The Old Town canoe with serial number 142515 is 15 feet long, AA (top) grade, a 50 Pound model with western red cedar planking, open mahogany gunwales (wood for decks, thwarts and seats is not specified, but are usually mahogany on an AA grade canoe) and equipped with a keel and floor rack. There is a notation that there was only a middle thwart -- but 15’ 50 Pound models usually had only a middle thwart. This canoe was shipped to a Boy Scout scoutmaster -- and camp and scout boats often had kneeling thwarts instead of seats. It’s not clear what this notation indicates -- no seats or kneeling thwarts at all? There is also a note that #10 canvas was used -- a grade heavier than usually used for 50 Pound models. In any event, it was built between July and August 1945. The exterior was
stamp-identified as dark green, but a hand-written note indicates that a custom color, guide special green, was actually used. It was shipped on August 17, 1945 to Springfield, Pennsylvania. A scan of this build record can be found by following the link behind the thumbnail image 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/catalogs/old-town/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/about-wcha to learn more about the WCHA and
http://www.wcha.org/store/membership to join.
It is also possible that you could have another number or manufacturer if this description doesn't match your canoe. Feel free to reply here if you have any other questions.
If possible, can you post a few pictures of your canoe? Seeing what the seating/thwart arrangement is would be of interest.
Greg
