I found some interesting pictures and story of an old canoe at http://www.mainesport.com/index.php/history/the-sea-canoe in Maine. Does anyone recognize it and can you offer any more information? Thanks,
Benson
Benson
The sea canoe
- Thread starter Benson Gray
- Start date
It's a Rob Roy-style double-paddle canoe, much like the pair of mine you are babysitting...
It's got a forward mast step for a downwind sail rig, but no provision for a centerboard.
B.B. Crowninshield is indeed a well-known yacht designer who is known to have designed some sailing canoes (notably Uncle Sam and Old Glory. W.F. Stevens was one of the finest sailing canoe builders, first in Lowell, MA and later in Bath, ME. Among others, he built Leo Friede's Mermaid, and most of Paul Butler's canoes.
I can't see enough detail to know if Stevens built this canoe or not.
It's got a forward mast step for a downwind sail rig, but no provision for a centerboard.
B.B. Crowninshield is indeed a well-known yacht designer who is known to have designed some sailing canoes (notably Uncle Sam and Old Glory. W.F. Stevens was one of the finest sailing canoe builders, first in Lowell, MA and later in Bath, ME. Among others, he built Leo Friede's Mermaid, and most of Paul Butler's canoes.
I can't see enough detail to know if Stevens built this canoe or not.
chris pearson
Michigan Canoe Nut
Okay, I'm very excited!!!!!
No, there are two builders with similar names.
William Picard Stephens (note spelling) built canoes for a living for a short time, then became editor of yachting and canoeing for Forest and Stream magazine. He also wrote Canoe and Boatbuilding for Amateurs. Look for an article about this Stephens in a future issue of Wooden Canoe. No W.P. Stephens canoes are known to exist that have been positively identified.
William Farran Stevens was located first in Lowell, Massachusetts, and later Bath, Maine. He built extremely fine racing canoes, and my impression of him is he would only build a canoe for you if he thought you were good enough. He built the first Mermaid for Leo Freide (canoe sailor extraordinaire), as well as Bee, Bug, Wasp, and Fly for Paul Butler (another canoe sailor extraordinaire), H. Dudley Murphy's Banshee and Fritz Fenger's Yakaboo (Alone in the Carribean. Four of these canoes survive and are in museum collections.
Canoeal
Canoe/kayak builder/resto
I have had occasion to view 2 canoes that may have been WP Stephens canoes. One you commented that you believe to be from "Dot"plans, the other was a boat that was built in North Jersey. Both according to the verbal histories were built in New Jersey and both have fiitings that rival most builder built boats. The sailing canoe has a brass centerboard. See pictures.
That is not to say that canoes built by W.P. Stephens do not survive - it is certainly possible. It's just that none have been identified as such without a doubt. In reviewing the period literature, many other builders, both professional and amateur, built canoes to Stephens's designs - probably far more than he built himself. Stephens himself only built canoes as a business for three years. After that he only built sporadically (and at least one was built over a three year period). There is no real way to know how many canoes he built, but my research suggests it is not all that many.
OP
OP
I finally got around to visiting this canoe in Rockport today but it is over a stairwell and not easy to see up close. It is smooth sided as shown in the pictures below. The link in the original message is now broken but remains at http://web.archive.org/web/20120828061243/http://www.mainesport.com/index.php/history/the-sea-canoe if anyone is curious. Their web site now has the images at http://www.mainesport.com/?attachment_id=1735 and http://www.mainesport.com/?attachment_id=1742 but no text. It looks nice but will probably remain unidentified.
Benson
Benson
