Looking for Build Record for Old Town 25' War Canoe

[markmorgen]

I have volunteered to repair a war canoe from our local Boy Scout camp. It's an Old Town, I believe, serial number 171865 25. I googled and found some info on the Old Town War Canoes. This canoe is in pretty good shape, needing recanvasing and replacement of some of the stem and gunnel materials. Thanks for any information.

 

[Kathryn Klos]

Kowabonga

Hi, Mark--

Old Town 171865 is a 25 foot War Canoe, finished between February and June of 1962. It has a keel, outside stems, and a floor rack. It was painted dark green and shipped to the Tomahawk Scout Reservation in Rice Lake, WI on October 15, 1963. There's a notation on the back of the record regarding an inquiry from the Indianhead Council in St. Paul, MN on 7/14/80.

The scans of this record (front and back) are attached below-- click on them to get larger images. 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 join or renew your membership to the WCHA 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.php to renew.

It is also possible that you could have another number or manufacturer if this description don't match your canoe. Feel free to reply here if you have any other questions.

There's an active WCHA Chapter in Wisconsin (Great Rivers). They get together for paddling and such-like... and it's great fun if someone in the group has a war canoe. Here's the contact:

Jerry Karbon
1531 Red Oak Court
Middleton, WI 53562
608-831-5552
jkarbon@charter.net

Kathy

 

[markmorgen]

Thanks Kathryn,

It is indeed a canoe from Tomahawk Scout Reservation. It is still there and we will be refurbishing it for the council. I had no idea it was originally from there. There is yellow lettering on both sides : Clarnence on one side and PBSC on the other. We don't know the significance of it. Indianhead Council is the council that owns Tomahawk. It is now renamed Northern Star Council. We spent many summers with our troop at the camp and wanted to help them out with the canoe. There is one other war canoe at the camp. I will try to get the serial number from it. The second canoe is still in good condition and is used all summer.

Our canoe all seems to be original, except the floor rack is missing. The small cleats that held it are still attached. Maybe we will try to get plans for the floor rack and build a replacement for it.

I will contact Old Town to see what they can do for us.

We met some of the WCHA members this spring in Madison at the local paddle shop's annual "Canoeacopia". We saw several canoes and talked with several members.

 

[Kathryn Klos]

You may want to run your questions regarding the canoe past the folks here in Forums, too... others here have re-created floor racks and all the various parts that go into a canoe (check out the thread at http://forums.wcha.org/showthread.php?t=4408 for an amazing restoration-story!