Welcome and congratulations, the Old Town canoe with serial number 131818 is a 16 foot long, CS (Common Sense or middle) grade, Otca model with open spruce gunwales, birch decks, birch thwarts, birch seats, and a keel. It was built between February and August, 1941. The original exterior paint design was similar to the one shown at
https://www.wcha.org/catalogs/old-town/designs/design39.gif which was known as the design number 39. It shipped on June 18th, 1942 to Detroit, Michigan. A scan of this build record can be found below.
This scan and several hundred thousand more 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 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. The information at the link below has a good summary about how to value a canoe like this and the classifieds at
https://www.woodencanoe.org/classifieds have some similar ones for comparison. The classified archive at
https://wcha.org/classified-archive/Old-Town-Otca.html shows the list prices of other Otcas over the years. The selling prices were probably lower. The brass nameplate on the deck is much newer than this canoe. Feel free to reply here if you have any other questions,
Benson
How much is my old canoe worth?
One of the most common questions that gets sent to the WCHA webmasters is "how much is my old canoe worth?" Tim Hewitt's responses over the years have included the following comments:
Any wooden or wood/canvas canoe in usable condition is worth $1000 - $1500. A canoe that is documentable will go on the high end, one that is particularly rare will bring more, up to $3000 for a wood canvas canoe, and as high as $5000 for an all-wood canoe. These high end canoes must be in showroom condition and you must have evidence or documentation of their age and...
