between 1928 and 1966 which is an average of about 41 per year so it is pretty unique. Feel free to reply here if you have any other questions.

Benson

 

[John Tedstrom]

Benson,
Thank you for the info. This does match our canoe and Bosacki's Boat House was place I frequented as a kid with my family. My grandfather knew the owners. My kids have fond memories of the place also. So much so, that when we got a puppy, my oldest son suggested we name him Bosacki and we did! We will donate to WCHA.