rounded stern and bow canoe/w serial #

[rippedoff54]

we have an 18 ft. cedar strip canoe we are trying to identify. serial # 108317 18 there are no other markings on the canoe. we did find out that this was the 108th built in march of 1917. Like i said in the posting, both the bow and stern are rounded, the do not come to a point, say like a Kennebec or a Grand laker. so any help identifing this canoe would be greatly appreciated. If you need pics, i will have them shortly. thanks for your help. Cliff

 

[Dan Lindberg]

Cliff,

Looking forward to seeing the pics, be sure to post a bunch, and show the details like decks, seats, thwarts, general shape etc.

Am curious though, what do you know about the boat and/or maker, that leads you to believe that the S/N 108317 translates into "108th built in March of 1917".

With most manufacturers, we don't know those details, and in fact many don't even have a S/N.

Dan

 

[rippedoff54]

serial #

we had a canoe officioado, or he said he was, take a look at it and he told us what the #'s meant. They are carvred into the the beginning of the bow stem where it is joined to the bottom of the canoe. the 7 is the old style english version with the cross hatch. It looks like it could be an old town, but none of the pics we have looked at come close except a 1915 old town, but it has an A shaped top where ours is slightly rounded. so we are baffled. any help will be greatly appreciated. and we have pics from the moment it came off the truck to as far as we are on the restoration which i will post as soon as they get to me. talk to you again. cliff

 

[Benson Gray]

The Old Town canoe with serial number 108317 is an 18 foot long, CS (common sense or middle) grade, Otca model with red western cedar planking, open spruce gunwales, birch decks, birch thwarts, birch seats, a keel, and a floor rack. It was built between December, 1930 and November, 1931. The original exterior paint color was dark red. It shipped on April 13th, 1933 to Essex, Conn.

A scan showing this build record can be found by following the link at 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/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/about-the-wcha/ to learn more about the WCHA and http://store.wcha.org/WCHA-New-Membership.html to join.

Modern hull identification numbers have an encoded date on the end as described at http://www.boatsafe.com/nauticalknowhow/hin.html which may have confused the person who gave you the incorrect information about this canoe being built in March of 1917. The image at http://forums.wcha.org/attachment.php?attachmentid=17995&d=1317585221 shows a typical rounded Otca deck.

Feel free to reply here if you have any other questions.

Benson

 

[rippedoff54]

Old town canoe ser#108317

i want to thank you very much for sending me the info on the canoe. I have about 40 odd pics of the canoe in various stages of restoration which i will post as soon as my new monitor arrives. the netbook i'm using doesn't have a CD drive, so i can't upload them today. But thank you again for finding the info for us. It is greatly appreciated. cliff