The Bark Canoes and Skin Boats of North America
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Title: The Bark Canoes and Skin Boats of North America
Author: Tappan Adney
Howard Irving Chapelle
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Language: English
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SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION
UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM
[Illustration: BULLETIN 230
WASHINGTON, D. C.
1964]
Museum of History and Technology
THE BARK CANOES AND SKIN BOATS OF NORTH AMERICA
EDWIN TAPPAN ADNEY and HOWARD I. CHAPELLE
Curator of Transportation
B031222CA
Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D. C.
1964
Publications of the United States National Museum
The scholarly and scientific publications of the United States National
Museum include two series, _Proceedings of the United States National
Museum_ and _United States National Museum Bulletin_.
In these series the Museum publishes original articles and
monographs dealing with the collections and work of its constituent
museums--The Museum of Natural History and the Museum of History
and Technology--setting forth newly acquired facts in the fields of
Anthropology, Biology, History, Geology, and Technology. Copies of each
publication are distributed to libraries, to cultural and scientific
organizations, and to specialists and others interested in the
different subjects.
The _Proceedings_, begun in 1878, are intended for the publication, in
separate form, of shorter papers from the Museum of Natural History.
These are gathered in volumes, octavo in size, with the publication
date of each paper recorded in the table of contents of the volume.
In the _Bulletin_ series, the first of which was issued in 1875,
appear longer, separate publications consisting of monographs
(occasionally in several parts) and volumes in which are collected
works on related subjects. _Bulletins_ are either octavo or quarto
in size, depending on the needs of the presentation. Since 1902
papers relating to the botanical collections of the Museum of Natural
History have been published in the _Bulletin_ series under the heading
_Contributions from the United States National Herbarium_, and since
1959, in _Bulletins_ titled "Contributions from the Museum of History
and Technology," have been gathered shorter papers relating to the
collections and research of that Museum.
This work, the result of cooperation with the Mariners' Museum, the
Stefansson Library, the Museum of the American Indian, Heye Foundation,
and the American Museum of Natural History, forms number 230 of the
_Bulletin_ series.
FRANK A. TAYLOR
_Director, United States National Museum_
U.S. GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE
WASHINGTON: 1964
* * * * *
For sale by the Superintendent of Documents,
U.S. Government Printing Office
Washington, D.C. 20402--Price $6.75
_Special acknowledgment_
_Is here gratefully made to The Mariners' Museum, Newport News,
Virginia, under whose auspices was prepared and with whose cooperation
is here published the part of this work based on the Adney papers; also
to the late Vilhjalmur Stefansson, for whose_ ENCYCLOPEDIA ARCTICA _was
written the chapter on Arctic skin boats._
_Contents_
_Page_
Introduction 1
1. Early History 7
2. Materials and Tools 14
3. Form and Construction 27
Form 27
Construction 36
4. Eastern Maritime Region 58
Micmac 58
Malecite 70
St. Francis 88
Beothuk 94
5. Central Canada 99
Eastern Cree 101
Têtes de Boule 107
Algonkin 113
Ojibway 122
Western Cree 132
Fur-trade Canoes 135
6. Northwestern Canada 154
Narrow-Bottom Canoe 155
Kayak-Form Canoe 158
Sturgeon-Nose Canoe 168
7. Arctic Skin Boats: by _Howard I. Chapelle_ 174
The Umiak 181
The Kayak 190
8. Temporary Craft 212
Bark Canoes 212
Skin Boats 219
Retrospect 221
Appendix: The Kayak Roll, by _John D. Heath_ 223
Bibliography 231
Index 235
_Illustrations_
_Figure_ _Page_
1 Fur-trade canoe on the Missinaibi River, 1901. (_Canadian
Geological Survey photo._) 2
2 Page from a manuscript of 1771, "Observations on Hudsons
Bay," by Alexander Graham, Factor. (In archives of Hudson's
Bay Company.) 9
3 Canoes from LaHontan's _Nouveaux Voyages ... dans l'Amerique
septentrionale_, showing crude representations typical of
early writers. 11
4 Lines of an old birch-bark canoe, probably Micmac, brought to
England in 1749 from New England. (_From Admiralty Collection
of Draughts, National Maritime Museum, Greenwich._) 12
5 Ojibway Indian carrying spruce roots, Lac Seul, Ont., 1919.
(_Canadian Geological Survey photo._) 15
6 Roll of bark for a hunting canoe. Algonkin Reserve, at Golden
Lake, Ont., 1927. 16
7 Sketch: wood-splitting techniques, cedar and spruce. 17
8-19 Sketches of tools: 8, stone axe; 9, stone hammer, wedge, and
knife; 10, mauls and driving sticks; 11, stone scraper; 12,
bow drill; 13, modern Hudson Bay axe; 14, steel fur-trade
tomahawk; 15, steel canoe awls; 16, crooked knives; 17, froe;
18, shaving horse; 19, bucksaw. 17
20 Peeling, rolling, and transporting bark. (_Sketches by
Adney._) 25
21 Sketch: Building frame for a large canoe. 26
22, 23 Sketches: Effect on canoe bottom of crimping and goring
bark. 30
24 Sketch: Canoe formed by use of gores and panels. 31
25 Gunwale ends nailed and wrapped with spruce roots. (_Sketch
by Adney._) 31
26 Gunwales and stakes on building bed, plan view. (_Sketch by
Adney._) 32
27 Photo: Gunwale lashings, examples made by Adney. 33
28 Photo: Gunwale-end lashings, examples made by Adney. 33
29 Sketch: Splints arranged in various ways to sheath the bottom
of a canoe. 34
30 End details, including construction of stem-pieces.
(_Sketches by Adney._) 35
31 Lines of 2½-fathom St. John River Malecite canoe. 36
32 Malecite canoe building, 1910. (Canadian Geological Survey
photos.) 39
33 First stage of canoe construction: assembled gunwale frame is
used to locate stakes temporarily on building bed. (_Sketch
by Adney._) 40
34 Second stage of canoe construction: bark cover is laid out on
the building bed, and the gunwales are in place upon it.
(_Sketch by Adney._) 41
35 Photo: Malecite canoe builders near Fredericton, N.B., using
wooden plank building bed. 42
36 Sketch: Two common styles of root stitching used in bark
canoes. 43
37 Comparison of canoe on the building bed and canoe when first
removed from building bed during fifth stage of construction.
(_Detail sketches by Adney._) 44
38 Third stage of canoe construction: the bark cover is shaped
on the building bed. (_Sketch by Adney._) 45
39 Cross section of canoe on building bed during third and
fourth stages of construction. (_Sketch by Adney._) 46
40 Sketch: Multiple cross section through one side of a canoe on
the building bed, at the headboard, middle, first, and second
thwarts. 46
41 Fourth stage of canoe construction: bark cover has been
shaped and all stakes placed. (_Sketch by Adney._) 47
42 Fifth stage of canoe construction: canoe is removed from
building bed and set on horses to shape ends and complete
sewing. (_Sketch by Adney._) 49
43 Ribs being dried and shaped for Ojibway canoe. (_Canadian
Geological Survey photo._) 50
44 Sketch: Details of ribs and method of shaping them in pairs. 51
45 Sixth stage of canoe construction: in this stage splints for
sheathing (upper left) are fixed in place and held by
temporary ribs (lower right) under the gunwales. (_Sketch by
Adney._) 53
46 General details of birch-bark canoe construction, in a
drawing by Adney. (From _Harper's Young People_, supplement,
July 29, 1890.) 54
47 Gunwale construction and thwart or crossbar fastenings, as
shown in a sketch by Adney. (_Harper's Young People_,
supplement, July 29, 1890.) 56
48 "Peter Joe at Work." Drawing by Adney for his article "How an
Indian Birch-Bark Canoe is Made." (_Harper's Young People_,
supplement, July 29, 1890.) 57
49 Lines of 2-fathom Micmac pack, or woods, canoe. 59
50 Lines of 2-fathom Micmac pack, or woods, canoe. 60
51 Lines of 2-fathom Micmac pack, or woods, canoe. 61
52 Lines of 2½-fathom Micmac big-river canoe. 62
53 Lines of 3-fathom Micmac ocean canoe fitted for sailing. 63
54 Micmac rough-water canoe, Bathurst, N.B. (_Canadian
Geological Survey photo._) 64
55 Micmac Woods canoe, built by Malecite Jim Paul at St. Mary's
Reserve in 1911. (_Canadian Geological Survey photo._) 64
56 Micmac rough-water canoe fitted for sailing. (_Photo W. H.
Mechling, 1913._) 65
57 Micmac rough-water canoe, Bay Chaleur. (_Photo H. V.
Henderson, West Bathurst, N.B._) 66
58 Micmac rough-water sailing canoe, Bay Chaleur. (_Canadian
Geological Survey photo._) 66
59 Drawing: Details of Micmac canoes, including mast and sail. 67
60 Micmac canoe, Bathurst, N.B. (_Canadian Geological Survey
photo._) 68
61 Micmac woman gumming seams of canoe, Bathurst, N.B., 1913.
(_Canadian Geological Survey photo._) 69
62 Lines of 2½-fathom Malecite river canoe, 19th century. Old
form with raking ends and much sheer. 71
63 Lines of old form of Malecite-Abnaki 2½-fathom ocean canoe of
the Penobscots in the Peabody Museum, Salem, Mass. 72
64 Lines of large 3-fathom ocean canoe of the Passamaquoddy
porpoise hunters. 73
65 Lines of old form of Passamaquoddy 2½-fathom ocean canoe. 74
66 Lines of Malecite racing canoe of 1888, showing ~V~-shaped keel
piece between sheathing and bark to form deadrise. 75
67 Lines of sharp-ended 2½-fathom Passamaquoddy hunting canoe,
for use on tidal river. 76
68 Lines of Malecite 2½-fathom St. Lawrence River canoe,
probably a hybrid model. 77
69 Lines of Malecite 2½-fathom river canoe of 1890 from the
Rivière du Loup region. 78
70 Lines of Modern (1895) 2½-fathom Malecite St. John River
canoe. 79
71 Drawing: Malecite canoe details, gear, and gunwale
decorations. 80
72 Drawing: Malecite canoe details, stem profiles, paddles, sail
rig, and salmon spear. 81
73 Lines and decoration reconstructed from a very old model of a
St. John River ancient woods, or pack, canoe. 81
74 Lines of last known Passamaquoddy decorated ocean canoe to be
built (1898). 82
75 Drawing: Malecite canoe details and decorations. 83
76 Sketches: Wulegessis decorations. 84-85
77 Photo: End decorations, Passamaquoddy canoe. 86
78 Photo: End decorations, Passamaquoddy canoe. 87
79 Photo: Passamaquoddy decorated canoe. 87
80 Lines of 2-fathom St. Francis canoe of about 1865 89
81 Lines of "14-foot" St. Francis canoe of about 191090
82 Lines of 2½-fathom low-ended St. Francis canoe. 91
83 Lines of St. Francis-Abnaki canoe for open water, a type that
became extinct before 1890. From Adney's drawings of a canoe
formerly in the Museum of Natural History. 92
84 Photo: Model of a St. Francis-Abnaki canoe under construction. 93
85 Photo: St. Francis-Abnaki canoe. 93
86 A 15-foot Beothuk canoe of Newfoundland (_Sketch by Adney._) 95
87 Lines based on Adney's reconstruction of 15-foot Beothuk
canoe. 97
88 Montagnais crooked canoe. (_Canadian Geological Survey
photo._) 100
89 Birch-bark crooked canoe, Ungava Cree. (_Smithsonian
Institution photo._) 101
90 Lines of 3-fathom Nascapee canoe, eastern Labrador. 102
91 Lines of 2-fathom Montagnais canoe of southern Labrador and
Quebec. 102
92 Lines of 2½-fathom crooked canoe of the Ungava Peninsula. 103
93 Lines of hybrid-model 2-fathom Nascapee canoe. 103
94 Eastern Cree crooked canoe of rather moderate sheer and
rocker. (_Canadian Pacific Railway Company photo._) 104
95 Photo: Straight and crooked canoes, eastern Cree. 105
96 Montagnais canvas-covered crooked canoe under construction.
(_Canadian Geological Survey photo._) 106
97 Sketch: Fiddlehead of scraped bark on bow and stern of a
Montagnais birch-bark canoe at Seven Islands, Que., 1915. 107
98 Sketch: Disk of colored porcupine quills decorating canoe
found at Namaquagon, Que., 1898. 107
99 Fleet of 51 birch-bark canoes of the Têtes de Boule Indians,
assembled at the Hudson's Bay Company post, Grand Lake
Victoria, Procession Sunday, August 1895. (_Photo,
Post-Factor L. A. Christopherson._) 108
100 Photo: Têtes de Boule canoe. 109
101 Photo: Têtes de Boule canoes. 110
102 Lines of 1½-fathom Têtes de Boule hunting canoe. 111
103 Lines of 2½-fathom Têtes de Boule canoe, with construction
details. 111
104 Lines of 2-fathom Têtes de Boule hunting canoe. 112
105 Photo: Old Algonkin canoe. 113
106 Lines of 2½-fathom old model, Ottawa River, Algonkin canoe. 114
107 Photo: Models made by Adney of Algonkin and Ojibway
stem-pieces. 115
108 Lines of light, fast 2-fathom hunting canoe of the old
Algonkin model. 116
109 Lines of hybrid 2½- and 2-fathom Algonkin canoes. 117
110 Lines of 2-fathom Algonkin hunter's canoe, without headboards. 118
111 Photo: Algonkin canoe, old type. 119
112 Photo: Algonkin "Wabinaki Chiman" 120
113 Algonkin canoe decorations, Golden Lake, Ont. 121
114 Lines of 2-fathom Ojibway hunter's canoe, built in 1873 123
115 Lines of 3-fathom Ojibway old model rice-harvesting canoe and
2-fathom hunter's canoe. 124
116 Lines of 3-fathom Ojibway freight canoe. 124
117 Lines of 2½-fathom Ojibway, old form, canoe and a 16-foot
long-nose Cree-Ojibway canoe. 125
118 Eastern Ojibway canoe, old form. (_Canadian Pacific Railway
photo._) 126
119 Photo: Ojibway Long-Nose canoe, Rainy Lake District. 126
120 Lines of 2-fathom Ojibway hunter's canoe, 1849 and long-nose
Minnesota Ojibway rice-harvesting canoe. 127
121 Photos: Canoe building, Lac Seul, Canada, 1918 128-129
122 Long Lake Ojibway long-nose canoe. (_Canadian Geological
Survey photo._) 130
123 Photo: Ojibway 19-foot canoe with 13 Indians aboard (1913) 131
124 Lines of 2½-fathom western Cree canoe, Winisk River district,
northwest of James Bay. 133
125 Lines of a 6-fathom fur-trade canoe of the early 19th century. 134
126 Inboard profile of a 6-fathom fur-trade canoe, and details of
construction, fitting, and decoration. 135
127 Lines of small 3-fathom north canoe of the Têtes de Boule
model. 136
128 Photo: Models of fur-trade canoes. 137
129 "Fur-Trade Maître Canot With Passengers." From an oil
painting by Hopkins (_Public Archives of Canada photo_). 138
130 "Bivouac in Expedition in Hudson's Bay Canoe." From an oil
painting by Hopkins (_Public Archives of Canada photo_). 139
131 Ojibway 3-fathom fur-trade canoe, a cargo-carrying type,
marked by cut-under end profiles, that was built as late as
1894. 139
132 Lines of a 5-fathom fur-trade canoe, Grand Lake Victoria
Post, Hudson's Bay Company. 140
133 "Hudson's Bay Canoe Running the Rapids." From an oil painting
by Hopkins (_Public Archives of Canada photo_). 141
134 "Repairing the Canoe." From an oil painting by Hopkins
(_Public Archives of Canada photo_). 142
135 Lines of a 4½-fathom Hudson's Bay Company "North Canoe,"
built by Crees near James Bay, mid-19th century. 143
136 Photo: 5-fathom fur-trade canoe from Brunswick House, a
Hudson's Bay Company post. 144
137 Fur-trade canoes on the Missinaibi River, 1901. (_Canadian
Geological Survey photo._) 145
138 Photo: Fur-trade canoe brigade from Christopherson's Hudson's
Bay Company post, about 1885. 146
139 Forest rangers, Lake Timagami, Ontario. (_Canadian Pacific
Railway Company photo._) 147
140 Photo: Models made by Adney of fur-trade canoe stem-pieces. 149
141 Photo: Models by Adney of fur-trade canoe stem-pieces. 151
142 Portaging a 4½-fathom fur-trade canoe, about 1902, near the
head of the Ottawa River. (_Canadian Pacific Railway Company
photo._) 152
143 Decorations, fur-trade canoes (_Watercolor sketch by Adney._) 153
144 Lines of 2-fathom Chipewyan hunter's canoe. 155
145 Lines of 2½-fathom Chipewyan and 3-fathom Dogrib cargo, or
family, canoes. 156
146 Lines of 3-fathom Slavey and 2½-fathom Algonkin-type
Athabascan plank-stem canoes. 157
147 Lines of Eskimo kayak-form birch-bark canoe from Alaskan
Coast. 159
148 Lines of Athabascan hunting canoes of the kayak form. 160
149 Lines of extinct forms of Loucheux and bateau-form canoes,
reconstructed from old models. 161
150 Lines of kayak-form canoes of the Alaskan Eskimos and
Canadian Athabascan Indians. 163
151 Lines of kayak-form canoe of British Columbia and upper Yukon
valley. 164
152 Construction of kayak-form canoe of the lower Yukon, showing
rigid bottom frame. (_Smithsonian Institution photo._) 165
153 Photo: Model of an extinct form of Athabascan type birch-bark
canoe, of British Columbia. In Peabody Museum, Harvard
University. 167
154 Lines of sturgeon-nose bark canoe of the Kutenai and Shuswap. 169
155 Ojibway canoe construction. (_Canadian Geological Survey
photos._) 170-171
156 Photo: Indians with canoe at Alert Bay, on Cormorant Island,
B. C. 173
157 Eighteenth-century lines drawing of a kayak, from Labrador or
southern Baffin Island. 175
158 Western Alaskan umiak with eight women paddling, Cape Prince
of Wales, Alaska, 1936. (_Photo by Henry B. Collins._) 177
159 Western Alaskan umiak being beached, Cape Prince of Wales,
Alaska, 1936. (_Photo by Henry B. Collins._) 177
160 Repairing umiak frame at St. Lawrence Island, Alaska, 1930.
(_Photo by Henry B. Collins._) 178
161 Eskimo woman splitting walrus hide to make umiak cover, St.
Lawrence Island, Alaska, 1930. (_Photo by Henry B. Collins._)
178
162 Fitting split walrus-hide cover to umiak at St. Lawrence
Island, Alaska, 1930. (_Photo by Henry B. Collins._) 179
163 Outboard motor installed on umiak, Cape Prince of Wales,
Alaska, 1936. (_Photo by Henry B. Collins._) 179
164 Launching umiak in light surf, Cape Prince of Wales, Alaska,
1936. (_Photo by Henry B. Collins._) 179
165 Umiaks on racks, in front of village on Little Diomede
Island, July 30, 1936. (_Photo by Henry B. Collins._) 181
166 Umiak covered with split walrus hide, Cape Prince of Wales,
Alaska. (_Photo by Henry B. Collins._) 183
167 Lines of small umiak for walrus hunting, west coast of
Alaska. 1888-89 184
168 Umiaks near Cape Prince of Wales, Alaska, showing walrus hide
cover and lacing. (_Photo by Henry B. Collins._) 185
169 Lines of umiak, west coast of Alaska, King Island, 1886 186
170 Making the blind seam: two stages of method used by the
Eskimo to join skins together. 186
171 Lines of north Alaskan whaling umiak of about 1890 187
172 Lines of Baffin Island umiak, 1885. Drawn from model and
detailed measurements of a single boat. 188
173 Lines of east Greenland umiak, drawn from measurements taken
off by a U.S. Army officer in 1945. 189
174 Frame of kayak, Nunivak Island, Alaska. (_Photo by Henry B.
Collins._) 191
175 Frame of kayak at Nunivak Island, Alaska, 1927. (_Photo by
Henry B. Collins._) 193
176 Lines of Koryak kayak, drawn from damaged kayak in the
American Museum of Natural History, 1948. 195
177 Lines of Kodiak Island kayak, 1885, in U.S. National Museum. 196
178 Lines of Aleutian kayak, Unalaska, 1894, in U.S. National
Museum. 196
179 Lines of kayak from Russian Siberia, 2-hole Aleutian type, in
Washington State Historical Society and Museum. Taken off by
John Heath, 1962. 197
180 Lines of Nunivak Island kayak, Alaska, 1889, in U.S. National
Museum. 198
181 Lines of King Island kayak, Alaska, 1888, in U.S. National
Museum. 198
182 Lines of Norton Sound kayak, Alaska, 1889, in U.S. National
Museum. 198
183 Nunivak Island kayak with picture of mythological water
monster Palriayuk painted along gunwale. (_Photo by Henry B.
Collins._) 199
184 Photo: Nunivak Island kayak in U.S. National Museum. 199
185 Western Alaskan kayak, Cape Prince of Wales, 1936. (_Photo by
Henry B. Collins._) 200
186 Lines of Kotzebue Sound kayak, in Mariners' Museum. 201
187 Lines of Point Barrow kayak, Alaska, 1888, in U.S. National
Museum. 201
188 Lines of Mackenzie Delta kayak, in Museum of the American
Indian. 201
189 Photo: Kayak from Point Barrow, Alaska, in U.S. National
Museum. 202
190 Photo: Cockpit of kayak from Point Barrow. 202
191 Lines of kayak in U.S. National Museum. 203
192 Lines of kayak from Coronation Gulf, Canada. 203
193 Lines of Caribou Eskimo kayak, Canada, in American Museum of
Natural History. 203
194 Lines of Netsilik Eskimo kayak, King William Island, Canada,
in the American Museum of Natural History. 203
195 Lines of old kayak from vicinity of Southampton Island,
Canada. 205
196 Lines of Baffin Island kayak, from Cape Dorset, Canada, in
the Museum of the American Indian. 205
197 Lines of kayak from north Labrador, Canada, in the Museum of
the American Indian. 207
198 Lines of Labrador kayak, Canada, in the U.S. National Museum. 207
199 Lines of north Greenland kayak, in the Museum of the American
Indian. 207
200 Lines of north Greenland kayak, in the Peabody Museum, Salem,
Mass. 207
201 Photo: Profile of Greenland kayak from Disko Bay, in the
National Museum. 208
202 Photo: Deck of Greenland kayak from Disko Bay. 208
203 Photo: Cockpit of Greenland kayak from Disko Bay. 209
204 Photo: Bow view of Greenland kayak from Disko Bay. 209
205 Lines of northwestern Greenland kayak, in the U.S. National
Museum. 210
206 Lines of southwestern Greenland kayak, 1883, in the U.S.
National Museum. 210
207 Lines of southwestern Greenland kayak, in the Peabody Museum,
Salem, Mass. 210
208 Lines of south Greenland kayak, in the American Museum of
Natural History. 211
209 Lines of Malecite and Iroquois temporary canoes. 214
210 Photo: Model of hickory-bark canoe under construction, in the
Mariner's Museum. 217
211 Sketch: Detail of thwart used in Malecite temporary
spruce-bark canoe. 217
212 Iroquois temporary elm-bark canoe, after a drawing of 1849. 218
213 Large moosehide canoe of upper Gravel River, Mackenzie
valley. (_Photo, George M. Douglas._) 221
214 Sketch: Standard Greenland roll. 224
215 Sketch: Critical stage of a capsize recovery. 225
216 Sketch: Hand positions used with the standard Greenland roll. 226
217 Sketch: Kayak rescue, bow-grab method. 226
218 Sketch: Kayak rescue, paddle-grab method. 226
219 Preparing for demonstration of Eskimo roll, Igdlorssuit, West
Greenland. (_Photo by Kenneth Taylor._) 227
220 Getting aboard kayak. (_Photo by Kenneth Taylor._) 228
221 Fully capsized kayak. (_Photo by Kenneth Taylor._) 228
222 Emerging from roll. (_Photo by Kenneth Taylor._) 229
223 Emerging from roll. (_Photo by Kenneth Taylor._) 229
224 Righting the kayak. (_Photo by Kenneth Taylor._) 229
_The
Bark Canoes and Skin Boats
of
North America_
INTRODUCTION
[Illustration: Figure 1
FUR-TRADE CANOE ON THE MISSINAIBI RIVER, 1901. (_Canadian Geological
Survey photo._)]
The bark canoes of the North American Indians, particularly those of
birch bark, were among the most highly developed of manually propelled
primitive watercraft. Built with Stone Age tools from materials
available in the areas of their use, their design, size, and appearance
were varied so as to create boats suitable to the many and different
requirements of their users. The great skill exhibited in their design
and construction shows that a long period of development must have
taken place before they became known to white men.
The Indian bark canoes were most efficient watercraft for use in
forest travel; they were capable of being propelled easily with a
single-bladed paddle. This allowed the paddler, unlike the oarsman,
to face the direction of travel, a necessity in obstructed or shoal
waters and in fast-moving streams. The canoes, being light, could be
carried overland for long distances, even where trails were rough or
nonexistent. Yet they could carry heavy loads in shallow water and
could be repaired in the forest without special tools.
Bark canoes were designed for various conditions: some for use in
rapid streams, some for quiet waters, some for the open waters of
lakes, some for use along the coast. Most were intended for portage in
overland transportation as well. They were built in a variety of sizes,
from small one-man hunting and fishing canoes to canoes large enough
to carry a ton of cargo and a crew, or a war-party, or one or more
families moving to new habitations. Some canoes were designed so that
they could be used, turned bottom up, for shelter ashore.
The superior qualities of the bark canoes of North America are
indicated by the white man's unqualified adoption of the craft. Almost
as soon as he arrived in North America, the white man learned to use
the canoe, without alteration, for wilderness travel. Much later,
when the original materials used in building were no longer readily
available, canvas was substituted for bark, and nails for the lashings
and sewing; but as long as manual propulsion was used, the basic
models of the bark canoes were retained. Indeed, the models and the
proportions used in many of these old bark canoes are retained in the
canoes used today in the wildernesses of northern Canada and Alaska,
and the same styles may be seen in the canoes used for pleasure in the
summer resorts of Europe and America. The bark canoe of North America
shares with the Eskimo kayak the distinction of being one of the few
primitive craft of which the basic models are retained in the boats of
civilized man.
It may seem strange, then, that the literature on American bark canoes
is so limited. Many possible explanations for this might be offered.
One is that the art of bark canoe building died early, as the Indians
came into contact with the whites, before there was any attempt fully
to record Indian culture. The bark canoe is fragile compared to the
dugout. The latter might last hundreds of years submerged in a bog, but
the bark canoe will not last more than a few decades. It is difficult,
in fact, to preserve bark canoes in museums, for as they age and the
bark becomes brittle, they are easily damaged in moving and handling.
Some small models made by Indians are preserved, but, like most models
made by primitive men, these are not to any scale and do not show
with equal accuracy all parts of the canoes they represent. They are,
therefore, of value only when full-sized canoes of the same type are
available for comparison, but this is too rarely the case with the
American Indian bark canoes. Today the builders who might have added to
our knowledge are long dead.
It might be said fairly that those who had the best opportunities to
observe, including many whose profession it was to record the culture
of primitive man, showed little interest in watercraft and have left
us only the most meager descriptions. Even when the watercraft of the
primitive man had obviously played a large part in his culture, we
rarely find a record complete enough to allow the same accuracy of
reproduction that obtains, say, for his art, his dress, or his pottery.
Once lost, the information on primitive watercraft cannot, as a rule,
be recovered.
However, as far as the bark canoes of North America are concerned,
there was another factor. The student who became sufficiently
interested to begin research soon discovered that one man was devoting
his lifetime to the study of these craft; that, in a field with few
documentary records and fewer artifacts, he had had opportunities for
detailed examination not open to younger men; and that it was widely
expected that this man would eventually publish his findings. Hence
many, who might otherwise have carried on some research and writing,
turned to other subjects. Practically, then, the whole field had been
left to Edwin Tappan Adney.
Born at Athens, Ohio, in 1868, Edwin Tappan Adney was the son of
Professor H. H. Adney, formerly a colonel in a volunteer regiment in
the Civil War but then on the faculty of Ohio University. His mother
was Ruth Shaw Adney. Edwin Tappan Adney did not receive a college
education, but he managed to pursue three years' study of art with
The Art Students' League of New York. Apparently he was interested in
ornithology as well as in art, and spent much time in New York museums,
where he met Ernest Thompson Seton and other naturalists. Being unable
to afford more study in art school, he went on what was intended to be
a short vacation, in 1887, to Woodstock, New Brunswick. There he became
interested in the woods-life of Peter Joe, a Malecite Indian who lived
in a temporary camp nearby. This life so interested the 19-year-old
Ohioan that he turned toward the career of an artist-craftsman,
recording outdoor scenes of the wilderness in pictures.
He undertook to learn the handicrafts of the Indian, in order to
picture him and his works correctly, and lengthened his stay. In 1889,
Adney and Peter Joe each built a birch-bark canoe, Adney following and
recording every step the Indian made during construction. The result
Adney published, with sketches, in _Harper's Young People_ magazine,
July 29, 1890, and, in a later version, in _Outing_, May 1900. These,
so far as is known, are the earliest detailed descriptions of a
birch-bark canoe, with instructions for building one. Daniel Beard
considered them the best, and with Adney's permission used the material
in his _Boating Book for Boys_.
In 1897, Adney went to the Klondike as an artist and special
correspondent for _Harper's Weekly_ and _The London Chronicle_, to
report on the gold-rush. He also wrote a book on his experience,
_Klondike Stampede_, published in 1900. In 1899 he married Minnie Bell
Sharp, of Woodstock, but by 1900 Adney was again in the Northwest,
this time as special correspondent for _Colliers_ magazine at Nome,
Alaska, during the gold-rush of that year. On his return to New
York, Adney engaged in illustrating outdoor scenes and also lectured
for the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals. In 1908
he contributed to a Harper's Outdoor Book for Boys. From New York
he removed to Montreal and became a citizen of Canada, entering the
Canadian Army as a Lieutenant of Engineers in 1916. He was assigned
to the construction of training models and was on the staff of the
Military College, mustering out in 1919. He then made his home in
Montreal, engaging in painting and illustrating. From his early years
in Woodstock he had made a hobby of the study of birch-bark canoes, and
while in Montreal he became honorary consultant to the Museum of McGill
University, dealing with Indian lore. By 1925 Adney had assembled a
great deal of material and, to clarify his ideas, he began construction
of scale models of each type of canoe, carrying on a very extensive
correspondence with Indians, factors and other employees (retired and
active) of the Hudson's Bay Company, and with government agents on the
Indian Reservations. He also made a number of expeditions to interview
Indians. Possessing linguistic ability in Malecite, he was much
interested in all the Indian languages; this helped him in his canoe
studies.
Owing to personal and financial misfortunes, he and his wife (then
blind) returned in the early 1930's to her family homestead in
Woodstock, where Mrs. Adney died in 1937. Adney continued his work
under the greatest difficulties, including ill-health, until his death,
October 10, 1950. He did not succeed in completing his research and had
not organized his collection of papers and notes for publication when
he died.
Through the farsightedness of Frederick Hill, then director of The
Mariners' Museum, Newport News, Virginia, Adney had, ten years before
his death, deposited in the museum over a hundred of his models and a
portion of his papers. After his death his son Glenn Adney cooperated
in placing in The Mariners' Museum the remaining papers dealing with
bark canoes, thus completing the "Adney Collection."
Frederick Hill's appreciation of the scope and value of the collection
prompted him to seek my assistance in organizing this material with a
view to publication. Though the Adney papers were apparently complete
and were found, upon careful examination, to contain an immense amount
of valuable information, they were in a highly chaotic state. At the
request of The Mariners' Museum, I have assembled the pertinent papers
and have compiled from Adney's research notes as complete a description
as I could of bark canoes, their history, construction, decoration and
use. I had long been interested in the primitive watercraft of the
Americas, but I was one of those who had discontinued research on bark
canoes upon learning of Adney's work. The little I had accomplished
dealt almost entirely with the canoes of Alaska and British Columbia;
from these I had turned to dugouts and to the skin boats of the Eskimo.
Therefore I have faced with much diffidence the task of assembling and
preparing the Adney papers for publication, particularly since it was
not always clear what Adney had finally decided about certain matters
pertaining to canoes. His notes were seldom arranged in a sequence that
would enable the reader to decide which, of a number of solutions or
opinions given, were Adney's final ones.
Adney's interest in canoes, as canoes, was very great, but his interest
in anthropology led him to form many opinions about pre-Columbian
migrations of Indian tribes and about the significance of the
decorations used in some canoes. His papers contain considerable
discussion of these matters, but they are in such state that only an
ethnologist could edit and evaluate them. In addition, my own studies
lead me to conclude that the mere examination of watercraft alone is
insufficient evidence upon which to base opinions as far-reaching as
those of Adney. Therefore I have not attempted to present in this
work any of Adney's theories regarding the origin or ethnological
significance of the canoes discussed. I have followed the same practice
with those Adney papers which concern Indian language, some of which
relate to individual tribal canoe types and are contained in the canoe
material. (Most of his papers on linguistics are now in The Peabody
Museum, Salem, Massachusetts.)
The strength and weaknesses of Adney's work, as shown in his papers,
drawings, and models, seem to me to be fully apparent. That part
dealing with the eastern Indians, with whom he had long personal
contact, is by far the most voluminous and, perhaps, the most accurate.
The canoes used by Indians west of the St. Lawrence as far as the
western end of the Great Lakes and northward to the west side of
Hudsons Bay are, with a few exceptions, covered in somewhat less
detail, but the material nonetheless appears ample for our purpose. The
canoes used in the Canadian Northwest, except those from the vicinity
of Great Slave Lake, and in Alaska were less well described. It appears
that Adney had relatively little opportunity to examine closely the
canoes used in Alaska, during his visit there in 1900, and that he
later was unable to visit those American museums having collections
that would have helped him with regard to these areas. As a result, I
have found it desirable to add my own material on these areas, drawn
largely from the collections of American museums and from my notes on
construction details.
An important part of Adney's work deals with the large canoes used in
the fur trade. Very little beyond the barest of descriptions has been
published and, with but few exceptions, contemporary paintings and
drawings of these canoes are obviously faulty. Adney was fortunate
enough to have been able to begin his research on these canoes while
there were men alive who had built and used them. As a result he
obtained information that would have been lost within, at most, the
span of a decade. His interest was doubly keen, fortunately, for Adney
not only was interested in the canoes as such, he also valued the
information for its aid in painting historical scenes. As a result,
there is hardly a question concerning fur trade canoes, whether of
model, construction, decoration, or use, that is not answered in his
material.
I have made every effort to preserve the results of Adney's
investigations of the individual types in accurate drawings or in the
descriptions in the text. It was necessary to redraw and complete
most of Adney's scale drawings of canoes, for they were prepared for
model-building rather than for publication. Where his drawings were
incomplete, they could be filled in from his scale models and notes.
It must be kept in mind that in drawing plans of primitive craft the
draftsman must inevitably "idealize" the subject somewhat, since a
drawing shows fair curves and straight lines which the primitive
craft do not have in all cases. Also, the inboard profiles are
diagrammatic rather than precise, because, in the necessary reduction
of the full-size canoe to a drawing, this is the only way to show its
"form" in a manner that can be interpreted accurately and that can
be reproduced in a model or full size, as desired. It is necessary
to add that, though most of the Adney plans were measured from
full-size canoes, some were reconstructed from Indian models, builders'
information, or other sources. Thanks to Adney's thorough knowledge of
bark construction, the plans are highly accurate, but there are still
chances for error, and these are discussed where they occur.
Although reconstruction of extinct canoe types is difficult, for the
strange canoes of the Beothuk Indians of Newfoundland Adney appears to
have solved some of the riddles posed by contemporary descriptions and
the few grave models extant (the latter may have been children's toys).
Whether or not his reconstructed canoe is completely accurate cannot be
determined; at least it conforms reasonably well to the descriptions
and models, and Adney's thorough knowledge of Indian craftsmanship
gives weight to his opinions and conclusions. This much can be said:
the resulting canoe would be a practical one and it fulfills very
nearly all descriptions of the type known today.
Adney's papers and drawings dealing with the construction of bark
canoes are most complete and valuable. So complete as to be almost a
set of "how-to-do-it" instructions, they cover everything from the
selection of materials and use of tools to the art of shaping and
building the canoe. An understanding of these building instructions is
essential to any sound examination of the bark canoes of North America,
for they show the limitations of the medium and indicate what was and
what was not reasonable to expect from the finished product.
In working on Adney's papers, it became obvious that this publication
could not be limited to birch-bark canoes, since canoes built of other
barks and even some covered with skins appear in the birch bark areas.
Because of this, and to explain the technical differences between these
and the birch canoes, skin-covered canoes have been included. I have
also appended a chapter on Eskimo skin boats and kayaks. This material
I had originally prepared for inclusion in the _Encyclopedia Arctica_,
publication of which was cancelled after one volume had appeared. As
a result, the present work now covers the native craft, exclusive of
dugouts, of all North America north of Mexico.
In my opinion the value of the information gathered by Edwin Tappan
Adney is well worth the effort that has been expended to bring it to
its present form, and any merit that attaches to it belongs largely to
Adney himself, whose long and painstaking research, carried on under
severe personal difficulties, is the foundation of this study.
HOWARD IRVING CHAPELLE
_Curator of Transportation,
Museum of History and Technology_
_Chapter One_
EARLY HISTORY
The development of bark canoes in North America before the arrival of
the white men cannot satisfactorily be traced. Unlike the dugout, the
bark canoe is too perishable to survive in recognizable form buried in
a bog or submerged in water, so we have little or no visual evidence of
very great age upon which to base sound assumptions.
Records of bark canoes, contained in the reports of the early white
explorers of North America, are woefully lacking in detail, but they
at least give grounds for believing that the bark canoes even then
were highly developed, and were the product of a very long period of
existence and improvement prior to the first appearance of Europeans.
The Europeans were most impressed by the fact that the canoes were
built of bark reinforced by a light wooden frame. The speed with
which they could be propelled by the Indians also caused amazement,
as did their light weight and marked strength, combined with a great
load-carrying capacity in shallow water. It is remarkable, however,
that although bark canoes apparently aroused so much admiration among
Europeans, so little of accurate and complete information appears in
their writings.
With two notable exceptions, to be discussed later, early explorers,
churchmen, travellers, and writers were generally content merely to
mention the number of persons in a canoe. The first published account
of variations in existing forms of the American bark canoe does not
occur until 1724, and the first known illustration of a bark canoe
accurate enough to indicate its tribal designation appeared only two
years earlier. This fact makes any detailed examination of the early
books dealing with North America quite unprofitable as far as precise
information on bark canoes is concerned.
The first known reference by a Frenchman to the bark canoe is that of
Jacques Cartier, who reported that he saw two bark canoes in 1535; he
said the two carried a total of 17 men. Champlain was the first to
record any definite dimensions of the bark canoes; he wrote that in
1603 he saw, near what is now Quebec, bark canoes 8 to 9 paces long
and 1½ paces wide, and he added that they might transport as much as
a pipe of wine yet were light enough to be carried easily by one man.
If a pace is taken as about 30 inches, then the canoes would have
been between 20 and 23 feet long, between 40 and 50 inches beam and
capable of carrying about half a ton, English measurements. These were
apparently Algonkin canoes. Champlain was impressed by the speed of
the bark canoes; he reported that his fully manned longboat was passed
by two canoes, each with two paddlers. As will be seen, he was perhaps
primarily responsible for the rapid adoption of bark canoes by the
early French in Canada.
The first English reference that has been found is in the records of
Captain George Weymouth's voyage. He and his crew in 1603 saw bark
canoes to the westward of Penobscot Bay, on what is now the coast of
Maine. The English were impressed, just as Champlain had been, by
the speed with which canoes having but three or four paddlers could
pass his ship's boat manned with four oarsmen. Weymouth also speaks
admiringly of the fine workmanship shown in the structure of the canoes.
When Champlain attacked the Iroquois, on what is now Lake Champlain,
he found that these Indians had "oak" bark (more probably elm) canoes
capable of carrying 10, 15, and 18 men. This would indicate that the
maximum size of the Iroquois canoes was about 30 to 33 feet long. The
illustrations in his published account indicate canoes about 30 feet
long; but early illustrations of this kind were too often the product
of the artist's imagination, just as were the delineations of the
animals and plants of North America.
As an example of what may be deduced from other early French accounts,
Champlain in 1615, with a companion and 12 Indians, embarked at La
Chine in two bark canoes for a trip to the Great Lakes. He stated
that the two canoes, with men and baggage aboard, were over-crowded.
Taking one of these canoes as having 7 men and baggage aboard, it seems
apparent that it was not much larger than the largest of the canoes
Champlain had seen in 1603 on the St. Lawrence. But in 1672, Louis
Joliet and Father Jacques Marquette traveled in two canoes, carrying
a total of 5 French and 25 Indians--say 14 in one canoe and 16 in the
other. These canoes, then, must have been at least 28 feet long over
the gunwales, exclusive of the round of the ends, or about 30 feet
overall. The Chevalier Henri de Tonti, one of La Salle's officers,
mentions a canoe carrying 30 men--probably 14 paddlers on each side, a
steersman, and a passenger or officer. Such a capacity might indicate
a canoe about 40 feet over the gunwales, though this seems very long
indeed; it is more probable that the canoe would be about 36 feet long.
Another of La Salle's officers, Baron de LaHontan, gave the first
reasonably complete account that has been found of the size and
character of a birch-bark canoe. This was written at Montreal June 29,
1684. After stating that he had seen at least a hundred bark canoes in
his journeys, he said that birch-bark canoes ranged in length from 10
to 28 _pieds_ and were capable of carrying from 2 to 14 persons. The
largest, when carrying cargo, might be handled by three men and could
carry 2,000 pounds of freight (20 quintals). These large canoes were
safe and never upset. They were built of bark peeled in the winter; hot
water was thrown on the bark to make it pliable, so that it could be
rolled up after it was removed from the tree. The canoes were built of
more than one piece of bark as a rule.
The large canoes, he reports, were 28 _pieds_ long, 4½ _pieds_ wide and
20 _pouces_ deep, top of gunwale to top of frames on bottom. The last
indicates "inside" measurement; in this the length would be over the
gunwales, not overall, and the beam inside the gunwales, not extreme.
He also says the canoes had a lining or sheathing of cedar "splints"
or plank and, inside this, cedar ribs or frames. The bark was the
thickness of an _écu_ (this coin, a crown, was a little less than ⅛
inch thick), the sheathing the thickness of two _écus_, and the ribs of
three. The ends of the ribs were pointed and these were seated in holes
in the underside of the gunwales. There were 8 crosspieces (thwarts)
between the gunwales (note: such a canoe would commonly have 9 thwarts;
LaHontan may have erred here).
The canoes were convenient, he says, because of their great lightness
and shallow draft, but they were easily damaged. Hence they had to be
loaded and unloaded afloat and usually required repairs to the bark
covers at the end of each day. They had to be staked down at night,
so that a strong wind might not damage or blow them away; but this
light weight permitted them to be carried with ease by two men, one at
each end, and this suited them for use on the rivers of Canada, where
rapids and falls made carrying frequently necessary. These canoes were
of no value on the Lakes, LaHontan states, as they could not be used
in windy weather; though in good weather they might cross lakes and
might go four or five leagues on open water. The canoes carried small
sails, but these could be used only with fair winds of moderate force.
The paddlers might kneel, sit, or stand to paddle and pole the canoes.
The paddle blade was 20 _pouces_ long, 6 wide, and 4 _lignes_ thick;
the handle was of the diameter of a pigeon's egg and three _pieds_
long. The paddlers also had a "setting pole," to pole the canoes in
shoal water. The canoes were alike at both ends and cost 80 _écus_
(LaHontan's cost 90), and would last not more than five or six years.
The foregoing is but a condensed extract of LaHontan's lively account.
In translating LaHontan's measurements a _pied_ is taken as 12.79
inches, a _pouce_ as about 1⅛ inches. The French fathom, or _brasse_,
as used in colonial Canada, was the length from finger-tip to
finger-tip of the arms outstretched and so varied, but may be roughly
estimated as about 64 inches; this was the "fathom" used later in
classing fur-trade canoes for length. In English measurements his
large canoe would have been about 30 feet long over the gunwales and,
perhaps, almost 33 feet overall, 57½ inches beam inside the gunwales,
or about 60 inches extreme beam. The depth inside would be 21 or 21¾
inches bottom to top of gunwale amidships. LaHontan also described the
elm-bark canoes of the Iroquois as being large and wide enough to carry
30 paddlers, 15 on a side, sitting or standing. Here again a canoe
about 40 feet long is indicated. He said that these elm-bark canoes
were crude, heavy and slow, with low sides, so that once he and his men
reached an open lake, he no longer feared pursuit by the Iroquois in
these craft.
[Illustration: Figure 2
PAGE FROM A MANUSCRIPT OF 1771, "Observations on Hudsons Bay," by
Alexander Graham, Factor, now in the archives of the Hudson's Bay
Company in London. The birch-bark canoe at the top, the kayak below,
and the paddles are obviously drawn by one not trained to observe as an
artist.]
From the slight evidence offered in such records as these, it appears
that the Indians may have had, when the Europeans first reached
Canada, canoes at least as long as the 5-fathom or 5½-fathom canoe
of later times. It appears also that these dimensions applied to the
canoes of the Great Lakes area and perhaps to the elm-bark canoes of
the Iroquois as well. Probably there were canoes as short as 10 feet,
used as one-man hunting and fishing boats, and it is plainly evident
that canoes between this length and about 24 feet were very common.
The evidence in La Salle's time, in the last half of the seventeenth
century, must be taken with some caution, as French influence on the
size of large canoes may have by then come into play. The comparison
between the maximum length of the Iroquois canoes, inferred from the
report of Champlain, and that suggested by LaHontan, might indicate
this growth.
Beginning as early as 1660, the colonial government of Canada issued
_congés_ or trading licenses. These were first granted to the military
officers or their families; later the _congés_ were issued to all
approved traders, and the fees were used for pensions of the military
personnel. Records of these licenses, preserved from about 1700, show
that three men commonly made up the crew of a trading canoe in the
earliest years, but that by 1725 five men were employed, by 1737 seven
men, and by 1747 seven or eight men. However, as LaHontan has stated
that in his time three men were sufficient to man a large canoe with
cargo, it is evident that the _congés_ offer unreliable data and do not
necessarily prove that the size of canoes had increased during this
period. The increase in the crews may have been brought about by the
greater distances travelled, with an increased number of portages or,
perhaps, by heavier items of cargo.
The war canoe does not appear in these early accounts as a special
type. According to the traditions of the eastern Micmac and Malecite
Indians, their war canoes were only large enough to carry three or
four warriors and so must not have exceeded 18 feet in length. These
were built for speed, narrow and with very sharp ends; the bottom
was made as smooth as was possible. Each canoe carried the insignia
of each of its warriors, that is, his personal mark or sign. A canoe
carrying a war leader had only his personal mark, none for the rest of
the crew. It is possible to regard the large canoes of the Iroquois
as "war canoes" since they were used in the pursuit of French raiders
in LaHontan's time. However, the Iroquois did not build the canoes
primarily for war; in early times these fierce tribesmen preferred
to take to the warpath in the dead of winter and to raid overland
on snowshoes. In open weather, they used the rough, short-lived and
quickly built elm-bark canoes to cross streams and lakes or to follow
waterways, discarding them when the immediate purpose was accomplished.
Probably it was the French who really produced the bark "war canoes,"
for they appear to have placed great emphasis on large canoes for use
of the military, as indicated by LaHontan's concern with the largest
canoes of his time. Perhaps large bark canoes were once used on the
Great Lakes for war parties, but, if so, no mention of a special type
has been found in the early French accounts. The sparse references
suggest that both large and small canoes were used by the war parties
but that no special type paralleling the characteristics of the Micmac
and Malecite war canoes existed in the West. The huge dugout war
canoe of the Indians of the Northwest Coast appears to have had no
counterpart in size among the birch or elm bark canoes.
Except for LaHontan, the early French writers who refer to the use
of sail agree that the canoes were quite unfitted for sailing. It is
extremely doubtful that the prehistoric Indians using bark canoes were
acquainted with sails, though it is possible that the coastal Indians
might have set up a bush in the bow to utilize a following wind and
thus lighten the labor of paddling. However, once the Indian saw the
usefulness of a sail demonstrated by white men, he was quick to adopt
it; judging from the LaHontan reference, and the use of sails in canoes
must have become well established in some areas by 1685.
One of the most important elements in the history of the canoe is its
early adoption by the French. Champlain was the first to recommend its
use by white men. He stated that the bark canoe would be very necessary
in trade and exploration, pointing out that in order to penetrate the
back country above the rapids at Montreal, during the short summer
season, and to come back in time to return to France for the winter
(unless the winter was to be spent in Canada) the canoe would have
to be used. With it the small and large streams could be navigated
safely and the numerous overland carries could be quickly made. Also,
of course, Indians could be employed as crews without the need of
training them to row. This general argument in favor of the bark canoe
remained sound after the desirability of going home to France for the
winter had ceased to influence French ideas. The quick expansion of the
French fur trade in the early seventeenth century opened up the western
country into the Great Lakes area and to the northward. It was soon
discovered that by using canoes on the ancient canoe route along the
Ottawa River goods could reach the western posts on the Lakes and be
transported north early enough to reach the northernmost posts before
the first freeze-up occurred. The use of sailing vessels on the Lakes
did not enable this to be accomplished, so that until the railroads
were built in western Canada, the canoe remained the mode of transport
for the fur trade in this area. Even after the railways were built,
canoe traffic remained important, until well into the first half of the
twentieth century as part of the local system of transportation in the
northwestern country of Canada.
[Illustration: Figure 3
CANOES FROM LAHONTAN'S _Nouveaux Voyages ... dans l'Amerique
Septentrionale_, showing crude representations typical of early
writers.]
The unsatisfactory illustrations accompanying early published accounts
have been mentioned. The earliest recognizable canoe to be shown in
an illustration is the reasonably accurate drawing of a Micmac canoe
that appears in Bacqueville de la Poterie's book, published in 1722.
LaFiteau, another Frenchman, in 1724 published a book that not only
contains recognizable drawings but points out reasons for the variation
in the appearance of bark canoes:
The Abenacquis, for example, are less high in the sides, less
large, and more flat at the two ends; in a way they are almost
level for their whole extent; because those who travel on their
small rivers are sure to be troubled and struck by the branches of
trees that border and extend over the water. On the other hand, the
Outaouacs [Ottawas] and the nations of the upper country having to
do their navigation on the St. Lawrence River where there are many
falls and rapids, or especially on the Lakes where there is always
a very considerable swell, must have high ends.
His illustrations show that his low-ended canoes were of Micmac type
but that his high-ended canoes were not of the Ottawa River or Great
Lakes types but rather of the eastern Malecite of the lower St.
Lawrence valley. This Jesuit missionary also noted that the canoes were
alike at the ends and that the paddles were of maple and about 5 feet
long, with blades 18 inches long and 6 wide. He observed that bark
canoes were unfitted for sailing.
[Illustration: Figure 4
LINES OF AN OLD BIRCH-BARK CANOE, probably Micmac, brought to England
in 1749 from New England. This canoe was not alike at both ends,
although apparently intended to be so by the builder. (_From Admiralty
Collection of Draughts, National Maritime Museum, Greenwich._)]
The early English settlers of New England and New York were acquainted
with the canoe forms of eastern Indians such as the Micmac, Malecite,
Abnaki, and the Iroquois. Surviving records, however, show no detailed
description of these canoes by an English writer and no illustration
until about 1750. At this time a bark canoe, apparently Micmac, was
brought from Portsmouth, New Hampshire, to England and delivered to
Lord Anson who had it placed in the Boat House of the Chatham Dockyard.
There it was measured and a scale drawing was made by Admiralty
draftsmen; the drawing is now in the Admiralty Collection of Draughts,
in the National Maritime Museum at Greenwich. A redrawing of this plan
appears opposite. It probably represents a war canoe, since a narrow,
sharp-ended canoe is shown. The bottom, neither flat nor fully round,
is a rounded ~V~-shape; this may indicate a canoe intended for coastal
waters. Other drawings, of a later date, showing crude plans of canoes,
exist in Europe but none yet found appear as carefully drawn as the
Admiralty plan, a scale drawing, which seems to be both the earliest
and the most accurate 18th-century representation of a tribal type of
American Indian bark canoe.
Due to the rapid development of the French fur trade, and the attendant
exploration, a great variety of canoe types must have become known to
the French by 1750, yet little in the way of drawings and no early
scale plans have been found. This is rather surprising, not only
because the opportunity for observation existed but also because a
canoe factory was actually operated by the French. The memoirs of
Colonel Franquet, Military Engineer-in-Chief for New France, contain
extensive references to this factory as it existed in 1751.
The canoe factory was located at Trois Rivières, just below Montreal,
on the St. Lawrence. A standard large canoe was built, and the rate
of production was then 20 a year. Franquet gives as the dimensions of
the canoes the following (converted to English measurement): length
36 feet, beam about 5½ feet, and depth about 33 inches. Much of his
description is not clear, but it seems evident that the canoe described
was very much like the later _grand canot_, or large canoe, of the
fur trade. The date at which this factory was established is unknown;
it may have existed as early as 1700, as might have been required by
the rapid expansion of the French trade and other activities in the
last half of the previous century. It is apparent from early comments
that the French found the Indian canoe-builders unreliable, not to say
most uncertain, as a source of supply. The need for large canoes for
military and trade operations had forced the establishment of such a
factory as soon as Europeans could learn how to build the canoes. This
would, in fact, have been the only possible solution.
Of course, it must not be assumed that the bark canoes were the only
watercraft used by the early French traders. They used plank boats as
well, ranging from scows to flat-bottomed bateaux and ship's boats, and
they also had some early sailing craft built on the Great Lakes and on
the lower St. Lawrence. The bateau, shaped much like a modern dory but
with a sharp stern, was adopted by the English settlers as well as the
French. In early colonial times this form of boat was called by the
English a "battoe," or "Schenectady Boat," and later, an "Albany Boat."
It was sharp at both ends, it usually had straight flaring sides with a
flat bottom, and was commonly built of white pine plank. Some, however,
had rounded sides and lapstrake planking, as shown by a plan of a
bateau of 1776 in the Admiralty Collection of Draughts. Early bateaux
had about the same range of size as the bark canoes but later ones were
larger.
After the English gained control of Canada, the records of the Hudson's
Bay Company, and of individual traders and travellers such as Alexander
Henry, Jr., and Alexander MacKenzie, at the end of the eighteenth
century, give much material on the fur-trade canoes but little on the
small Indian canoes. In general, these records show that the fur-trade
canoe of the West was commonly 24 feet long inside the gunwales,
exclusive of the curves of bow and stern; 4 feet 9 inches beam; 26
inches deep; and light enough to be carried by two men, as MacKenzie
recorded, "three or four miles without resting on a good road." But the
development of the fur-trade canoes is best left for a later chapter.
The use of the name "canoe" for bark watercraft does not appear to
been taken from a North American Indian usage. The early French
explorers and travellers called these craft _canau_ (pl. _canaux_).
As this also meant "canal," the name _canot_ (pl. _canots_) was soon
substituted. But some early writers preferred to call the canoe _ecorse
de bouleau_, or birch-bark, and sometimes the name used was merely the
generic _petit embarcation_, or small boat. The early English term was
"canoa," later "canoe." The popular uses of canoe, canoa, _canau_, and
_canot_ are thought to have begun early in the sixteenth century as the
adaptation of a Carib Indian word for a dugout canoe.
Summary
It will be seen that the early descriptions of the North American
bark canoes are generally lacking in exact detail. Yet this scanty
information strongly supports the claim that bark canoes were highly
developed and that the only influence white men exercised upon their
design was related to an increase in size of the large canoes that
may have taken place in the late seventeenth and early eighteenth
centuries. The very early recognition of the speed, fine construction,
and general adaptability of the bark canoes to wilderness travel
sustain this view. The two known instances mentioned of early accurate
illustration emphasize that distinct variations in tribal forms of
canoes existed, and that these were little changed between early
colonial times and a relatively recent period, despite steadily
increasing influence of the European.
_Chapter Two_
MATERIALS and TOOLS
Bark of the paper birch was the material preferred by the North
American Indians for the construction of their canoes, although other
barks were used where birch was not available. This tree (_Betula
papyrifera_ Marsh.), also known as the canoe birch, is found in good
soil, often near streams, and where growing conditions are favorable
it becomes large, reaching a height of a hundred feet, with a butt
diameter of thirty inches or more. Its range forms a wide belt
across the continent, with the northern limits in Canada along a
line extending westward from Newfoundland to the southern shores of
Hudson Bay and thence generally northwestward to Great Bear Lake,
the Yukon River, and the Alaskan coast. The southern limits extend
roughly westward from Long Island to the southern shores of Lake
Erie and through central Michigan to Lake Superior, thence through
Wisconsin, northern Nebraska, and northwesterly through the Dakotas,
northern Montana, and northern Washington to the Pacific Coast. The
trees are both abundant and large in the eastern portion of the belt,
particularly in Newfoundland, Quebec, the Maritime Provinces, Ontario,
Maine, and New Hampshire, in contrast to the western areas. Near the
limits of growth to the north and south the trees are usually small and
scattered.
The leaves are rather small, deep green, and pointed-oval, and are
often heart-shaped at the base. The edges of the leaves are rather
coarsely toothed along the margin, which is slightly six-notched. The
small limbs are black, sometimes spotted with white, and the large are
white.
The bark of the tree has an aromatic odor when freshly peeled, and is
chalky white marked with black splotches on either side of limbs or
where branches have grown at one time. Elsewhere on the bark, dark,
or black, horizontal lines of varying lengths also appear. The lower
part of the tree, to about the height of winter snows, has bark that
is usually rough, blemished and thin; above this level, to the height
of the lowest large limbs, the bark is often only slightly blemished
and is thick and well formed. The bark is made up of paper-like
layers, their color deepens with each layer from the chalky white of
the exterior through creamy buff to a light tan on the inner layer. A
gelatinous greenish to yellow rind, or cambium layer, lies between the
bark and the wood of the trunk; its characteristics are different from
those of the rest of the bark. The horizontal lines that appear on each
successive paper-like layer do not appear on the rind.
The thickness of the bark cannot be judged from the size of a tree
and may vary markedly among trees of the same approximate size in a
single grove. The thickness varies from a little less than one-eighth
to over three-sixteenths inch; bark with a thickness of one-quarter
inch or more is rarely found. For canoe construction, bark must be over
one-eighth inch thick, tough, and from a naturally straight trunk of
sufficient diameter and length to give reasonably large pieces. The
"eyes" must be small and not so closely spaced as to allow the bark to
split easily in their vicinity.
The bark can be peeled readily when the sap is flowing. In winter,
when the exterior of the tree is frozen, the bark can be removed only
when heat is applied. During a prolonged thaw, however, this may be
accomplished without the application of heat. Bark peeled from the tree
during a winter thaw, and early in the spring or late in the fall,
usually adheres strongly to the inner rind, which comes away from the
tree with the bark. The act of peeling, however, puts a strain on the
bark, so that only tough, well-made bark can be removed under these
conditions. This particular characteristic caused Indians in the east
to call bark with the rind adhering "winter bark," even though it might
have been peeled from a tree during the warm weather of early summer.
Since in large trees the flow of sap usually starts later than in small
ones, the period in which good bark is obtainable may extend into late
June in some localities. Upon exposure to air and moisture, the inner
rind first turns orange-red and gradually darkens with age until in a
few years it becomes dark brown, or sepia. If it is first moistened,
the rind can be scraped off, and this allowed it to be employed in
decoration, enough being left to form designs. Hence winter bark was
prized.
To the eastern Indians "summer bark" was a poor grade that readily
separated into its paper-like layers, a characteristic of bark peeled
in hot weather, or of poorly made bark in any season. In the west,
however, high-quality bark was often scarce and, therefore, the
distinction between winter and summer bark does not seem to have been
made. Newfoundland once had excellent canoe bark, as did the Maritime
Provinces, Maine, New Hampshire, and Quebec, but the best bark was
found back from the seacoast. Ontario and the country to the immediate
north of Lake Superior are also said to have produced bark of high
quality for canoe building.
The bark of the paper birch was preferred for canoe building because
it could be obtained in quite large sheets clear of serious blemishes;
because its grain ran around the tree rather than along the line of
vertical tree growth, so that sheets could be "sewn" together to obtain
length in a canoe; and because the bark was resinous and not only did
not stretch and shrink as did other barks, but also had some elasticity
when green, or when kept damp. This elasticity, of course, was lost
once the bark was allowed to become dry through exposure to air and
sunshine, a factor which controlled to some extent the technique of its
employment.
Many other barks were employed in bark canoe construction, but in
most instances the craft were for temporary or emergency use and were
discarded after a short time. Such barks as spruce (_Picea_), elm
(_Ulmus_), chestnut (_Castenea dentata L._), hickory (_Carya_ spp.),
basswood (_Tilia_ spp.), and cottonwood (_Populus_ spp.) are said
to have been used in bark canoe construction in some parts of North
America. Birches other than the paper birch could be used, but most of
them produced bark that was thin and otherwise poor, and was considered
unsuitable for the better types of canoes. Barks other than birch
usually had rough surfaces that had to be scraped away, in order to
make the material flexible enough for canoe construction. Spruce bark
had some of the good qualities of the paper birch bark, but to a far
less degree, and was considered at best a mere substitute. Non-resinous
barks, because of their structure could not be joined together to
gain length, and their characteristic shrinkage and swelling made it
virtually impossible to keep them attached to a solid framework for any
great length of time.
[Illustration: Figure 5
OJIBWAY INDIAN carrying spruce roots, Lac Seul, Ont., 1919. (_Canadian
Geological Survey photo._)]
The material used for "sewing" together pieces of birch bark was most
commonly the root of the black spruce (_Picea mariana_ (Mill.) B.S.P.),
which grows in much of the area where the paper birch exists. The root
of this particular spruce is long but of small diameter; it is tough,
durable, and flexible enough for the purpose. The tree usually grows
in soft, moist ground, so that the long roots are commonly very close
to the surface, where they could easily be dug up with a sharp stick
or with the hands. In some areas of favorable growing conditions, the
roots of the black spruce could be obtained in lengths up to 20 feet,
yet with a maximum diameter no larger than that of a lead pencil.
[Illustration: Figure 6
ROLL OF BARK FOR A HUNTING CANOE. Holding the bark is the intended
builder, Vincent Mikans, then (in 1927), at age 100, the oldest Indian
on the Algonkin Reserve at Golden Lake, Ont.]
Other roots could be used in an emergency, such as those of the other
spruces, as well as of the northern white-cedar (_Thuja occidentalis_
L.), tamarack (hackmatack or eastern larch) (_Laris laricina_ (Du Roi)
K. Koch) and jack pine (_pinus banksiana_ Lamb.), the last named being
used extensively by some of the western tribes. Although inferior to
the black spruce for sewing, these and other materials were used for
sewing bark; even rawhide was employed for some purposes in canoe
construction by certain tribes.
Canoes built of nonresinous barks were usually lashed, instead of sewn,
by thongs of such material as the inner bark of the northern white
cedar, basswood, elm, or hickory, for the reason stated earlier. Spruce
root was also used for lashings, if readily available. Since sheets of
birch bark were joined without employing a needle, the sewing actually
could more correctly be termed lacing, rather than stitching. But for
the nonresinous barks, which could stand little sewing or lacing,
perhaps lashing is the better term.
Before steel tools became available to the Indians, the woodwork
required in constructing a birch-bark canoe represented great labor,
since stone tools having poor cutting characteristics were used.
Selection of the proper wood was therefore a vital consideration. In
most sections of the bark canoe area, the northern white cedar was
the most sought-for wood for canoe construction. This timber had the
excellent characteristic of splitting cleanly and readily when dry and
well-seasoned. As a result, the Indian could either utilize fallen
timber of this species, windblown or torn up in spring floods; with the
crude means available he could fell a suitable tree well in advance of
his needs; or he could girdle the tree so that it would die and season
on the stump and then fell it at his convenience. If split properly,
ribs of white cedar could be bent and set in shape by the use of hot
water. In many areas the ribs, sheathing, and the gunwale members of
bark canoes were made of this wood, as were also the headboards and
stem pieces.
[Illustration: Figure 7
White cedar Black spruce
Wood-splitting techniques]
Black spruce was also employed, as it too would split well, although
only when green. This wood also required a different direction in
splitting than the white cedar. Ribs of black spruce could be bent and
set in shape when this was done while the wood was green. In some areas
black spruce was used in place of white cedar for all parts of a bark
canoe structure.
Hard maple (usually either _Acer saccharum_ Marsh. or _A. nigrum_
Michx.), can be split rather easily while green; this wood was used
for the crosspieces or thwarts that hold the gunwales apart and for
paddles. Larch, particularly western larch (_Larix occidentalis_
Nutt.), was used in some areas for canoe members. White and black ash
(_Fraxinus americana_ L. and _F. nigra_ Marsh.), were also used where
suitable wood of these species was available. In the northwest, spruce
and various pines were employed, as was also willow (_Salix_). It
should be noted that the use of many woods in bark canoe construction
can be identified only in the period after steel tools became
available; it must be assumed that the range of selection was much
narrower in prehistoric times.
To make a bark cover watertight, it is necessary to coat all seams
and to cover all "sewing" with a waterproof material, of which the
most favored by the Indians was "spruce gum," the resin obtained from
black or white spruce (_Picea mariana_ or _P. glauca_ (Moench) Voss).
The resin of the red spruce (_Picea rubens_ Sarg.) was not used, so
far as has been discovered. The soft resin was scraped from a fallen
tree or from one damaged in summer. Spruce gum could be accumulated by
stripping a narrow length of bark from trees early in the spring and
then, during warm weather, gathering the resin that appeared at the
bottoms of the scars thus made. It was melted or heated in various ways
to make it workable and certain materials were usually added to make it
durable in use.
[Illustration: Figure 8
Stone axe]
The most important aids to the Indian in canoe construction were his
patience, knowledge of the working qualities of materials, his manual
skill with the crude cutting, scraping, and boring instruments known
to him, and of course fire; time was, perforce, of less importance. The
canoe builder had to learn by experience and close observation how to
work the material available. The wood-working tools of the stone age
were relatively inefficient, but with care and skill could be used with
remarkable precision and neatness.
Felling of trees was accomplished by use of a stone axe, hatchet, or
adze, combined with the use of fire. The method almost universally
employed by primitive people was followed. The tree was first girdled
by striking it with the stone tool to loosen and raise the wood fibers
and remove the soft green bark. Above this girdle the trunk was daubed
all around with wet earth, or preferably clay. A large, hot fire was
then built around the base of the tree and, after the loose fibers were
burned away and the wood well charred, the char was removed by blows
from the stone tool. The process was repeated until the trunk was cut
through enough for the tree to fall. The fallen trunk could be cut into
sections by employing the same methods, mud being laid on each side
of the "cut" to prevent the fire from spreading along the trunk. Fire
could also be used to cut down poles and small trees, to cut them into
sections, and to sharpen the ends into points to form crude wedges or
stakes.
Stone tools were formed by chipping flint, jasper, or other forms of
quartz, such as chalcedony, into flakes with sharp edges. This was done
by striking the nodule of stone a sharp blow with another stone held
in the hand or mounted in a handle of hide or wood to form a stone
hammer. The flakes were then shaped by pressing the edges with a horn
point--say, part of a deer antler--to force a chip from the flake. The
chipping tool was sometimes fitted with a hide or wood handle set at
right angles to the tool, so that its head could be hit with a stone or
horn hammer. The flake being worked upon, if small, was often held in
the hand, which was protected from the slipping of a chipping tool by
a pad of rawhide. Heat was not used in chipping, and some Indians took
care to keep the flake damp while working it, occasionally burying the
flake for a while in moist soil. The cutting edge of a stone tool could
be ground by abrasion on a hard piece of granite or on sandstone, but
the final degree of sharpness depended upon the qualities of the stone
being used as a tool. Slate could be used in tools in spite of its
brittleness. In general, stone tools were unsuitable for chopping or
whittling wood.
[Illustration: Figure 9
Stone hammer
Stone wedge
Stone knife with rawhide thong handle]
Splitting was done by starting the split at the upper, or small end, of
a balk of timber with a maul and a stone wedge or the blade of a stone
axe, hatchet, or knife. The stone knives used for this work were not
finished tools with wood handles, but rather, as the blade was often
damaged in use, selected flakes fitted with hide pads that served as
a handle. The tool was usually driven into the wood with blows from a
wooden club or maul, the brittle stone tool being protected from damage
by a pad of rawhide secured to the top, or head, of the tool. Once the
split was started, it could be continued by driving more wedges, or
pointed sticks, into the split; this process was continued until the
whole balk was divided. White cedar was split into quarters by this
method and then the heartwood was split away, the latter being used for
canoe structural members. From short balks of the length of the longest
rib or perhaps a little more, were split battens equal in thickness
to two ribs and in width also equal to two, so that by splitting one
batten two ways four finished ribs were produced. The broad faces
of the ribs were as nearly parallel to the bark side of the wood as
possible, as the ribs would bend satisfactorily toward or away from the
bark side only. Black spruce, however, was split in line with the wood
rays, from the heart outward toward the bark, so that one of the rib's
narrow edges faced the bark side; only in this direction would the wood
split readily and only when made this way would the ribs bend without
great breakage.
[Illustration: Figure 10
Wooden mauls
(2, 3 used to set ribs with 4, 5)
Driving sticks]
Long pieces for sheathing and for the gunwale members were split
from white cedar or black spruce. The splitting of such long pieces
as these required not only proper selection of clear wood, but also
careful manipulation of wood and tools in the operation. Splitting of
this kind--say, for ribs in the finish cut--was usually done by first
splitting out a batten large enough to form two members. To split it
again, a stone knife was tapped into the end grain to start the split
at the desired point, which, as has been noted, was always at the upper
end of the stick, not at the root end. Once the split was opened, it
was continued by use of a sharp-pointed stick and the stone knife;
if the split showed a tendency to run off the grain as it opened, it
could be controlled by bending the batten, or one of the halves, away
from the direction the split was taking. The first rough split usually
served to show the worker the splitting characteristics of a piece of
wood. This method of finishing frame members in bark canoes accounts
for the uneven surfaces that often mark some parts, a wavy grain
producing a wave in the surface of the wood when it was finished. If
it were desired to produce a partially split piece of wood, such as
some tribal groups used for the stems, or in order to allow greater
curvature at the ends of the gunwale, the splitting was stopped at the
desired point and a tight lashing of rawhide or bark was placed there
to form a stop.
The tapering of frames, gunwales, and thwarts and the shaping of
paddles were accomplished by splitting away surplus wood along the
thin edges and by abrasion and scraping on all edges. Stone scrapers
were widely employed; shell could be employed in some areas. Rubbing
with an abrasive such as soft sandstone was used when the wood became
thoroughly dry; hardwood could often be polished by rubbing it with a
large piece of wood, or by use of fine sand held in a rawhide pad. By
these means the sharp edges could be rounded off and the final shaping
accomplished. Some stone knives could be used to cut wood slowly, saw
fashion, and this process appears to to have been used to form the
thwart ends that in many canoes were tenoned into the gunwales. A stone
knife used saw fashion would also cut a bent sapling easily, though
slowly. To cut and trim bark a stone knife was employed; to peel bark
from a tree, a hatchet, axe, or chisel could be used.
[Illustration: Figure 11
Stone scraper]
Drilling was done by means of a bone awl made from a splinter of the
shank-bone of a deer; the blade of this awl had a roughly triangular
cross-section. The splinter was held in a wooden handle or in a rawhide
grip. The awl was used not only to make holes in wood, but also as the
punch to make holes for "sewing" in bark. Large holes were drilled by
means of the bow-drill, in which a stone drill-point was rotated back
and forth by the bow-string. Some Indians rotated the drill between the
palms of their hands, or by a string with handgrips at each end. The
top of the drill was steadied by a block held in the worker's mouth,
the top rotating in a hole in the underside of the block. With the
bow-drill, however, the block was held in one hand.
[Illustration: Figure 12
Bow Drill]
Peeling the bark from roots and splitting them was done by use of the
thumbnail, a stone knife, or a clamshell. Biting was also resorted
to. The end of a root could also be split by first pounding it with a
stone, using a log or another stone as an anvil, to open the fibers
at one end. Splitting a root was usually done by biting to start the
split. Once this was done, half was held in the mouth and the other
half between the thumb and forefinger of the right hand. Then the
two parts were gradually pulled apart with the right hand, while the
thumbnail of the left was used to guide the split. If the split showed
a tendency to "run off," bending the root away from the direction of
the run while continuing the splitting usually served to change the
course of the split. If a root was hard to split, the stone knife
came into play instead of the thumbnail. When the split reached arm's
length, the ends were shifted in hand and mouth and the operation
continued.
The use of hot water as an aid in bending wood was well known to
some tribal groups before the white man came. Water was placed in a
wooden trough, or in a bark basin, and heated to boiling by dropping
hot stones into it. Some Indians boiled water in bark utensils by
placing them over a fire of hot coals surrounded by stones and earth
so that the flame could not reach the highly inflammable bark above
the water-level in the dish. Stones were lifted from the fire with
wooden tongs made of green saplings bent into a ~U~-shape or made
into a spoon-like outline. A straight stick and a forked one, used
together, formed another type of tongs. The straight stick was placed
in and under the fork; then, by forcing the latter under the stone and
bringing the end of the straight stick hard against its top, the stone
was held firmly, pincer-fashion.
The wood to be bent was first soaked in the boiling water, or the water
was poured over it by means of a birch-bark or other dipper. When the
wood was thoroughly soaked with boiling water, bending began, and as
it progressed boiling water was almost continuously poured on the
wood. When the wood had been bent to a desired form, it was secured in
shape by thongs and allowed to cool and dry out, during which it would
take a permanent set. Hard bends, as in gunwale ends and stem-pieces,
were made by this means, usually after the wood had been split into a
number of laminations in the area of the greatest bend. When the piece
had been boiled and bent to its required form, the laminations were
secured by wrapping them spirally with a thong of inner bark (such as
basswood), of roots, or of rawhide.
Flat stones were used to weigh down bark in order to flatten it and
prevent curling. Picked up about the canoe-building site, they had
one smooth and fairly flat surface so that no harm came to the bark,
and were of such size and weight as could be handled easily by the
builder. Smooth stones from a stream appear to have been preferred. In
preparation for building a canoe, the pins, stakes, and poles which
were of only temporary use were cut or burned down in the manner
mentioned and stored ready for use. Bark containers were made and
filled with spruce gum, and the materials used in making it hard and
durable were gathered. The building site was selected in the shade,
to prevent the bark from becoming hard and brittle, and on ground
that was smooth, clear of outcroppings of stone, and roots, or other
obstructions, and firm enough to hold the stakes driven into it. The
location was, of course, usually near the water where the canoe was to
be launched.
[Illustration: Figure 13
Modern Hudson Bay axe]
When steel tools became available, the work of the Indian in cutting
and shaping wood became much easier but it is doubtful that better
workmanship resulted. The steel axe and hatchet made more rapid and
far easier than before the felling and cutting up of trees, poles, and
sticks; they could also be used in peeling bark. The favored style of
axe among Canadian Indians was what is known as the "Hudson Bay axe";
it is made as a fairly large or "full-axe," as a lighter "half-axe,"
and as a large hatchet, or hand-axe. The head of the blade is very
narrow, the front of the blade vertical, while the back widens toward
the cutting edge and the latter stands at a slightly acute angle to the
front of the blade. This style of axe seems to follow the traditional
form of the tomahawk and is popular because it cuts well, yet is
lighter to carry than the other forms of axe. It is also called a
"cedar axe" in some localities. In modern times, Indian hatchets are of
the commercial variety, the "lathing" form being preferred because it
holds somewhat to the old trade tomahawk in form of blade and weight.
The traditional steel tomahawk, incidentally was an adaptation of one
of the European forms of hatchet, sold in the early days of the fur
trade.
[Illustration: Figure 14
Steel tomahawk (fur trade)]
[Illustration: Figure 15
Steel canoe awls]
The "canoe awl" of the fur trade was a steel awl with a blade
triangular or square in cross-section, and was sometimes made of an old
triangular file of small size. Its blade was locked into a hardwood
handle, and it was a modern version of the old bone awl of the bark
canoe builders, hence its name.
The plane was also used by modern Indians, but not in white man's
fashion, in which the wood is held in a vise and smoothed by sliding
the tool forward over the work. The Indian usually fixed the plane
upside down on a bench or timber and slid the work over the sole, much
as would be done with a power-driven joiner. However, the plane was not
very popular among any of the canoe-building Indians.
[Illustration: Figure 16
Crooked knives]
The boring tool most favored by the Indians was the common steel
gimlet; if a larger boring tool was desired, an auger of the required
diameter was bought and fitted with a removable cross-handle rather
than a brace.
One steel tool having much popularity among canoe-building Indians was
the pioneer's splitting tool known as the "froe." This was a heavy
steel blade, fifteen to twenty inches long, about two inches wide, and
nearly a quarter inch thick along its back. One end of the blade ended
in a tight loop into which a heavy hardwood handle, about a foot long,
was set at right angles to the back edge of the blade, so that, when
held in the hand, the blade was cutting edge down, with the handle
upright. The froe was driven into the end of a balk of timber to be
split by blows from a wooden maul on the back of its blade. Once the
split was started, the maul was dropped and the hand that had held it
was placed at the end of the blade away from the handle. By twisting
the blade with the two hands the split could be forced open. The froe
was a most powerful and efficient splitting tool when narrow, short
plank, or battens, were required. The balk to be split was usually
placed more or less end-up, as its length permitted, in the crotch of a
felled tree, so as to hold it steady during the splitting. The pioneer
used this tool to make clapboards and riven shingles; the Indian canoe
builder found it handy for all splitting.
[Illustration: Figure 17
Froe]
Another pioneer tool that became useful to the Indian canoe builder was
the "shaving horse." A sort of bench and vise, it was used by Indians
in a variety of forms, all based on the same principle of construction.
Usually a seven-foot-long bench made of a large log flattened on top
was supported by two or four legs, one pair being high enough to
raise that end of the bench several feet off the ground to provide a
seat for the operator. To the top of the bench was secured a shorter,
wedge-shaped piece flattened top and bottom, with one end beveled and
fastened to the bench and the other held about 12 inches above it by a
support tenoned into the bench about thirty inches from the high end.
Through the bench and the shorter piece were cut slots, about four feet
from the high end of the bench and aligned to receive an arm pivoted on
the bench and extending from the ground to above the upper slot. The
arm was shaped to overhang the slot on the front, toward the operator's
end of the bench, and on each side. The lower portion of the arm was
squared to fit the slot, and a crosspiece was secured to, or through,
its lower end.
[Illustration: Figure 18
SHAVING HORSE.]
The worker sat astraddle the high end of the bench, facing the low end,
with his feet on the crosspiece of the pivoted arm. Placing a piece of
wood on top of the wedge-shaped piece, close to the head of the pivoted
arm, he pushed forward on the crosspiece with his feet, thus forcing
the head down hard upon the wood, so that it was held as in a vise. The
wood could then be shaved down to a required shape with a drawknife or
crooked knife without the necessity of holding the work. A long piece
was canted on top of the bench so that the finished part would pass by
the body of the worker, and, if it were necessary to shape the full
length, it could be reversed.
Nails and tacks eventually came into use, though they were never used
in all phases of the construction of a particular canoe. In the last
days of bark canoe construction, the bark was tacked to the gunwales
and, in areas where a gunwale cap was customarily employed, the cap was
often nailed to the top of the gunwales.
The "bucksaw" also came into the hands of the Indians, but the frame of
this saw was too awkward to carry, so the Indian usually bought only
the blade. With a couple of nails and a bent sapling he could make a
very good frame in the woods, when the saw was required. The ends of
the sapling were slotted to take the ends of the blade and then drilled
crosswise to the slot, so a nail could be inserted to hold the ends of
blade and sapling together. With the end of the nail bent over, the
frame was locked together and the tension was given to the blade by the
bent sapling handle.
[Illustration: Figure 19
Bucksaw]
The "crooked knife" was the most important and popular steel tool found
among the Indians building bark canoes. It was made from a flat steel
file with one side worked down to a cutting-edge. The back of the
blade thus formed was usually a little less than an eighth of an inch
thick. The cutting edge was bevel-form, like that of a drawknife or
chisel, with the back face quite flat. The tang of the file was fitted
into a handle made of a crotched stick, to one arm of which the tang
was attached, while the other projected at a slightly obtuse angle
away from the back of the blade. The tang was usually held in place
by being bent at its end into a slight hook and let into the handle,
where it was secured with sinew lashing; wire later came into use for
this lashing. The knife, held with the cutting edge toward the user,
was grasped fingers-up with the thumb of the holding hand laid along
the part of the handle projecting away from the user. This steadied the
knife in cutting. Unlike a jackknife, the crooked knife was not used
to whittle but to cut toward the user, and was, in effect, a one-hand
drawknife. This form of knife is so satisfactory that it is to this day
employed instead of a drawknife by many boat-builders in New Brunswick
and Quebec. A variation in the crooked knife has the tip of the blade
turned upward, on the flat, so that it can be used in hollowing out
a wooden bowl or dish. The blades of crooked knives seen are usually
about five-eighths inch wide and perhaps five or six inches long. Some
are only slightly beveled along the cutting edge; others show this
feature very markedly.
Awls, as well as chisels and other stone or bone blades, often had
handles on their sides to allow them to be held safely when hit with
a hammer. Some of the stone blades and chisels thus took the form of
adzes and could be used like them, but only, of course, to cut charred
or very soft wood. The sharpening of stone tools followed the same
methods used in their original manufacture and was a slow undertaking.
To some Indians an efficient wood-cutting chisel was available in the
teeth of the beaver. Each tooth was nearly a quarter inch wide, so
two teeth would give a cut of nearly half an inch. The usual practice
appears to have been to employ the skull as a handle, though some
beaver tooth chisels had wooden handles. As used in making tenons in
the gunwales, two holes, of a diameter equal to the desired width, were
first drilled close enough together to make the length of the desired
tenon, after which the intervening wood, especially if it was white
cedar or black spruce, could be readily split out by means of either a
beaver tooth or narrow stone chisel.
The maul was merely some form of wooden club; the most common type
was made by cutting away part of the length of a small balk to form a
handle, the remainder being left to form the head. The swelling of the
trunk of a small tree at the ground, where the roots form, was also
utilized to give weight and bulk to the head of a maul. It could be
hardened by scorching the head in a fire. Another method of pounding
and driving was to employ a stone held in one hand or both. Stone
hammers were rarely employed, since the maul or a stone held in the
hand would serve the purpose.
The birch tree that was to supply the bark was usually selected far in
advance of the time of construction. By exploring the birch groves,
the builder located a number of trees from which a suitable quantity
of bark of the desired quality could be obtained. Samples of the bark
of each tree were stripped from the trunk and carefully inspected and
tested. If they separated into layers when bent back and forth, the
bark was poor. If the "eyes" inside the bark were lumpy, the bark in
their vicinity would split too easily; this was also true if they were
too close together, but if the eyes on the inside of the bark appeared
hollow there was no objection. Bark that was dead white, or the outer
surface of which was marked by small strips partly peeled away from the
layer below, would be rejected as poor in quality.
Preferably, bark was stripped from the selected trees during a
prolonged thaw in winter, particularly one accompanied by rain, or as
soon as the sap in the trees had begun to flow in early spring. If this
was not possible, "winter" bark, as described on page 14, was used as
long as it was obtainable. Only dire necessity forced the Indian to use
bark of a poor quality. Fall peeling, after the first frosts, was also
practiced in some areas. The work on the tree was done from stages made
of small trees whose branches could be used in climbing, or from rough
ladders constructed of short rungs lashed to two poles. When steel axes
and hatchets were available the tree could be felled, provided care was
taken to have it fall on poles laid on the ground to prevent damage
to the bark in the fall and to keep the trunk high enough to allow it
to be peeled. Felling permitted use of hot water to heat the bark,
and thus made peeling possible in colder weather than would permit
stripping a standing tree. Felling by burning, however, sometimes
resulted in an uncontrolled fall in which the bark could be damaged.
Whether stone or steel knives were used, the bark was cut in the same
manner, with the blade held at an angle to make a slashing cut; holding
a sharp knife upright, so as to cut square to the surface of the bark,
makes the tool stick and jump, and a ragged cut results. A stone or
steel axe blade could also very readily be used in cutting bark; with
such tools, it was customary to tap the head with a maul to make the
cut. It was necessary to make only the longitudinal cut on the trunk of
the birch tree, as the bark would split around the tree with the grain
at the ends of this cut. Spruce and other barks, however, required both
vertical and horizontal cuts.
Once the vertical cut was made to the desired length, one edge of the
bark was carefully pried away from the wood with the blade of a knife.
Then the removal of the bark could proceed more rapidly. Instead of
starting the bark with a knife blade, some Indians used a small stick,
one end of which was slightly bent and made into a chisel shape about
three-quarters of an inch wide. This was used to pry the bark away, not
only along the edge of the vertical cut, but throughout the operation
of peeling. Another tool, useful in obtaining "winter" bark, which was
difficult to strip from the tree, was a piece of dry, thick birch bark,
about a foot square, with one edge cut in a slight round and beveled to
a sharp edge. The beveled side was inserted beneath the bark and rocked
on its curved cutting edge, thus separating the bark from the wood with
less danger of splitting the bark. Spruce and other barks were removed
from the tree with the same tools.
After the bark had been removed from the tree, it was handled with
great care to avoid splitting it along the grain. Even in quite warm
weather, the bark was usually heated slightly with a bark torch to make
it flexible; sometimes hot water was applied if the inner rind was not
to be used for decoration. Then the sheets were rolled up tightly in
the direction of growth of the tree. This made a roll convenient for
transporting and also helped to prevent the bark from curling. If the
bark was not to be used immediately, it was carefully submerged in
water so that it would not dry out before it was fitted to the canoe.
Spruce and other resinous barks, which could not be stored, were used
as soon as possible after they were stripped from the tree, the rough
exterior surface being removed by scraping.
Roots for "sewing" were also gathered, split, and rolled up, then
placed in water so they would remain flexible. Sometimes they were
boiled as well, just before being used.
The spruce gum was gathered and tempered. Before metal kettles and
frying pans became available to the Indians, it was heated in a number
of ways. One method was to heat it in a wooden trough with hot stones.
As the spruce gum melted easily, great temperature was not required.
Stone and pottery containers were also used. Another method was to boil
water in a bark container and drop in the spruce gum, which melted and
floated on top of the water in such a consistency that it could be
skimmed off with a bark spoon or dipper. Chips and dirt were skimmed
off the hot gum with a strip of bark or a flat stick.
[Illustration: Figure 20
PEELING, ROLLING, AND TRANSPORTING bark for use in canoe construction.
(_Sketches by Adney._)]
Tempering, done after the gum was melted, consisted of adding animal
fat and a little finely powdered charcoal. The mixture was then tested
by dipping a strip of bark into it and then into cold water. The strip
was bent to see if it cracked the spruce gum; if it did, too much
tempering material had been added and more gum was required. If no
cracking occurred, the gum on the strip was held in the hand for a few
moments to see if it became tacky or could be rubbed off the strip; if
either occurred, more tempering was needed. The method of tempering
had many variations. One was to remelt the gum a number of times; this
darkened it and made it harder. Red ochre or vermillion were sometimes
added, often together with charcoal made from the willow. Instead of
spruce gum, in some areas, pine resin was used, tempered with tallow
and sometimes charcoal. The Indians in the East sometimes used remelted
spruce gum to which a little tallow had been added, making a light
brown or almost transparent mixture. Most tribal groups used gum that
was black, or nearly so.
For repair work, when melted spruce gum could not be procured in the
usual manner, hard globules and flakes of gum scraped from a fallen
spruce tree were used. These could not be easily melted, so they were
first chewed thoroughly until soft; then the gum was spread over a
seam. This type of gum would not stick well unless it were smoothed
with a glowing stick, and hence was used only in emergencies.
It is believed that before steel tools were available birch-bark canoes
were commonly built of a number of sheets of bark rather than, as quite
often occurred in later times, of only one or two sheets. The greater
number of sheets in the early canoes resulted from the difficulty in
obtaining large sheets from a standing tree. Comparison of surviving
birch-bark canoes suggests that those built of a number of sheets
would have contained the better bark, as large sheets often included
bark taken from low on the trunk, and this, as has been mentioned, is
usually of poorer quality than that higher on the trunk.
It is known that the early Indians carried on some trade in bark canoe
building materials, as they did in stone for weapons and tools. Areas
in which some materials were scarce or of poor quality might thus
obtain replacements from more fortunate areas. Fine quality bark,
"sewing" roots, and good spruce gum had trade value, and these items
were sold by some of the early fur traders. Paint does not appear to
have been used on early canoes, except, in some instances, on the
woodwork. This use occurred mostly in the East, particularly among the
Beothuks in Newfoundland. Paint was apparently not used on birch bark
until it was introduced by white men in the fur trade.
Summary
It will be seen that the Indian gathered all materials and prepared
them for use with only a few simple tools, most of which could be
manufactured at the building site and discarded after the work was
completed. The only other tools he usually brought to the scene were
those he normally required in his everyday existence in the forest.
Some instruments used in canoe building, however, might be preserved;
these were the measuring sticks on which were marked, by notches,
certain measurements to be used in shaping a canoe. Also, some Indians
used a building frame that shaped the bottom in plan view. These are
best described when the actual building methods are examined.
[Illustration: Figure 21
BUILDING FRAME FOR A LARGE CANOE. Dotted lines show change in shape
is caused by omitting crossbars or by using short bars in ends. Note
lashing at ends and method of fastening thwart with a thong.]
_Chapter Three_
FORM AND CONSTRUCTION
Classification of the types of bark canoes built by the Indians is not
a simple matter. Perhaps the most practical way is to employ the tribal
designation, such as Cree canoe, Micmac canoe, accepting as a criterion
the distinctive general appearance of the canoes used by each tribe. It
must be emphasized, however, that this method of classification does
not indicate the model, or "lines," employed. Both the model and the
size of bark canoes were extensively affected by the requirements of
use: lake, coastal, or river navigation; smooth, rough, or fast-running
water; transportation of a hunter, a family, or cargo; the conditions
and length of portages; and the permanence of construction desired.
Canoes of various models, sizes, methods of construction, or decoration
might be found within the limits of a single tribal classification.
Also, within a given area, there might be apparent similarity in
model among the canoes of two or three tribal groups. However, a
classification based on geographical areas has been found to be
impractical, because the movements of tribal groups in search of new
hunting grounds tend to make tribal boundaries difficult to define.
_Form_
The canoes of some tribal groups appear to be hybrids, representing an
intermingling of types as a result of some past contact between tribes.
Those of other groups are of like model, form, and even appearance,
possibly owing to like conditions of employment. The effects of a
similarity in use requirements upon inventiveness is seen in the
applications for modern patent rights, where two or more applications
can cover almost exactly the same device without the slightest evidence
of contact between the applicants; there is no logical reason to
suppose the same condition cannot apply to primitive peoples, even
though their processes of invention might be very slow or relatively
rare in occurrence.
The effects of migration of tribes upon their canoe forms can only be
studied with respect to those comparatively recent times for which
records and observations are available. From the limited information
at hand it appears that the Indian, when he moved to an area where use
requirements and materials available for building differed from those
to which he had been accustomed, was often forced to modify the model,
form, size, and construction of his canoe. In some instances this seems
to have resulted in the adoption of another tribal form.
The distinctive feature that usually identifies the tribal
classification of a bark canoe is the profile of the ends, although
sometimes the profile of the gunwale, or sheer, and even of the
bottom, is also involved. The bow and stern of many bark canoes were
as near alike in profile as the method of construction would permit;
nevertheless some types had distinct bow and and stern forms. Among
tribes the form of the ends of the canoes varied considerably; some
were low and unimpressive, others were high and often graceful.
Obviously practical reasons can be found for certain tribal variations.
In some areas, the low ends appear to ensue from the use of the canoe
in open water, where the wind resistance of a high end would make
paddling laborious. In others the low ends appear to result from the
canoe being commonly employed in small streams where overhanging
branches would obstruct passage. Portage conditions may likewise have
been a factor; low ends would pass through brush more easily than high.
Types used where rapids were to be run often had ends higher than the
gunwales to prevent the canoe from shipping water over the bow. The
high, distinctive ends of the canoes most used in the fur trade,
on the other hand, were said to have resulted from the necessity of
employing the canoe as a shelter. When the canoe was turned upside
down on the ground, with one gunwale and the tops of the high ends
supporting it, there was enough headroom under the canoe to permit
its use as a shelter without the addition of any temporary structure.
The desirability of this characteristic in the fur-trade canoe can be
explained by the fact that the crew travelled as many hours as possible
each day, and rested for only a very short period, so that rapid
erection of shelter lengthened both the periods of travel and of rest.
Yet these practical considerations do not always explain the end-forms
found in bark canoes. Canoes with relatively high ends were used in
open waters, and similar canoes were portaged extensively. Possibly
the Indian's consciousness of tribal distinctions led him to retain
some feature, such as height of the end-forms, as a means of tribal
recognition, even though practical considerations required its
suppression to some degree.
The profile of the gunwales also varied a good deal among tribal types.
Most bark canoes, because of the raised end-forms, showed a short,
sharp upsweep of the sheer close to the bow and stern. Some showed a
marked hump, or upward sweep, amidships which made the sheer profile
follow somewhat the form of a cupid's bow. Many types had a straight,
or nearly straight, sheer; others had an orthodox sheer, with the
lowest part nearly amidships.
The bottom profiles of bark canoes showed varying degrees of curvature.
In some the bottom was straight for most of its length, with a slight
rise toward the ends. In others the bottom showed a marked curvature
over its full length, and in a few the bottom was practically straight
between the points at which the stems were formed. Some northwestern
types had a slightly hogged bottom, but in these the wooden framework
was unusually flexible, so that the bottom became straight, or even a
little rockered when the canoe was afloat and manned.
The practical reasons for these bottom forms are not clear. For canoes
used in rapid streams or in exposed waters where high winds were to
be met many Indians preferred bottoms that were straight. Others in
these same conditions preferred them rockered to varying degrees. It
is possible that rocker may be desirable in canoes that must be run
ashore end-on in surf. Of course, a strongly rockered bottom permits
quick turning; this may have been appreciated by some tribal groups.
Still other Indians appear to have believed that a canoe with a
slightly rockered bottom could be paddled more easily than one having a
perfectly straight bottom.
The midsections of bark canoes varied somewhat in form within a single
tribal type, because the method of construction did not give absolute
control of the sectional shape during the building, but, on the whole,
the shape followed tribal custom, being modified only to meet use
requirements. Perhaps the two most common midsection shapes were the
~U~-form, with the bottom somewhat flattened, and the dish-shape,
having rather straight, flaring sides combined with a narrow, flat,
or nearly flat bottom. Some eastern canoes showed marked tumble-home
in the topside above the bilge; often they had a wide and rather flat
rounded bottom, with a short, hard turn in the bilge. A few eastern
canoes, used mainly in open waters along the coast, had bottoms with
deadrise--that is, a shallow ~V~-form, the apex of the ~V~ being much
rounded; the ~V~-bottom, of course, would have aided in steering the
canoe in strong winds. One type of canoe with this rising bottom had
tumble-home topsides, but another, used under severe conditions, had a
midsection that was an almost perfect ~V~, the apex being rounded but
with so little curvature in the arms that no bilge could be seen.
Generally speaking, the eastern canoes had a rather well rounded bottom
with a high turn of the bilge and some tumble-home above, though they
might have a flatter form when built for shallow-water use or for
increased carrying capacity. A canoe built for speed, however, might
be very round on the bottom, and it might or might not have some
tumble-home in the topside. In the West, a flat bottom with flaring
topsides predominated; fast canoes there had a very narrow, flat bottom
with some flare, the width of the bottom and the amount of flare being
increased to give greater capacity on a shallow draft. Some canoes in
the Northwest had a skiff-form flat bottom and flaring sides, with the
chine rounded off sharply.
The form of the sections near the ends of a canoe are controlled to a
great extent by the form of midsection. In canoes having flat bottoms
combined with flaring sides this form was usually carried to the ends,
where it became a rather sharp ~V~, giving fine lines for speed when
the canoe was light, and only moderately increased resistance when
it was loaded. Among eastern canoes having tumble-home topsides, the
midsection form could be carried to the ends, gradually becoming
sharper in canoes having "chin" in the profiles of the ends; in canoes
having no chin, the sections necessarily took a pointed oval form close
to the ends. A few canoes having flaring sides and chin ends showed a
similar change in form. In all, however, the bow and stern showed a
tendency toward fullness near the waterline.
Canoes with a strongly ~U~-shaped midsection commonly carried this form
to the ends, with increasing sharpness in the round of the ~U~. The
~U~-form predominated in the end-sections of eastern canoes, of course,
though a few showed a ~V~-form, as must be expected. The fairing of
the end sections into the end profiles appears to have controlled this
matter. The outline of the gunwales, in plan view, also influenced the
form of the end-sections and of the level lines there. Some canoes,
when viewed from above, showed a pinched-in form at the ends, this was
caused by the construction of the gunwales or by the projection of
the end-profile forms beyond the ends of the true structural gunwale
members. Such canoes would have a very strong hollow in the level lines
projected through their hull-form below the gunwales, and this could
have been accentuated by any strong chin in the bow and stern shapes.
On the other hand, many canoes showed no hollow, and the level lines
were straight for some distance inboard of the ends, or were slightly
convex. Full, convex level lines will appear below the waterline in
canoes having a strongly rockered bottom.
It should be noted that the Indians were aware that very sharp-ended
canoes usually were fast under paddle; hence they employed this
characteristic in any canoe where high speed was desired. However,
the degree of sharpness in the gunwales and at the level lines is not
always the same at both ends, though the variation is sometimes too
slight to be detected without careful measurement; it may at times have
been accidental, but in many cases it appears to have been intentional.
Some eastern canoes having their greatest width, or beam, on the
gunwales at midlength had finer level lines aft than forward,
apparently to produce trim by the stern when afloat and manned. This
made them steer well in rough water. Some northwestern canoes had their
greatest beam abaft the midlength, giving them a long, sharp bow; the
run was sometimes formed by sweeping up the bottom aft to a shallow
stern, as well as by the double-ended form of the canoe. Despite a
general similarity in the form of the ends, in some canoes the bow
was marked by its greater height, in others, by the manner in which
the bark was lapped at the seams, or by the manner of decoration. In
a few with ends exactly alike the bow was indicated by the fitting
of the thwarts such as, for example, by placing at the forward end a
particular style of thwart, intended to hold the torch used in spearing
fish at night, or to support a mast and sail.
In examining the lines, or model, of a bark canoe, the limitations
imposed upon the builder by the characteristics of bark must be
considered. The degree of flexibility, the run of the grain, and the
toughness and elasticity of the bark used all influenced the form
of canoes. The marked chin in the ends of some canoes, for example,
resulted from an effort to offset the tendency of birch bark to split
when a row of stitches lay in the same line of grain. The curved chin
profile allowed the stitching to cross a number of lines of grain.
Sometimes this tendency was avoided by incorporating battens into the
coarse stitching; this style of sewing was particularly useful in
piecing out birch bark for width in a canoe, where the sewing had to be
in line with the grain. The Indians also employed alternating short and
long stitching in some form for the same purpose. Spruce bark, as used
in canoes in the extreme North and Northwest, could be sewn in much the
same manner as birch bark, but with due regard for the longitudinal
grain of the spruce bark.
The joining of two pieces of bark by root sewing or lacing, combined
with the use of spruce gum to obtain watertightness, formed a seam that
could be readily damaged by abrasion from launching the canoe, from
pulling it ashore, or from grounding it accidentally. For this reason,
seams below the waterline were kept at a minimum and were never placed
along the longitudinal centerline of the bottom, where they would
have formed a sharp apex to both the ~V~-shaped midsection and to the
deadrise bottom form. Likewise, a seam was not used in forming the
rocker of the bottom. Though seams had to be used to join the bark at
bow and stern, the form of the canoe allowed the seams to be greatly
strengthened and protected there.
The restrictions on form imposed by barks such as elm, chestnut, and
hickory were very great. These barks, which are not as elastic as birch
bark, were sometimes employed in a single large sheet. The sheets were
not joined for length; canoes of this material were often formed by
crimping, or lap folding, rather than by cutting out gores and then
sewing the edges together. The characteristics of these barks can
readily be demonstrated with a sheet of paper: such a sheet can be
made into a crude canoe-form by bending it lengthwise and joining the
ends, but it will be obvious that the midsection takes a very unstable
~U~-form. By forcing the ends inward to give a ram, or chin, effect
to bow and stern, a somewhat flatter bottom can be obtained in the
midsection. By crimping or folding the paper gore-fashion near each
end of the canoe-form at the gunwale edge, some rocker is created in
the bottom and the width of the gunwales is increased near the ends,
giving more capacity. But without the crimping along the gunwale, when
the midsection form is flattened on the bottom, the latter tends to
hog. Many of these bark canoes utilized both the rams ends and crimping
to obtain a more useful form. However, while a sheet of birch bark
could be crimped or gored into a scow-form canoe such as the Asiatic
birch-bark canoe, no example of this form from North America is known.
On this continent all bark canoes were sharp at both ends, i.e.,
double-ended, although a number of North American dugouts were scow-(or
punt-) shaped.
[Illustration: Figure 22
CANOE formed (a) without crimping or goring sides, showing hogged
bottom; and (b) with ram ends to reduce hogging of bottom.]
[Illustration: Figure 23
CANOE formed (a) by crimping sides, showing rockered bottom line, and
(b) by simple gores in sides. The same effects are obtained by making
bark cover of three pieces: sides and bottom.]
Birch bark gave much more freedom in the selection of form simply
because it could be joined together in small odd-sized sheets to shape
a hull, and because it was elastic enough to allow some "moulding"
by pressure of the framework employed. Birch bark could be gored, or
slashed, and rejoined without resort to folding or crimping; thus it
permitted a smooth exterior surface to be achieved. The toughness of
the bark was sufficient to allow some sewing in line with the grain,
to add to the width of a sheet, if the proper technique were employed
(this was also true to a lesser extent of spruce bark).
[Illustration: Figure 24
CANOE FORMED by use of gores and panels.]
The framework of most bark canoes depended upon the gunwale structure
to give longitudinal strength to the hull; for this reason the
structure was made sufficiently large in cross-section to be rather
stiff, or was formed of more than one member. An inner and outer
gunwale construction was employed in many bark canoes. The inner
member was the strength member and was sometimes square, or nearly so,
in cross-section. In some canoes bark was brought up on the outside
of this gunwale member, lapped over the top, and lashed over it; in
others the bark was lashed to both inner and outer gunwales. The outer
gunwale, a rectangular-sectioned batten bent narrow-edge up, was
applied like a guard, outside the bark, and was secured by pegs, by the
lashings of the bark cover, or by widely spaced lashings. On top of
the large inner gunwale and usually extending outward over the outer
gunwale, a thin cap, pegged or lashed in the same manner as the outer
gunwale, was sometimes added; this was intended to protect the lashing
of the bark to the gunwale rather than to add longitudinal strength.
The corners of the inner gunwale, or of the single gunwale, were all
rounded off to prevent them from cutting the sewing and lashings. The
bottom outboard corner was sometimes rounded off more than the other,
or beveled, in order to form between the outboard face of the gunwale
and the bark a slot into which the heads of the ribs could be forced.
An alternate method of accomplishing this was to notch or drill holes
in the gunwales for the heads of the ribs.
The ends of the gunwales were fashioned in various ways. In some canoes
the gunwales were sheered upward at the ends only slightly, the gunwale
ends being secured to wide end boards in the stems or extended past
them and secured to the stem-pieces. The apparent sheer in the latter
might be formed by bending the outer gunwale, or outwale, and the cap
(if one existed) to the required curve and then securing the ends
to the stem-piece, or to the end boards, as the form of end profile
dictated. If either the single gunwale or the outwale or both were
sharply sheered, they were split, to a point near the end thwart, into
two or four or even more laminations; even the rail cap, which was
perhaps half an inch thick, might be split in the same manner to allow
a sharp upward sweep at the stems. After being bent, the split members
were temporarily wrapped to hold the laminations together. In no bark
canoes did the ends of the gunwales curve back on themselves to form a
hook just inboard of the bow and stern, despite the numerous pictures
that show this feature. The gunwale ends sometimes projected almost
perpendicularly upward, slightly above the top of the bow and stern,
so that when the canoe was upside down its weight came on these rather
than on the sewing of the ends of the craft.
[Illustration: Figure 25
GUNWALE ENDS nailed and wrapped with spruce roots. (_Sketch by Adney._)]
The gunwale ends in some canoes were fastened together by means of one
or more lashings, often widely spaced. After being lashed together,
a narrow wedge was sometimes driven between the two gunwales from
inboard to tighten the lashings. The ends were sometimes beveled on
their bearing surfaces so as to make a neat appearance when joined. The
various ways in which the gunwale ends at stem and stern were finished
can best be described when individual types are under examination. Some
canoes had a small piece of bark over the ends of the gunwales but
under the outwales that held it in place. Whether these pieces were
employed to protect the lashing of the gunwales and adjoining work from
the weather, or whether they were the vestigial remains of a decking
once used, cannot be determined. In the Canadian Northwest the ends
of bark canoes were sometimes decked with bark for a short distance
inboard.
[Illustration: Figure 26
GUNWALES AND STAKES ON BUILDING BED, plan view. (_Sketch by Adney._)]
The bark was secured to the gunwales by a continuous spiral lashing
all along the main gunwale or by separated lashing in series. In the
first, the continuous lashing, where it passed through the bark, might
show regularly spaced separations to avoid the tops of the ribs. In the
second, the lashings were placed clear of the ribs. There were some
slight variations in the lashings, but these were of minor importance
so far as structural strength is concerned. In all cases, the bark was
brought up to or over the top of the gunwale before being secured, so
that the holes for the lashing were pierced at some distance from the
edge of the bark to prevent it from splitting.
The ends of the thwarts were mortised into the gunwales and also
secured by lashings. The number of thwarts varied with the tribal type,
the size, and the purpose of the canoe. Usually an odd number, from
three to nine, were used, though occasional canoes had two or four
thwarts. Very small canoes for hunting might have only two or three
thwarts, but most canoes 14 to 20 feet long had five. Canoes intended
for portaging usually had one thwart at midlength to aid in lifting the
canoe for the carry position. The distance between the thwarts might be
determined by structural design, or might be fixed so as to divide the
cargo space to allow proper trim. The thwarts might serve as backrests
for passengers, but were never used as seats. There was no standard
form for the shape of the thwarts, which varied not only to some degree
by tribal classification, but even among builders in single tribe. They
were usually thickest and widest over the centerline of the canoe,
tapering outboard and then spreading again at the gunwales to form a
marked shoulder at the mortise. The lashings to the gunwales often
passed through two or more holes in this shoulder.
The ribs, or frames, of most canoes were very closely spaced and
were wide, flat, and thin. They ran in a single length from gunwale
to gunwale. In canoes having ~V~-sections near the ends, the ribs
were often so sharply bent as to be fractured slightly. Across the
bottom they were wide but above the bilge they tapered in width toward
the end, which was either a rounded point or a beveled or rounded
chisel-edge. The ribs were forced under the gunwales so that the heads
fitted into the bevel, or into notches or holes at the underside and
outboard edge of the gunwale, between it and the bark cover. By canting
the rib to bring its ends into the proper position and then forcing it
nearly perpendicular, the builder brought enough pressure on the bark
cover to mold it to the required form. Bulging of the bark at each
frame was prevented by a thin plank sheathing. The ribs in many Eastern
canoes were spaced so that on the bottom they were separated only by a
space equal to the width of a rib.
Each piece of sheathing, better described as a "splint" than as
"planking," was commonly of irregular form. The edges were often
beveled to a marked thinness. While some builders laid the sheathing
edge-to-edge in the bark cover, others overlapped the edges. Nearly
all builders feathered the butts and overlapped them slightly. The
sheathing was held in position by a number of light temporary ribs
while the permanent frames, or ribs, were being installed. It is to be
noted that the sheathing was neither lashed nor pegged; it remained
fixed in place only through the pressure of the bent ribs and the
restraint of the bark skin.
The exact method of fitting the sheathing varied somewhat from area
to area, but not in every instance from tribe to tribe. The bottom
sheathing used by some eastern Indians was in two lengths. The
individual pieces were tapered toward the stems and the edges butted
closely together. The sides were in three lengths, but otherwise
similarly fitted. The butts lapped very slightly. In a second method,
used to the westward, the sheathing was laid edge-to-edge in two
lengths, with the butts slightly lapped. The center members of the
bottom, usually five, were parallel-sided, but the outboard ends of
those at the turn of the bilges were beveled, or snied, off. The
members further outboard were in one length, with both ends snied off.
The bottom thus appeared as an elongated diamond-form. The topside
sheathing was fitted as in the first instance.
[Illustration: Figure 27
GUNWALE LASHINGS, examples made by Adney: 1, Elm-bark, Malecite; 2, St.
Francis; 3, Algonkin; 4, Malecite.]
[Illustration: Figure 28
GUNWALE-END LASHINGS, examples made by Adney: Athabascan (large),
Ojibway (small).]
A variation in the second style used three lengths in the centerline
sheathing. In still another variation a centerline piece was laid in
two lengths without taper, the next outboard piece was then cut in the
shape of a broad-based triangle, and the rest were laid in two lengths,
with the sides parallel to the sides of the triangular strake and with
their ends snied off against the centerline pieces. In a fourth style
short pieces, roughly elongate-oval in shape, were overlapped on all
sides and laid irregularly so that when in place they appeared "thrown
in." With this style, the midship section was laid first and secured by
a temporary rib, then the next toward the ends, with the butts shoved
under the ends of the middle section. The next series was similarly
laid so that the top member of each butt-lap faced toward the ends of
the hull and was under a rib. The ends were not cut square across,
but were either blunt-pointed or rounded. Five lengths of sheathing
were often used, and the widths of the individual pieces of sheathing
were rarely the same, so the seams were not lined up and presented an
irregular appearance in the finished canoe. The sheathing was thin
enough to allow it to take the curve of the bilge easily.
[Illustration: Figure 29
SPLINTS ARRANGED in various ways to sheath the bottom of a canoe: 1,
Micmac, Malecite; 2, Central Cree, Têtes de Boule, etc.; 3, Montagnais;
4, Algonkin, Ojibway, etc.]
If the sheathing was lapped, the overlap was always slight. In some
old canoes a small space was left between the edges of the sheathing,
particularly in the topsides. In some northwestern bark canoes there
was no sheathing; these used a batten system somewhat like that in
the Eskimo kayak, except that in the bark canoes the battens were
not lashed to the ribs, being held in place only by pressure. These
kayak-like bark canoes had a bottom framework formed with chine
members; some had a rigid bottom frame of this type, while others
had bottom frames secured only by rib pressure. The purpose of the
sheathing, it should be noted, was to protect the bark cover from
abrasion from the inside, to prevent the ribs from bulging the bark,
and to back up the bark so as to resist impacts; but in no case, even
when battens were employed, as in the Northwest, did the sheathing
add to the longitudinal strength of the bark canoe. The principle
of the stressed rib and clamped sheathing, which is the most marked
characteristic in the construction of the North American Indian bark
canoe, is fundamentally different from that used in the construction of
the Eskimos' skin craft.
A wide variety of framing methods are exhibited in the construction of
the ends, or stems, of bark canoes. In the temporary types of the East,
the bark was trimmed to a straight, slightly "ram" form and secured by
sewing over two battens, one outboard on each side. Birch-bark canoes
of the East usually had an inside stem-piece bent by the lamination
method to the desired profile, the heel being left unsplit; as usual,
the laminations were spirally wrapped, often with basswood-bark thongs.
The stem-piece was then placed between the bark of the sides, and
the bark and wood were lashed together with an over-and-over stitch.
Sometimes variations of the short-and-long form of stitch were used
here, and some builders also placed a halved-root batten over the
ends of the bark before lashing to form a stem-band as protection to
the seam. In some canoes the end lashing passed through holes drilled
in the stem-pieces, often with the turns alternating in some regular
manner through and around the stem-piece.
The stem-pieces were generally very light, and in some canoes the head
was notched and sharply bent down and inboard, so that it could be
secured to the ends of the gunwales. Some tribal types had no inner
stem-piece, and the stem profiles were strengthened merely by the use
of two split-root or halved-sapling battens, one on each side, outside
the bark and under the sewing.
[Illustration: Figure 30
END DETAILS, INCLUDING CONSTRUCTION OF STEM-PIECES and fitting of bark
over them, ending of gunwale caps at stem heads, and the headboard,
with its location. Lamination of the stem pieces shows fewer laminae
than is common. (_Sketches by Adney._)]
Birch-bark canoes to the westward used battens under the end lashing
as well as rather complicated inside stem-pieces. In some parts of
the West and Northwest, the ends were formed of boards set up on edge
fore-and-aft, the bark being lashed through all, with the boards
projecting slightly outboard of the ends of the bark cover to form a
cutwater.
To support the inside stem-piece, some form of headboard was usually
fitted near each end after the sheathing was in place. These were
shaped to the cross-section of the canoe so as to form bulkheads.
In some canoes, these miniature bulkheads stood vertical, but in
others they were curved somewhat to follow the general curve of the
end-profile, and this caused them to be shaped more like a batten
than a bulkhead. Bent headboards were sometimes stepped so as to rake
outboard. Sometimes the form of the headboard permitted the gunwale
members to be lashed to it, and often there was a notch for the main
gunwale on each side.
The headboards were sometimes stepped on the unsplit heel of the
stem-piece; a notch was made in the bottom of the headboard to allow
this. In two types of canoe in which there was no inner stem-piece, the
headboards were stepped on short keel pieces, or "frogs," fore-and-aft
on the bottom and extending slightly forward of the end of the
sheathing to reinforce the forefoot. The purpose of the headboard was
to strengthen the stem-piece, and in many cases it was an integral
member of the end structure itself and helped to maintain its form. The
headboard usually served to support the gunwale ends in some manner, it
stretched the bark smooth near the stems, and it secured the ends of
the sheathing where support from a rib would have been most difficult
to obtain. Many canoes had the space between the headboard and the
stem-piece stuffed with shavings, moss, or other dry material to help
mold the bark to form beyond the sheathing in the ends. Some tribal
groups decorated the headboards.
In a few canoes, the stem-piece was additionally supported by a short,
horizontal member stepped in the forward face of the headboard and
projecting forward to bear on the after side of the stem-piece. The
latter was sometimes bent back onto itself above this member to form a
loop around the top of the end-profile, and the gunwale ends or a part
of the gunwale structure were secured to it. This complicated bending
of the stem-piece, in conjunction with use of a headboard and a brace
member, served to stiffen the end structure sufficiently to meet the
requirements of service.
[Illustration: Figure 31
MALECITE CANOE OF THE TYPE DESCRIBED IN THIS CHAPTER. This 2½ fathom
St. John River canoe represents the last Malecite birch-bark model,
and usually was fastened with tacks and nails, rather than with root
lashings and pegs as described here.]
The use of a bark cover over the gunwale ends has already been
mentioned. In some eastern canoes, this was placed under the cap and
outwale pieces and extended below the latter in a shallow flap on which
the owner's mark or other decoration might appear; the flap was in fact
a kind of name board. Such flaps do not appear on the partly decked
bark canoes of the Northwest.
This general description of the structure of the bark canoes is
sufficient to permit the explanation of the actual construction of
a bark canoe to be more readily understood, and it also serves to
illustrate the close connection between the method of construction
and the formation of the lines, or model, of bark canoes. From the
description, too, it can be seen that while the shape of a bark canoe
was partially planned during the construction the control of every part
of the model could not be maintained with the same degree of precision
as in the building of an Eskimo skin boat or an Indian dugout.
_Construction_
One aspect of canoe construction, the Indian method of making
measurements, was briefly mentioned (p. 8) under a discussion of the
origin of the measurement known in French Canada as the _brasse_.
This was the distance from finger-tip to finger-tip of the arms
outstretched; in the fur trade in English times it was known as the
fathom and it appears to have been about 64 inches, or less than the
nautical fathom of 6 feet. Other measurements used were the greatest
width of the ball of the thumb, which is very close to an English inch,
and the width of the four fingers, each finger-breadth being close to
three-fourths of an English inch. The length of the forearm, usually
from the knuckles of the clenched hand to the elbow, was also employed
by some Indians, as a convenient measurement.
Measurements in these units might be memorized and used in building,
but many Indians used measuring sticks, and these served as
"foot-rules." They were sometimes squared and were painted as well as
notched.
A Malecite Indian, interviewed in 1925, had three such sticks for canoe
building. One, for the length of the gunwale frame, was half the total
length required; it was notched to show the distance at which the ends
of the gunwales were lashed and also the position of the thwarts. Such
a stick would be about 7 feet long for a 16-foot canoe, 8 feet for an
18-foot canoe. The second stick was notched to show half the length of
each of the thwarts. The third stick had notches showing the height of
the gunwale at each thwart and at the end, four notches in all for the
half-length of the canoe. This stick measured from the surface of the
building bed, not from a regular base line.
The method of measuring canoes appears to have been fairly well
standardized, at least in historical times. As stated earlier, length
was commonly taken over the gunwales only, and did not include the
end profiles, which might extend up to a foot or slightly more beyond
the gunwale ends, bow and stern. However, in certain old records
the overall length is given, and in various areas other methods of
measurement existed. Where a building frame was used, the given length
of the canoe was the length of this frame; usually this approximated
the length of the gunwales. The width of a canoe was measured by the
Indian from inside to inside of the main gunwale members. The extreme
beam might be only 2 or 3 inches greater than the inside measurement
of the gunwales, but if the sides bulged out, the beam might actually
be 6 or more inches greater. The depth was usually measured from the
inside of the ribs to the top of the gunwale but in building it was
measured from the surface of the building bed to the bottom of the main
gunwales, as noted above in the description of the measuring sticks.
Thus it will be seen that the Indian measurements constituted a
statement of dimensions primarily useful to the builder, for their main
purpose was to fix the proportions rather than establish the actual
length, width, and depth. Today we state the length of a canoe in terms
of extreme overall measurement; the Indian was inclined to state the
length in building terms, giving dimensions applicable to the woodwork
only, just as the old-time shipbuilder gave the keel length of a vessel
instead of the overall length on deck.
The building site was carefully selected. The space in which the canoe
was to be set up had to be smooth, free of stones and roots or anything
that might damage the bark, and the soil had to be such that stakes
driven into it would stand firmly. A shady place was preferred, as the
bark would not dry there as fast as in sunlight. Since the construction
of a canoe required both time and the aid of the whole Indian family,
the site had to be close to a suitable place for camping, where food
and water could be obtained. It is not surprising, therefore, to find
canoe building sites that apparently had been used by generations of
Indians.
The preparation of the building bed was controlled by the intended
form of the canoe to be built. If the bottom of the canoe was to be
rockered, the cleared ground was brought to a flat surface for the
length required for setting up the canoe. If the rocker was to be
great, the middle of the bed would be slightly depressed. If the bottom
was to be straight fore-and-aft, or very nearly so, the bed was crowned
from 1½ to 2 inches higher in the middle than at the ends, so that the
canoe was first set up with a hogged bottom. Very large canoes such as
were used in the fur trade required as much as 4 inches crown in the
building bed. Other dimensions being equal, the amount of crown was
usually somewhat greater in canoes having bulging sides than in ones
having more upright or flaring sides. Canoe factories such as were
operated in certain fur-trading posts sometimes had a plank building
bed suitably crowned and drilled for setting the stakes.
Two methods of setting up the canoe were used. In most of the eastern
area, the gunwales were put together and used to establish the plan
outline of the canoe on the building bed. But a building frame was used
for constructing the various narrow-bottom canoes having flaring sides,
and for some other tribal forms. The frame, made in the same general
form as the gunwales when assembled, but less wide and sometimes much
shorter, could be taken apart easily, allowing it to be removed after
the canoe was built; hence it could be used to build as many canoes as
desired to the same dimensions as the first, and was retained by the
builder as a tool, or pattern, for future use.
The method of construction in which gunwales only were used in setting
up the canoe will be explained first in order to show the general
technique of construction. Use of the building frame will then be
described. Important deviations from these methods will be described in
later chapters under the individual tribal types in which they occur.
The Malecite canoe, a straight-bottomed craft about 19 feet long and 36
inches beam, is used as the example, hence the method of building to be
described is that generally employed in the East, where variations in
construction mainly involve the use or omission of structural elements.
The gunwales are the first members to be formed. In the Malecite canoe
these are the inner gunwales, as the canoe will have outwales and
caps. The gunwales are split from white cedar to produce battens that
will square 1½ inches when shaped. The gunwales are tapered each way
from midlength, where they are 1½ inches square, to a point 3 inches
short of the ends, where they are ¾ by 1 to 1¼ inches. The edges of
the gunwales are all rounded, and the outboard bottom edge is beveled
almost ½ inch, at 45° to the bottom of the member. The last 3 inches at
each end is formed like half a blunt arrowhead, as shown in the sketch
of the member on page 31. The gunwales will be bent, side to side, on
the flat as far as the ends are concerned, so the blunt arrowhead is
formed on one of the wide faces of the ends as shown. The arrowhead
form allows a neat joint when the gunwale ends are brought together,
pegged athwartships, and then wrapped with a root lashing. In forming
and finishing the gunwales, a good deal of care is required to get them
to bend alike, so that the centerline of the finished frame will be
straight and true.
To take the ends of the middle thwart, a mortise ¼ by 2 inches is cut
in each gunwale member athwartships at exactly midlength, the length
of the mortise being with the run of the gunwale. In it, the middle
thwart, 33 inches long, is fitted. Made of a ⅞-inch by 3-inch piece of
hard maple, the thwart tapers slightly in thickness each way from its
center to within 5 inches of the shoulders, which are 30 inches apart.
The thickness at a point 5 inches from the shoulder is ¾ inch; from
there the taper is quick to the shoulder, which is ⁵⁄₁₆ inch thick,
with a drop to ¼ inch in the tenon. The width, 3 inches at the center,
decreases in a graceful curve to within 5 inches of the shoulder, where
it is 2 inches, then increases to about 3 inches at the shoulder. The
width of the tenon is, of course, 2 inches, to fit the mortise hole in
the gunwale. The edges of the outer 5 inches of the thwart are rounded
off or beveled a good deal; inboard they are only slightly rounded.
The thwart is carefully fitted to the gunwale members and the ends are
pegged. Some builders wedged the ends of this thwart from outside the
gunwales, the wedge standing vertical in the thwart so that the gunwale
would not split; however, it is not certain that wedging was used in
prehistoric times, although it is seen in some existing old canoes. The
pegs used in this canoe are driven from above, into holes bored through
the gunwale and the tenon of the thwart to lock all firmly together.
Three holes are then bored in the broad shoulders of the thwart about
1½ inches inboard of gunwale for the root lashing that is also used.
The ends of the gunwale members are now brought together, and to avoid
an unfair curve appearing at the thwart in place, short pieces of
split plank or of sapling, notched to hold them in place, are inserted
between the gunwale members as temporary thwarts at points about 5 feet
on each side of the middle thwart. After the ends are brought together
and the final fitting is carried out, a peg is driven athwartships the
ends and a single-part root lashing is carefully wrapped around the
assembly.
Some canoe builders omitted the blunted half-arrowhead form at the
gunwale end. Instead, the inside faces were tapered to allow the two
parts to bear on one another for some distance. The gunwales were then
pinched together and lashed with one or more wrappings. Finally, a thin
wedge was sometimes driven from inboard between the two gunwale ends to
tighten the wrappings. The wedges were usually so carefully fitted as
to be difficult to identify. It is probable that this wedged gunwale
ending represents the prehistoric form, and the blunted half-arrowhead
ending is a result of the use of steel tools.
After the ends of the gunwales have been securely fastened together,
the first pair of permanent thwarts is fitted. These are located 36
inches, center to center, on each side of the middle thwart, a distance
that determines the centers of the mortises in each gunwale member.
Each thwart, made from a ¾-inch by 3-inch piece, tapers smoothly in
thickness from the ¾-inch center to the ⁵⁄₁₆-inch shoulder. The tenon
is of the same dimensions as that of the middle thwart, the width
takes the same form as that of the middle thwart, and the edges are
similarly beveled and rounded. The distance between the shoulders,
taken along the centerline, is 22½ inches, and the centerline length of
the thwart 25½ inches. However, the shoulders and ends of the tenons
must be bevelled to follow the curve of the gunwales hence the extreme
length of the thwart is actually very close to 26 inches. The worker
determines the bevel of the shoulders by fitting the thwart to the
run of the gunwales, the temporary thwarts being shifted so that the
distance between the gunwales equals that set by the measuring stick.
These two thwarts having been fitted, the tenons are pegged as before,
but in the shoulders only one lashing hole is bored instead of the
three employed in the middle thwart.
[Illustration: Figure 32
MALECITE CANOE BUILDING, 1910. (_Canadian Geological Survey photos._)
Weighting gunwales on bark cover on building bed.
Resetting stakes.
Shaping bark cover and securing it to stakes.]
[Illustration: Figure 33
FIRST STAGE OF CANOE CONSTRUCTION: assembled gunwale frame is used to
locate stakes temporarily on building bed. Instead of the gunwales, a
building frame was used in some areas. (_Sketch by Adney_.)]
The second pair of thwarts is placed 30 inches, center to center, from
the first pair, one at each end, and on the basis of this measurement
the tenons are cut as for the others. These two thwarts are made of
⅝-by 4-inch pieces tapering in thickness each way from the center to
the shoulder, where they are a scant ⁵⁄₁₆ inch thick, the tenons having
the same dimensions as in the other thwarts. In width the thwarts are
worked to an even 3 inches from shoulder to shoulder, but in the form
of a curve so that when each thwart is in place its center will be
bowed toward the ends of the canoe, viewed from above. As in the first
pair, the shoulders and ends are cut to a bevel to fit the gunwale;
at the centerline they each measure 12 inches shoulder-to-shoulder in
a straight line athwartships and 15 inches end-to-end. Allowing for
bevel, the maximum length is just over 15-⁵⁄₁₆ inches. These thwarts
are drilled for single gunwale lashings and the corner edges are well
rounded from shoulder to shoulder. The distance from the centerlines
of these last thwarts at the bow and stern to the extreme ends of the
joined gunwales is 33 inches, so the finished gunwale length is 16 feet.
After the endmost thwarts are pegged into place, the temporary stays
are removed. At each step of construction the alignment of the gunwales
is checked by measuring with the measuring sticks and by sighting,
since the shape of the assembled gunwales, in this case of the inner
gunwales, is very important in determining the sharpness of the
completed canoe and the fairness of its general form.
The assembled gunwales are now ready to be laid on the building bed
which, for the Malecite canoe, is 20 feet long, about 3½ feet wide and
is raised about 1½ inches at midlength so that the canoe bottom will be
straight when the craft is in the water. The gunwale frame having been
carefully centered on this bed, with the middle thwart exactly over the
highest point in the surface of the bed, some scrap split-planking is
laid across the gunwales and the whole weighted down with a few flat
stones. Next, 34 stakes from 30 to 50 inches long are prepared, each
made of a halved length of sapling. Around the outside of the gunwale
frame 26 of these are driven in pairs opposite one another across the
frame, about 24 inches apart and placed so that none is opposite a
thwart, except for the stakes at the extreme ends of the gunwale frame,
which are spaced about a foot from their nearest neighbors and are
face-to-face, about 1½ inches apart. All the stakes are driven with
the flat face about an inch from the gunwale frame and parallel to its
outside edge. Finally two more pairs of stakes are driven at each end,
the first pair about a foot beyond the end of the gunwale frame and
1½ inches apart, the second about 6 inches beyond these and similarly
spaced. The length between the outermost stakes, measured over the
gunwale frame, is about 18½ feet. Great care is taken to line up the
last pairs of stakes with the centerline of the gunwale frame.
[Illustration: Figure 34
SECOND STAGE OF CANOE CONSTRUCTION: stakes have been removed and laid
aside, and the gunwales shown in first stage have been removed from the
building bed. The bark cover is laid out on the building bed, and the
gunwales are in place upon it, weighted down with stones. (_Sketch by
Adney_.)]
If the canoe is to have a slight rocker near the ends and is to be
straight over the rest of the bottom, the ends of the gunwale frame
will be blocked above the building bed so that the frame is not hogged
on the bed.
After the builder is satisfied with the staking, each stake is
carefully pulled up and laid to one side, off the bed but near its
hole. The weights are then removed from the gunwale frame, which is
lifted from the bed and laid aside, and the bed, if disturbed is
repaired and re-leveled.
The roll of birch bark is now removed from storage, perhaps in a nearby
pool where it has been placed to keep it flexible, and unrolled white
side up on the building bed. As the bark dries, it will become more and
more stiff, so it will be necessary to moisten it frequently during
construction to maintain its flexibility.
The bark is usually long enough, but often it is not wide enough. If
the bark is too short, it may be pieced out at this time, or later. If
it is not wide enough it is centered on the bed; the piecing out will
be done later. The gunwale frame is now laid on the bark, care being
taken to place it as nearly as possible in its former position on the
bed.
The bark outside the frame is then slashed from the edge to a point
close to the end of each thwart, and also to points along the frame
halfway between the thwarts, so that the edges can be turned up. While
it is being slashed, the bark cover is bent slightly, so that it is
cut under tension. Later, when the required shape can be determined,
these slashes will be made into gores, the Malecite canoes having
flush seams, not overlaps, in the topsides and bottom. If a fault is
noted along the outer edge of the bark, a slash may be placed so as to
allow the fault to be cut out in the later goring; irregularity in the
position of the cuts does no great harm to the progress of building
these canoes. The slashes are usually carried to within an inch of the
gunwales on the bed. It is not customary to slash the bark close to the
end, there the bark can usually be brought up unbroken, depending upon
the form of the end.
When the bark has been cut as described, it can be turned up smoothly
all around the frame so that the stake holes can be seen and a few
of the stakes can be replaced. The frame and the bark are then
realigned so that all stakes may be replaced in their holes without
difficulty. When the frame and bark are aligned, the frame is weighted
as before and the bark is turned up all around it, the stakes being
firmly driven, as this is done, in their original holes. The longest
stakes are at the ends of the frame, as the depth of the hull is to be
greatest there. The tops of each pair of opposite stakes are now tied
together with a thong of basswood or cedar bark, to hold them rigid and
upright.
[Illustration: Figure 35
MALECITE CANOE BUILDERS NEAR FREDERICTON, N.B., using wooden plank
building bed with stakes set in holes in the platform. This was a late
method of construction, which probably originated in the early French
canoe factory at Trois Rivières, Que.]
After the bark is turned up around the frame, its lack of width becomes
fully apparent. At this stage, some builders fitted the additional
pieces to gain the necessary width; others did it later. The method of
piecing the bark cover and the sewing technique, however, is explained
here.
The bark is pieced out with regard to the danger of abrasion that would
occur when the canoe is moving through obstructions in the water, or
when it is rolled or hauled ashore and unloaded. If the bark is to be
lapped below the waterline, the thickness of the bark of both pieces
in the lap is scraped thin so a ridge will not be formed athwart the
bottom; here, however, most tribes used edge-to-edge joining. If
there are laps in the topsides, the exposed edge is toward the stern;
if in the midlength, upward toward the gunwale; and if it is in the
end the lap may be toward the bottom, because this makes it easier
to sew, and because in the ends of the canoe there is less danger of
serious abrasion. Many tribes used edge-to-edge joining everywhere
in the topsides so that the direction of lapping was not a matter of
consideration. The type of goring, whether by slash and lap or by
cutting out a ~V~-shaped gore, will, of course, have much to do with
the selection of the method of sewing to be used.
It is to be recalled that in canoe building no needle was used in
sewing the bark; the ends of the root strands were sharpened and used
to thread the strand through the awl holes. Much of the topside sewing
in a bark canoe was done with small strands made by splitting small
roots in half and then flattening the halves by scraping. Large root
strands quartered and prepared in the same manner, or the cores of
these, were sometimes used in heavy sewing or lashing at the gunwale or
in the ends of a canoe.
As noted previously, root thongs were used well water-soaked or quite
green, for they became very stiff and rather brittle as they dried
out. Once in place, however, the drying did not seem to destroy their
strength. Rawhide was also used for such sewing by some tribes.
The sewing was done by Indian women, if their help was available, and
the forms of stitching used in canoe building varied greatly. The root
sewing at the ends of the canoes ranged from a simple over-and-over
spiral form to elaborate and decorative styles. Long-and-short
stitching in a sequence that usually followed some formal pattern was
widely used. Among the patterns were such arrangements as one long,
four short, and one long; or two longs, two or three shorts, and two
longs; or one short, five of progressively increasing length, and then
one short; or six progressively longer followed by six progressively
shorter. Cross-stitching, employing the two ends of the sewing root as
in the lacing of a shoe was also common. Sometimes this was combined
with a straight-across double-strand pass to join the ends of the ~X~.
The harness stitch, in which both ends of the sewing root were passed
in opposite directions through the same holes, was often used, as was
the 2-thong in-and-out lacing from each side used in northwestern
canoes having plank stem-pieces.
If the root strand was too short to complete a seam, instead of being
spliced or knotted the end was tucked back under the last turns or
stitches, on the inside of the bark cover. In starting, the tail was
placed under the first turn of the stitch, so that it could not be
pulled through. To finish sewing with double-ended strands, as in the
harness stitch, both ends were tucked under the last turn or two.
Commonly two or more turns were taken through a single hole in the
bark; this might be done to clear some obstruction such as a frame head
at the gunwale, or to provide a stronger stitch, or turn, as in the
harness stitch and others, or to allow for greater spacing between awl
holes in the bark. (Since the awl blade was tapered, the size of the
hole it made in the bark could be regulated by the depth of penetration
of the blade as it was turned in the hole.)
The length of stitches varied with the need for strength and
watertightness. Long stitches were about I inch, short stitches from
about ⅜ to ½ inch in length. The run of the grain, of course, was a
consideration in the length of stitch used.
[Illustration: Figure 36
SEWING: two common styles of root stitching used in bark canoes.]
The piecing of the side panels was done with a great variety of sewing
styles, according to strength requirements. The strain put upon the
bark in molding it by rib pressure was greater in the midlength than
in the ends; and the sewing differed accordingly. The over-and-over
spiral, with a batten under the sewing, was used for sewing in the
midlength, as was back-stitching, a variety of basting stitch in which
a new pass is started about half way between stitches, thus forming
overlapped passes or turns. Back-stitching was usually done in a
direction slightly diagonal to the line of sewing, so as to cross
the grain of the bark at an angle with each pass. The double-thong
in-and-out stitch, in which each thong goes through the same hole from
opposite sides, was frequently used. The simple, spiral over-and-over
stitch was used in sewing panels in the ends of canoes, as was the
simple, in-and-out basting stitch using either a single or double
strand.
When the sides were pieced out edge-to-edge, the sewing was usually
done spirally, over and over a narrow, thin batten placed outside the
bark cover. This batten might be either a thin split sapling or, more
commonly, a split and thinned piece of root. If the pieced-out sides
were lapped, then the harness stitch was commonly used. The lap might
be some inches wide to decrease the danger of splitting while the bark
was being punched with the awl, afterward the surplus was cut away
leaving about a half inch of overlap. On rare occasions the strength
of a lapped-edge seam was increased by the use of a parallel row of
stitching.
[Illustration: Figure 37
COMPARISON OF CANOE ON THE BUILDING BED (above), with gunwales or
building frame weighted down by stones inside bark cover, and (below)
canoe when first removed from building bed during fifth stage of
construction. (_Sketches by Adney._)]
In making the canoe watertight, it is to be remembered that some forms
of stitch make the bark lie up tight all along its edges while others
bind only where the stitch crosses the seam. The in-and-out stitch,
which was used only above the waterline, cannot be pulled up hard
without causing the bark to pucker and split and cannot be made very
watertight with gum. The over-and-over stitch, in either a spiral
form or square across the seam on the outside and diagonally on the
inside, is very strong; when a batten is used under the stitches it
can be pulled up hard and allows a very watertight gumming. When this
style of sewing is used without a batten across the run of the grain,
as in the gore seams, it cannot be pulled up as hard, but will serve.
Back-stitching, which was much used in the topsides, can be pulled up
quite hard and makes a tight seam when gummed, as do the harness stitch
and cross-stitch. The ends, regardless of the style of sewing used,
were more readily made tight by gumming than the other seams in a bark
canoe.
Two basic methods, with some slight and unimportant variations, were
used to fasten the bark to the gunwales. One employed a continuous
over-and-over stitch, the other employed groups of lashings. On a canoe
with the lashing continuous along the gunwales, the turns were made
two or more times through the same hole on each side of each rib head
to allow space for them. This might also be done where the lashing was
in groups, as described above. Usually, a measuring stick was used to
space the groups between thwart ends so that each group came between
the rib heads. The groupings could be independent lashings, or the
strand could be carried from one group to another. If the latter, it
was passed along under the gunwale in a number of in-and-out stitches
or in a single lone stitch either inside or out, or else it was brought
around over the gunwale from the last full turn. Some tribes use both
ends of the lashing, passing them through the same hole in the bark
from opposite directions below the gunwales; the ends might be carried
in the same manner in a long stitch to the next group. In some elm and
other bark canoes employing basswood or cedar-bark lashings the bark
was tied with a single turn at wide intervals; when roots were used
in these, however, small groupings of stitches were customary. When
group lashings were used with birch bark, the intervals between groups
was usually relatively short, though in a few canoes the groups and
intervals were of nearly equal length.
[Illustration: Figure 38
THIRD STAGE OF CANOE CONSTRUCTION: the bark cover is shaped on the
building bed. The gores have been cut; part of the cover is shaped and
secured by stakes and battens. "A" shows battens secured by sticks
lashed to stakes. (_Sketch by Adney_.)]
In an independent group, the ends of the strand were treated as in
whipping, the tail being under the first turns made and the end tucked
back under the last--usually on the inside of the gunwales. Where there
were inner and outer gunwales the lashing was always around both,
and the tail might be jammed between them. If a cap was used on the
gunwales, the lashings were always under it. The use of a knotted turn
to start a lashing occurred only in the old Têtes de Boule canoes.
On the Malecite canoe, the sides are pieced out in one to three panels
rather than in one long, narrow panel on each side. The panel for the
midlength requires the greatest strength and is usually lapped inside
the bottom bark. The latter is first trimmed straight along its edge,
and the panel inserted behind it with a couple of inches of lap. Then
the two pieces of bark are sewn together over a halved-root batten with
an over-and-over stitch. (Other tribes used some form of the harness
stitch, or a similar style, allowing great strength.) The middle panel
does not extend much beyond the ends of the first pair of thwarts on
each side of the middle. The next panels toward the ends are lapped
outside the bottom bark and are sewn with the back-stitch. Then,
if still another panel is required at each end, this too is lapped
outside and is sewn in the lap with an in-and-out stitch. The ends of
the panels are usually sewn with an over-and-over stitch that runs
square with the seam outside and diagonally to it inside the bark. (The
harness stitch was used here by some tribes, as were many forms of the
cross-stitch.) The ends of the canoe and the gores have already been
sewn during an earlier stage of the building process.
Once the sides are pieced out, the bark is ready to be turned up and
around the gunwale frame and clamped perpendicularly. To effect this,
small stakes are made by halving saplings, so that each half is about a
half inch thick. The butt of each half is cut chisel-shaped, with the
bevel on the flat side; the rounded face is smoothed off, and it may
be tapered toward the head of the stake. Between two of the slashes
a length of bark is now brought up against the outer stakes; against
the bark the small, inside stake is placed with the round face of the
chisel-pointed butt wedged against the outer face of the gunwale. The
top is then levered against the outside stake, so that the flat face of
each clamps the bark in place. The top of the inner stake is then bound
to the outer.
[Illustration: Figure 39
CROSS SECTION of canoe on building bed during third stage of
construction (above) and fourth stage. (_Sketch by Adney._)]
In setting the inside stakes, care is taken that their points do not
pierce the bark. No inside stakes are required at the ends, as here the
outside stakes are so close together in opposing pairs as to hold the
bark in a sharp fold along the centerline of the cover. This of course
is also true of the stakes beyond the ends of the gunwales.
After a few lengths of bark have been thus secured, they are faired
between the stakes by inserting thin strips of split sapling, or
battens of wood or root, along each side of the bark, under the inside
and outside stakes. These battens are placed about halfway up the
upturned bark. Some builders used long wooden battens, as this gave a
very fair side when enough lengths were secured upright; others got
the same results with short battens, the ends of which were overlapped
between a pair of stakes on each side.
[Illustration: Figure 40
MULTIPLE CROSS SECTION through one side of a canoe on the building
bed: at the headboard, middle, first, and second thwarts. Gunwale is
raised and supported on sheering posts set under thwarts. Crown of
the building bed is shown by varying heights of bottoms of the four
sections.]
When the bark has been turned up and clamped, the gores may be trimmed
to allow it to be sewn with edge-to-edge seams at each slash. This
is usually done after the sides are faired, by moving the battens up
and down as the cuts are made, then replacing them in their original
position. The gores or slashes, if overlapped, are not usually sewn at
this stage of construction.
With the inside stakes in place, the longitudinal battens secured,
and the gores cut or the overlaps properly arranged, all is ready for
sheering the gunwales. First the weights are removed from the gunwale
frame so that it can be lifted. If the inside stakes have been properly
made and fitted this can be done without disturbing the sides, though
the ties across each pair of outside stakes may have to be slacked
off somewhat. Before lifting the frame, some short posts, usually of
sapling or of waste from splitting out the gunwales and thwarts, are
cut in lengths determined by the measuring stick or from memory, one
for each end of each thwart, and one for each end of the gunwale frame.
Those under the middle thwart ends in this canoe are 7½ inches long,
those under the next thwarts out from the middle will be 9 inches,
those under the end thwarts will be 12 inches, and those at the gunwale
ends will be 17 inches long. These posts, cut with squared butts, are
laid alongside the bed. The gunwale frame is now lifted and the pair of
posts to go under the middle thwart are stepped on the bark cover, the
gunwale is lowered onto them, and while the frame and posts are held
steady, stones are laid on a plank over the middle thwart. Next, the
ends of the gunwales are held and lifted so that a pair of posts can be
placed at the thwarts next out from the middle. More weights are placed
over these, the operation is repeated for the end thwarts and, finally
at the gunwale ends, so that the gunwales now stand on posts on the
bark cover, sprung to the correct fore-and-aft sheer and steadied by
the bearing of the outside of the gunwale frame on the rounded faces of
the inside stakes. Now the sheer has been established and the depth of
the canoe is approximated.
[Illustration: Figure 41
FOURTH STAGE OF CANOE CONSTRUCTION: bark cover has been shaped and
all stakes placed. The gunwales have been raised to sheer height; "A"
indicates the sticks which fix the sheer of the gunwales; "B" indicates
blocks placed under ends to form rocker. Side panels are shown in
place, and cover is being sewn to gunwales. (_Sketch by Adney._)]
To protect the bark cover from the thrust of the weights used to
ballast the frame, some builders inserted small bark or wood shields
for padding under the heels of the posts. By some tribes the posts were
notched on one face, to fit inside the gunwales near the thwarts, and
there were also other ways of assembling the gunwales themselves.
It should be apparent that the operations just described would serve
only for canoes in which the sheer had a gentle, fair sweep. For canoes
in which the sheer turned up sharply at the ends, the gunwale members
might have to be split into laminations and prebent to the required
sheer before being assembled into the gunwale frame. To accomplish
this, the laminations were scalded with boiling water until saturated
and then the gunwale members were staked out on the ground or tied
with cords to set the wood in the desired curves as it dried out. The
laminations were then wrapped with cord and the gunwale was ready to
assemble. To produce a hogged sheer, the gunwales were made of green
spruce and then staked out to season in the form desired; a hogged
sheer was also formed by steaming or boiling the gunwale members at
midlength.
The canoe, as now erected on the building bed, has a double-ended,
flat-bottomed, wall-sided form. The gunwales are sprung to the proper
breadth and sheer, and the bark is standing irregularly above them. At
this point, on canoes not having outwales, the bark cover was laced or
lashed to the gunwales. Since the Malecite canoe has outwales, these
are now made and fitted. They consist of two white cedar battens
about 19½ feet long, perhaps 1 inch wide, and ½ inch thick. The face
that will be the outboard side is usually somewhat rounded, as are all
the corners, and the corner that will be on the inside and bottom of
each batten when it is in place is somewhat beveled. The outwales are
placed between the bark and the outside stakes, the inside stakes being
removed one by one as this is done. The removal of the inside stakes
allows room for the outwale to be inserted in their place, between
the outside stakes and the inner gunwale face, and it allows the bark
to be brought against the outside face of the inner gunwales. In the
process of fitting the outwales, the battens along the sides may have
to be removed and replaced, or shifted, and the cross-ties of each
pair of outside stakes may require adjustment. Beginning at midlength,
the outwale is pegged through the bark cover to the inner gunwales at
intervals of 6 to 9 inches. The pegging is not carried much beyond the
end thwarts in any canoe and could not be in canoes having laminated
gunwales near the ends.
The Malecite canoe has bark covers over the ends of the inner gunwales,
and these are now fitted so that they can be passed under the outwales
and clamped in place. The ends of the outwales are forced inside the
stakes at and beyond the ends of the gunwales, assuming a pinched-in
appearance there, and they may reach a few inches beyond the ends
of the bark cover; they will be cut and shaped to the length of the
finished canoe later.
The outwale pegs are made by splitting from a balk of birch, larch, or
fir roughly squared dowels about ¼ inch square and 6 to 9 inches long.
Each dowel is then tapered and rounded each way from the middle to
form two shanks that are between ⅛ and ³⁄₁₆ inch in diameter over 2 to
3 inches of length. The ends may be sharpened by fire. The dowels are
then cut in two, providing a pair of pegs with large heads. These are
driven in holes drilled through the outwales, bark cover, and gunwales,
and when well home, the protruding ends are cut off flush. Toward the
ends of the gunwales, the spaces between the pegs increase, and at
the extreme ends, the outwale will be lashed to the gunwale by widely
spaced groupings of root strand. These are usually temporary, as the
final lashing of the bark to the gunwales will secure the outwales.
After the outwales are secured in place, the bark is fastened to the
assembled gunwales with group lashings. In the Malecite canoe being
built, these are independent, each grouping consisting of eight to ten
complete turns of the root strand. The intervals between, roughly 2
inches, are usually spaced by means of a special measuring-stick to
insure evenness. Before the lashing is actually begun, however, the
excess bark standing above the gunwales is cut away. The bark either
is trimmed flush with the top of the gunwale, or enough is left for a
flap that will fully cover the top of the inner gunwale, to be turned
down under the lashing. The latter method, the stronger, was used by
many builders. In making the turns in the group lashings, two or three
turns may be taken through a single hole in the bark; the Malecites did
this to avoid having the holes too close together. The result is that
the group when seen from outboard appears as a ~W~-form, with only two
or three holes in the bark for an entire group. Care is taken to lay
up the turns over the gunwales neatly, turn against turn without open
spacing or overlaps and crossings.
When this is completed, the ends of the thwarts can be lashed, the
strand passing through the holes in the shoulders, around the two
gunwale members, and through one or two holes in the bark cover. The
groupings for the bark cover are spaced so that these lashings do not
overlap them, and thus the lashings serve a dual purpose.
Next, the gores are usually sewn and the ends of the side panels
closed. To do this, the temporary side battens outside the bark
are removed. Since this is a Malecite canoe, the gores are sewn
edge-to-edge with an over-and-over stitch, the strand crossing the
seam square outside and diagonally inside. When these seams and those
remaining in the upper panels are sewn, the rather stiff bark holds the
shape formed on the building bed to a remarkable degree.
The canoe can now be raised from the building bed. To set it up at a
most convenient working height, the weights are first removed from the
gunwales and the remaining stakes are pulled up. The canoe is then
lifted from its bed and turned upside down over a couple of logs, or
crude horses. Traditionally, logs or sapling were rested across two
pairs of boulders or the logs were tied between two pairs of trees at
convenient distances apart. More recently, horses, formed by sticking
four legs into auger holes drilled in the bottom of a 4-foot length
of timber, were used. After the canoe is on its supports the ends are
ready to be closed in.
The stem-pieces customarily used by the Malecite builder are formed
from two clear white cedar billets a full 36 inches long and in the
rough nearly 1½ inches square. The billets are first shaped so that
the outboard face of each stem-piece is about ¾ inch wide, making it
a truncated triangle in cross-section. Then, along lines parallel to
the base of the truncated triangle, it is split into six laminations
which are carried to within 6 or 7 inches of the end selected to be the
heel of the stem-piece. Just clear of the laminations a notch is cut
into the top side of the heel, to hold the headboard, as will be seen.
The piece is then treated with boiling water until the laminations are
flexible, and the curve of the stem-piece can be formed and either
pegged out or tied with cords until it dries in the desired shape.
When dry the laminations are tightly wrapped with basswood bark cord,
leaving the form of the stem-piece a quarter arc of a circle, with
short tangents at each end, as shown in the illustration (p. 35).
[Illustration: Figure 42
FIFTH STAGE OF CANOE CONSTRUCTION: canoe is removed from building bed
and set on horse in order to shape ends and complete sewing. Bark cover
has dried out in a flat-bottomed and wall-sided form. (_Sketch by
Adney._)]
Next, the ends of the outwales are cut to a length determined by the
quality of the bark already in place; if the bark in one end is not
very good, it may be cut away somewhat and the canoe made shorter by
this amount at both ends in finishing. After the ends of the outwales
have been cut, both are notched on the inside at the extreme ends to
take the head of the stem-piece. The outwales may or may not project
¼ or ½ inch beyond the stem and the stem head may project ½ or 1 inch
above the top of the outwales of the canoe; these matters, at the
builder's option, decide the length of the notch and the fitting of the
stem-pieces.
The stem-piece is now placed between the folded bark end of the canoe
with the heel resting for a small distance along its length on the bark
bottom; the head must come to the right height above the outwales, as
noted. While one worker holds the stem-piece in place, another trims
away the excess bark at the end to the profile of the outboard face of
the stem-piece. Thus the profile of each end is cut and the rake of
the ends is established. The bark is next lashed to the stem-piece.
In this canoe it is done with a spiral over-and-over stitch, a batten
made of a large split root being placed over the edges of the bark, as
the lashing proceeds, to form a stem band. The turns pass alternately
from outboard around the inboard face of the stem-piece and through it;
the awl inserted in the laminations from one side opens them enough to
allow the strand to be forced through. Care is taken to pull up the
strand very hard each time. As the outwale is approached, the bark is
cut away at the notching in each so that the outwales can be brought
snugly against the sides of the stem-piece. Here the strand is brought
up one or two times over the outwales, abaft the stem head, before the
bitter end is tucked, thus locking the outwales to the stem-piece and
the bark. Then a lashing is placed around the outwales just inboard
of the stem-piece, passing through a hole in the flap of the end
deck-piece of bark and through the side bark. This lashing holds the
outboard end of the deck piece flap. At the inboard end of the flap,
another lashing is required, but the pinched-in outwales require
additional securing outboard of this point; hence a lashing is passed
just inboard of the middle of the flap, a little outboard of the ends
of the inwales, and about six inches inboard from this lashing another
is passed through the side bark and around the gunwale and outwale on
each side. These three lashings hold the outwales snug to the ends of
the gunwales and against the projecting bark ends in the pinched-in
form of projecting outwales.
[Illustration: Figure 43
RIBS BEING DRIED AND SHAPED FOR OJIBWAY CANOE. (_Canadian Geological
Survey photo._)]
The heels of the stem-pieces rest on the bottom bark and the sewing is
carried down to where the cutting of the profile makes an end to the
seam, the solid part of the heels extending about 6 to 8 inches inboard
of this. Next, any sewing required on the bottom is done. When the bark
cover has been given a final inspection on the outside and all sewing
has been completed, the canoe is lifted from its supports, righted, and
set on the bed or on a smooth grassy place.
All seams are now payed with gum on the inside of the bark while this
can still be done without interference from the sheathing or those
parts of the structure remaining to be installed. The Malecites used
only spruce gum tempered with animal fat. The gum, heated until it is
sufficiently soft to pour like heavy syrup, is spread with a small
wooden paddle or spoon, and is then worked into the seam and smoothed
by rubbing with the thumb dipped in water to prevent the gum from
sticking and burning. It is first worked into the ends, between the
bark and each side of the stem-pieces, particularly near the heel below
the waterline. When the crevices are filled, a piece of bark (in later
times a piece of cloth was used) wide enough to cover the gum alongside
is well smeared with warm gum and pressed down along the inside of the
stem-pieces. On each seam, at gores, and on side panels a thin narrow
strip of bark is smeared with gum and pressed over the seam after the
latter had been well payed. The bark is now carefully scrutinized for
small splits, holes, or thin spots since these can be easily patched
from the inside at this stage of construction. In fitting bark strips
and in gumming, great care is taken to obtain a flat surface; the edges
of the strips inside are faired to the inside face of the bark by
smearing gum along the edges. The canoe is now ready to be sheathed and
ribbed out.
The sheathing for this canoe has been split in advance out of clear
white cedar in splints about 5 to 9 feet long, 3 to 4¼ inches wide, and
⅛ inch thick. The butts of each piece have been whittled to a feather
edge, the bevel extending back about 2 inches. Also, some pieces of
basket ash have been split out of saplings for temporary ribs to hold
the sheathing in place.
A total of 50 or more ribs in five lengths, the longest about 5 feet,
have been made up from white cedar heartwood and bent to the desired
shape.
In deciding the rough lengths of the ribs, the builder can resort
to various methods. He can prebend ribs in pairs to a number of
arbitrarily chosen shapes: the first set of six pairs to the desired
midsection form; a second set of five pairs to the form of the section
between the middle and first pair of thwarts; a third, of five pairs,
to the section at the first thwarts each way from the middle; a fourth,
of four pairs, to the section between the end and the first pair of
thwarts each way from the middle; a fifth, of three pairs, to the
section at the end thwarts; and a sixth, of two or three pairs, for the
section at or near the headboards. This makes from 50 to 52 frames in a
canoe measuring 18 or 19 feet overall.
Each frame piece is treated with boiling water and then bent, over the
knee or around a tree, to a slightly greater degree than is needed.
While thus bent, each pair is wrapped lengthwise over the end with a
strip of basswood or cedar bark to hold the ribs in shape. Sometimes
a strut is placed under the bark strips to maintain the desired form,
or a cross-tie of bark may be employed. The ribs are then allowed to
season in this position.
Another method, which will be illustrated later (p. 53), involves
placing ribs of green spruce in their approximate position and forcing
them against the bark. In this method, a number of long battens are
placed over the roughly bent ribs laid loosely inside the bark cover,
and are spread by forcing a series of short crosspieces, or stays,
between them athwartships. The bark is given a good wetting with
boiling water to make it flexible and elastic, so that the pressure
applied to the battens by the temporary crosspieces brings the bark
to the shape desired for the canoe. The rough lengths of the ribs are
determined by use of a measuring stick or by measurements made around
the bark with a piece of flexible root or a batten of basket ash. The
ribs, in any case, are made somewhat longer than required to allow a
final fitting when being placed over the sheathing.
It can be seen that the exact form the canoe takes is largely a matter
of judgment and of the flexibility and elasticity of the bark, rather
than of precise molding on a predetermined model, or lines.
[Illustration: Figure 44
DETAILS OF RIBS and method of shaping them in pairs in a bark strap or
thong so that they take a "set" while drying out.]
In the Malecite canoe the ribs are wide amidships, 3 or 4 inches, and
narrow to 2½ or 2 inches toward the ends. The thickness is an even ⅜
inch. Most birch-bark canoes have ribs of even thickness their full
length, but in a few the thickness is tapered slightly above the turn
of the bilge, usually when the tumble-home is high on the sides and
rather great. The width, as previously explained, is usually carried
all across the bottom; above the bilges there is a moderate taper.
The sheathing of the canoe is now first to be put in place. In the
Malecite canoe the center pieces are the longest; they are tapered
each way from their butts, which overlap about 2 inches amidships. The
ends are made narrow enough to fit readily into the sharp transverse
curve of the bottom and are long enough to pass under the heels of the
stem pieces for an inch or two. The pieces of sheathing on each side
of the center pieces are fitted in the same manner, and by the time
two or three courses are in place they must be held in some manner at
the ends. This is accomplished by means of the rough temporary ribs
mentioned earlier. The sheathing is laid edge-to-edge, with the butts
overlapping, and, if there are not enough long pieces to complete the
bottom amidships, three or four lengths, with overlapped butts, will be
used. As the sheathing progresses, more temporary ribs will have to be
added. At the turn of the bilge, the sheathing will bend transversely
as pressure is applied by the temporary ribs; the bark must be again
wetted so that the angular bilge can be forced into a roughly rounded
form. Particular care is required in finishing the sheathing below the
gunwale to be certain that the top strake will be close up against the
sewing of the bark at gunwales, but no particular attempt is made to
make the edges of the sheathing in the topsides maintain edge-to-edge
contact.
The pressure of the temporary ribs, the heads of which are forced under
the gunwales, and the elasticity of the bark due to treating it with
boiling water are enough to rough-shape the canoe.
Before the permanent ribs are placed the sheer is checked. If it
appears to have straightened, the ends of the gunwales are supported
by means of short posts placed under them, with the heels standing on
the heels of the stem pieces or on the sheathing. Then some stakes,
each having a projecting limb or root, are cut and are driven into the
ground with the limb hooked over the gunwale to force it down.
After measurements have been made for the first rib with a strand of
root or an ash batten, it is now cut to a length slightly more than
would permit the rib to be forced upright when in place. The ends of
the rib are set in place in the bevel, or notch, on the underside of
the gunwales, against the bark cover, and with the bottom part of the
ri
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