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Title: The Bark Canoes and Skin Boats of North America

Author: Tappan Adney
Howard Irving Chapelle

Release date: January 2, 2016 [eBook #50828]
Most recently updated: October 22, 2024

Language: English

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The Project Gutenberg eBook, The Bark Canoes and Skin Boats of North
America, by Edwin Tappan Adney and Howard Irving Chapelle

SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION
UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM

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
Fur-trade canoe on the Missinaibi River, 1901. (Canadian
1 2
Geological Survey photo.)
Page from a manuscript of 1771, "Observations on
2 Hudsons Bay," by Alexander Graham, Factor. (In archives 9
of Hudson's Bay Company.)
Canoes from LaHontan's Nouveaux Voyages ... dans
3 l'Amerique septentrionale, showing crude representations 11
typical of early writers.
Lines of an old birch-bark canoe, probably Micmac,
brought to England in 1749 from New England. (From
4 12
Admiralty Collection of Draughts, National Maritime
Museum, Greenwich.)
Ojibway Indian carrying spruce roots, Lac Seul, Ont.,
5 15
1919. (Canadian Geological Survey photo.)
Roll of bark for a hunting canoe. Algonkin Reserve, at
6 16
Golden Lake, Ont., 1927.
7 Sketch: wood-splitting techniques, cedar and spruce. 17
Sketches of tools: 8, stone axe; 9, stone hammer, wedge,
and knife; 10, mauls and driving sticks; 11, stone scraper;
8-19 12, bow drill; 13, modern Hudson Bay axe; 14, steel fur- 17
trade tomahawk; 15, steel canoe awls; 16, crooked knives;
17, froe; 18, shaving horse; 19, bucksaw.
Peeling, rolling, and transporting bark. (Sketches by
20 25
Adney.)
21 Sketch: Building frame for a large canoe. 26
Sketches: Effect on canoe bottom of crimping and goring
22, 23 30
bark.
24 Sketch: Canoe formed by use of gores and panels. 31
Gunwale ends nailed and wrapped with spruce roots.
25 31
(Sketch by Adney.)
Gunwales and stakes on building bed, plan view. (Sketch
26 32
by Adney.)
27 Photo: Gunwale lashings, examples made by Adney. 33
28 Photo: Gunwale-end lashings, examples made by Adney. 33
Sketch: Splints arranged in various ways to sheath the
29 34

p g y
29 34
bottom of a canoe.
End details, including construction of stem-pieces.
30 35
(Sketches by Adney.)
31 Lines of 2½-fathom St. John River Malecite canoe. 36
Malecite canoe building, 1910. (Canadian Geological
32 39
Survey photos.)
First stage of canoe construction: assembled gunwale
33 frame is used to locate stakes temporarily on building bed. 40
(Sketch by Adney.)
Second stage of canoe construction: bark cover is laid out
34 on the building bed, and the gunwales are in place upon it. 41
(Sketch by Adney.)
Photo: Malecite canoe builders near Fredericton, N.B.,
35 42
using wooden plank building bed.
Sketch: Two common styles of root stitching used in bark
36 43
canoes.
Comparison of canoe on the building bed and canoe when
37 first removed from building bed during fifth stage of 44
construction. (Detail sketches by Adney.)
Third stage of canoe construction: the bark cover is shaped
38 45
on the building bed. (Sketch by Adney.)
Cross section of canoe on building bed during third and
39 46
fourth stages of construction. (Sketch by Adney.)
Sketch: Multiple cross section through one side of a canoe
40 on the building bed, at the headboard, middle, first, and 46
second thwarts.
Fourth stage of canoe construction: bark cover has been
41 47
shaped and all stakes placed. (Sketch by Adney.)
Fifth stage of canoe construction: canoe is removed from
42 building bed and set on horses to shape ends and complete 49
sewing. (Sketch by Adney.)
Ribs being dried and shaped for Ojibway canoe.
43 50
(Canadian Geological Survey photo.)
Sketch: Details of ribs and method of shaping them in
44 51
pairs.
Sixth stage of canoe construction: in this stage splints for

sheathing (upper left) are fixed in place and held by
45 53
temporary ribs (lower right) under the gunwales. (Sketch
by Adney.)
General details of birch-bark canoe construction, in a
46 drawing by Adney. (From Harper's Young People, 54
supplement, July 29, 1890.)
Gunwale construction and thwart or crossbar fastenings, as
47 shown in a sketch by Adney. (Harper's Young People, 56
supplement, July 29, 1890.)
"Peter Joe at Work." Drawing by Adney for his article
48 "How an Indian Birch-Bark Canoe is Made." (Harper's 57
Young People, supplement, July 29, 1890.)
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
Micmac rough-water canoe, Bathurst, N.B. (Canadian
54 64
Geological Survey photo.)
Micmac Woods canoe, built by Malecite Jim Paul at St.
55 Mary's Reserve in 1911. (Canadian Geological Survey 64
photo.)
Micmac rough-water canoe fitted for sailing. (Photo W. H.
56 65
Mechling, 1913.)
Micmac rough-water canoe, Bay Chaleur. (Photo H. V.
57 66
Henderson, West Bathurst, N.B.)
Micmac rough-water sailing canoe, Bay Chaleur.
58 66
(Canadian Geological Survey photo.)
Drawing: Details of Micmac canoes, including mast and
59 67
sail.
Micmac canoe, Bathurst, N.B. (Canadian Geological
60 68
Survey photo.)
Micmac woman gumming seams of canoe, Bathurst, N.B.,
61 69
1913. (Canadian Geological Survey photo.)
Lines of 2½-fathom Malecite river canoe, 19th century.
62 71
Old form with raking ends and much sheer.

Lines of old form of Malecite-Abnaki 2½-fathom ocean
63 canoe of the Penobscots in the Peabody Museum, Salem, 72
Mass.
Lines of large 3-fathom ocean canoe of the
64 73
Passamaquoddy porpoise hunters.
Lines of old form of Passamaquoddy 2½-fathom ocean
65 74
canoe.
Lines of Malecite racing canoe of 1888, showing V-shaped
66 75
keel piece between sheathing and bark to form deadrise.
Lines of sharp-ended 2½-fathom Passamaquoddy hunting
67 76
canoe, for use on tidal river.
Lines of Malecite 2½-fathom St. Lawrence River canoe,
68 77
probably a hybrid model.
Lines of Malecite 2½-fathom river canoe of 1890 from the
69 78
Rivière du Loup region.
Lines of Modern (1895) 2½-fathom Malecite St. John
70 79
River canoe.
Drawing: Malecite canoe details, gear, and gunwale
71 80
decorations.
Drawing: Malecite canoe details, stem profiles, paddles,
72 81
sail rig, and salmon spear.
Lines and decoration reconstructed from a very old model
73 81
of a St. John River ancient woods, or pack, canoe.
Lines of last known Passamaquoddy decorated ocean
74 82
canoe to be built (1898).
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 1910 90
82 Lines of 2½-fathom low-ended St. Francis canoe. 91
Lines of St. Francis-Abnaki canoe for open water, a type
83 that became extinct before 1890. From Adney's drawings 92
of a canoe formerly in the Museum of Natural History.

y y
Photo: Model of a St. Francis-Abnaki canoe under
84 93
construction.
85 Photo: St. Francis-Abnaki canoe. 93
A 15-foot Beothuk canoe of Newfoundland (Sketch by
86 95
Adney.)
Lines based on Adney's reconstruction of 15-foot Beothuk
87 97
canoe.
Montagnais crooked canoe. (Canadian Geological Survey
88 100
photo.)
Birch-bark crooked canoe, Ungava Cree. (Smithsonian
89 101
Institution photo.)
90 Lines of 3-fathom Nascapee canoe, eastern Labrador. 102
Lines of 2-fathom Montagnais canoe of southern Labrador
91 102
and Quebec.
Lines of 2½-fathom crooked canoe of the Ungava
92 103
Peninsula.
93 Lines of hybrid-model 2-fathom Nascapee canoe. 103
Eastern Cree crooked canoe of rather moderate sheer and
94 104
rocker. (Canadian Pacific Railway Company photo.)
95 Photo: Straight and crooked canoes, eastern Cree. 105
Montagnais canvas-covered crooked canoe under
96 106
construction. (Canadian Geological Survey photo.)
Sketch: Fiddlehead of scraped bark on bow and stern of a
97 107
Montagnais birch-bark canoe at Seven Islands, Que., 1915.
Sketch: Disk of colored porcupine quills decorating canoe
98 107
found at Namaquagon, Que., 1898.
Fleet of 51 birch-bark canoes of the Têtes de Boule
Indians, assembled at the Hudson's Bay Company post,
99 108
Grand Lake Victoria, Procession Sunday, August 1895.
(Photo, Post-Factor L. A. Christopherson.)
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
Lines of 2½-fathom Têtes de Boule canoe, with
103 111
construction details.
104 Lines of 2-fathom Têtes de Boule hunting canoe 112

104 Lines of 2-fathom Têtes de Boule hunting canoe. 112
105 Photo: Old Algonkin canoe. 113
Lines of 2½-fathom old model, Ottawa River, Algonkin
106 114
canoe.
Photo: Models made by Adney of Algonkin and Ojibway
107 115
stem-pieces.
Lines of light, fast 2-fathom hunting canoe of the old
108 116
Algonkin model.
109 Lines of hybrid 2½- and 2-fathom Algonkin canoes. 117
Lines of 2-fathom Algonkin hunter's canoe, without
110 118
headboards.
111Photo: 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
Lines of 3-fathom Ojibway old model rice-harvesting
115 124
canoe and 2-fathom hunter's canoe.
116 Lines of 3-fathom Ojibway freight canoe. 124
Lines of 2½-fathom Ojibway, old form, canoe and a 16-
117 125
foot long-nose Cree-Ojibway canoe.
Eastern Ojibway canoe, old form. (Canadian Pacific
118 126
Railway photo.)
119 Photo: Ojibway Long-Nose canoe, Rainy Lake District. 126
Lines of 2-fathom Ojibway hunter's canoe, 1849 and long-
120 127
nose Minnesota Ojibway rice-harvesting canoe.
121 Photos: Canoe building, Lac Seul, Canada, 1918 128-129
Long Lake Ojibway long-nose canoe. (Canadian
122 130
Geological Survey photo.)
Photo: Ojibway 19-foot canoe with 13 Indians aboard
123 131
(1913)
Lines of 2½-fathom western Cree canoe, Winisk River
124 133
district, northwest of James Bay.
Lines of a 6-fathom fur-trade canoe of the early 19th
125 134
century.
Inboard profile of a 6-fathom fur-trade canoe, and details
126 135
of construction, fitting, and decoration.
f f f

Lines of small 3-fathom north canoe of the Têtes de Boule
127 136
model.
128 Photo: Models of fur-trade canoes. 137
"Fur-Trade Maître Canot With Passengers." From an oil
129 138
painting by Hopkins (Public Archives of Canada photo).
"Bivouac in Expedition in Hudson's Bay Canoe." From an
130 oil painting by Hopkins (Public Archives of Canada 139
photo).
Ojibway 3-fathom fur-trade canoe, a cargo-carrying type,
131 marked by cut-under end profiles, that was built as late as 139
1894.
Lines of a 5-fathom fur-trade canoe, Grand Lake Victoria
132 140
Post, Hudson's Bay Company.
"Hudson's Bay Canoe Running the Rapids." From an oil
133 141
painting by Hopkins (Public Archives of Canada photo).
"Repairing the Canoe." From an oil painting by Hopkins
134 142
(Public Archives of Canada photo).
Lines of a 4½-fathom Hudson's Bay Company "North
135 143
Canoe," built by Crees near James Bay, mid-19th century.
Photo: 5-fathom fur-trade canoe from Brunswick House, a
136 144
Hudson's Bay Company post.
Fur-trade canoes on the Missinaibi River, 1901. (Canadian
137 145
Geological Survey photo.)
Photo: Fur-trade canoe brigade from Christopherson's
138 146
Hudson's Bay Company post, about 1885.
Forest rangers, Lake Timagami, Ontario. (Canadian
139 147
Pacific Railway Company photo.)
Photo: Models made by Adney of fur-trade canoe stem-
140 149
pieces.
141 Photo: Models by Adney of fur-trade canoe stem-pieces. 151
Portaging a 4½-fathom fur-trade canoe, about 1902, near
142 the head of the Ottawa River. (Canadian Pacific Railway 152
Company photo.)
Decorations, fur-trade canoes (Watercolor sketch by
143 153
Adney.)
144 Lines of 2-fathom Chipewyan hunter's canoe. 155
f f f

Lines of 2½-fathom Chipewyan and 3-fathom Dogrib
145 156
cargo, or family, canoes.
Lines of 3-fathom Slavey and 2½-fathom Algonkin-type
146 157
Athabascan plank-stem canoes.
Lines of Eskimo kayak-form birch-bark canoe from
147 159
Alaskan Coast.
148 Lines of Athabascan hunting canoes of the kayak form. 160
Lines of extinct forms of Loucheux and bateau-form
149 161
canoes, reconstructed from old models.
Lines of kayak-form canoes of the Alaskan Eskimos and
150 163
Canadian Athabascan Indians.
Lines of kayak-form canoe of British Columbia and upper
151 164
Yukon valley.
Construction of kayak-form canoe of the lower Yukon,
152 showing rigid bottom frame. (Smithsonian Institution 165
photo.)
Photo: Model of an extinct form of Athabascan type birch-
153 bark canoe, of British Columbia. In Peabody Museum, 167
Harvard University.
Lines of sturgeon-nose bark canoe of the Kutenai and
154 169
Shuswap.
Ojibway canoe construction. (Canadian Geological Survey
155 170-171
photos.)
Photo: Indians with canoe at Alert Bay, on Cormorant
156 173
Island, B. C.
Eighteenth-century lines drawing of a kayak, from
157 175
Labrador or southern Baffin Island.
Western Alaskan umiak with eight women paddling, Cape
158 Prince of Wales, Alaska, 1936. (Photo by Henry B. 177
Collins.)
Western Alaskan umiak being beached, Cape Prince of
159 177
Wales, Alaska, 1936. (Photo by Henry B. Collins.)
Repairing umiak frame at St. Lawrence Island, Alaska,
160 178
1930. (Photo by Henry B. Collins.)
Eskimo woman splitting walrus hide to make umiak cover,
161 St. Lawrence Island, Alaska, 1930. (Photo by Henry B. 178
C lli )

Collins.)
Fitting split walrus-hide cover to umiak at St. Lawrence
162 179
Island, Alaska, 1930. (Photo by Henry B. Collins.)
Outboard motor installed on umiak, Cape Prince of Wales,
163 179
Alaska, 1936. (Photo by Henry B. Collins.)
Launching umiak in light surf, Cape Prince of Wales,
164 179
Alaska, 1936. (Photo by Henry B. Collins.)
Umiaks on racks, in front of village on Little Diomede
165 181
Island, July 30, 1936. (Photo by Henry B. Collins.)
Umiak covered with split walrus hide, Cape Prince of
166 183
Wales, Alaska. (Photo by Henry B. Collins.)
Lines of small umiak for walrus hunting, west coast of
167 184
Alaska. 1888-89
Umiaks near Cape Prince of Wales, Alaska, showing
168 185
walrus hide cover and lacing. (Photo by Henry B. Collins.)
169 Lines of umiak, west coast of Alaska, King Island, 1886 186
Making the blind seam: two stages of method used by the
170 186
Eskimo to join skins together.
171 Lines of north Alaskan whaling umiak of about 1890 187
Lines of Baffin Island umiak, 1885. Drawn from model
172 188
and detailed measurements of a single boat.
Lines of east Greenland umiak, drawn from measurements
173 189
taken off by a U.S. Army officer in 1945.
Frame of kayak, Nunivak Island, Alaska. (Photo by Henry
174 191
B. Collins.)
Frame of kayak at Nunivak Island, Alaska, 1927. (Photo
175 193
by Henry B. Collins.)
Lines of Koryak kayak, drawn from damaged kayak in the
176 195
American Museum of Natural History, 1948.
Lines of Kodiak Island kayak, 1885, in U.S. National
177 196
Museum.
Lines of Aleutian kayak, Unalaska, 1894, in U.S. National
178 196
Museum.
Lines of kayak from Russian Siberia, 2-hole Aleutian type,
179 in Washington State Historical Society and Museum. 197
Taken off by John Heath, 1962.
Li f N i k I l d k k Al k 1889 i U S

Lines of Nunivak Island kayak, Alaska, 1889, in U.S.
180 198
National Museum.
Lines of King Island kayak, Alaska, 1888, in U.S. National
181 198
Museum.
Lines of Norton Sound kayak, Alaska, 1889, in U.S.
182 198
National Museum.
Nunivak Island kayak with picture of mythological water
183 monster Palriayuk painted along gunwale. (Photo by 199
Henry B. Collins.)
184 Photo: Nunivak Island kayak in U.S. National Museum. 199
Western Alaskan kayak, Cape Prince of Wales, 1936.
185 200
(Photo by Henry B. Collins.)
186 Lines of Kotzebue Sound kayak, in Mariners' Museum. 201
Lines of Point Barrow kayak, Alaska, 1888, in U.S.
187 201
National Museum.
Lines of Mackenzie Delta kayak, in Museum of the
188 201
American Indian.
Photo: Kayak from Point Barrow, Alaska, in U.S. National
189 202
Museum.
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
Lines of Caribou Eskimo kayak, Canada, in American
193 203
Museum of Natural History.
Lines of Netsilik Eskimo kayak, King William Island,
194 203
Canada, in the American Museum of Natural History.
Lines of old kayak from vicinity of Southampton Island,
195 205
Canada.
Lines of Baffin Island kayak, from Cape Dorset, Canada,
196 205
in the Museum of the American Indian.
Lines of kayak from north Labrador, Canada, in the
197 207
Museum of the American Indian.
Lines of Labrador kayak, Canada, in the U.S. National
198 207
Museum.
Lines of north Greenland kayak, in the Museum of the
199 207
American Indian.

Lines of north Greenland kayak, in the Peabody Museum,
200 207
Salem, Mass.
Photo: Profile of Greenland kayak from Disko Bay, in the
201 208
National Museum.
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
Lines of northwestern Greenland kayak, in the U.S.
205 210
National Museum.
Lines of southwestern Greenland kayak, 1883, in the U.S.
206 210
National Museum.
Lines of southwestern Greenland kayak, in the Peabody
207 210
Museum, Salem, Mass.
Lines of south Greenland kayak, in the American Museum
208 211
of Natural History.
209 Lines of Malecite and Iroquois temporary canoes. 214
Photo: Model of hickory-bark canoe under construction, in
210 217
the Mariner's Museum.
Sketch: Detail of thwart used in Malecite temporary
211 217
spruce-bark canoe.
Iroquois temporary elm-bark canoe, after a drawing of
212 218
1849.
Large moosehide canoe of upper Gravel River, Mackenzie
213 221
valley. (Photo, George M. Douglas.)
214 Sketch: Standard Greenland roll. 224
215 Sketch: Critical stage of a capsize recovery. 225
Sketch: Hand positions used with the standard Greenland
216 226
roll.
217 Sketch: Kayak rescue, bow-grab method. 226
218 Sketch: Kayak rescue, paddle-grab method. 226
Preparing for demonstration of Eskimo roll, Igdlorssuit,
219 227
West Greenland. (Photo by Kenneth Taylor.)
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

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

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

Figure 7
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.

Figure 8
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.

Figure 9
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.

Figure 10
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.

Figure 11

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.

Figure 12
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.

Figure 13
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.

Figure 14

Figure 15
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.

Figure 16
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.

Figure 17
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.

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.

Figure 19
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.

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.

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.

Figure 22
Canoe formed (a) without crimping or goring sides, showing
hogged bottom; and (b) with ram ends to reduce hogging of
bottom.

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).

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.

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.

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.

Figure 27
Gunwale Lashings, examples made by Adney:
1, Elm-bark, Malecite; 2, St. Francis; 3,
Algonkin; 4, Malecite.

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.

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.

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.

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.
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.

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 155⁄16 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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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).

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.

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.

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 rib
standing inboard of the head. Then, with one end of a short batten placed against its
inboard side, the rib is driven toward the end of the canoe with blows from a club on
the head of the batten. If the rib drives too easily it is removed and laid aside; if too
hard, it is shortened. It must go home tightly enough to stretch slightly the bark cover
by bringing pressure to bear on the whole width of the sheathing. Care is taken, in this
operation, to keep moist not only the bark but also the sewing, particularly along the
gunwales, so that all possible elasticity is obtained. The ribs are set, one by one,
working to within two or three frames of the midship thwart; then the other end of the
canoe is begun. The last three or four ribs to be placed are thus amidships. In every rib
driven, the tension is great, but no rib is driven so that it stands perpendicular to the
base. Those first driven stand with their bottoms nearer the midship thwart than the
ends, and this angle, or slant, continues to amidships; the ribs in the other end of the
canoe slant in the opposite direction.
It will be evident that skill is required to estimate how much pressure the bark will
stand before bursting under the strain of the driven ribs. It is also apparent that the

shape of the canoe is controlled by the shaping given the ribs in the prebending, for
this fixes the amount of tumble-home and the amount of round, or rounded-V, given
to the bottom athwartships. No fixed rules appear to exist; the eye and judgment of the
builder are his only guides. To show how much strain is placed on the bark, however,
it may be noted that inspection of two old canoes showed that the gunwale pegs had
been noticeably bent between the inner and outer gunwales.
It appears to have been a rather common practice, after all the ribs had been driven
into place, to allow the canoe to stand a few days and then again to set the frames
(where unevenness appears in the topsides) with driving batten and maul, the bark
cover and the root sewing or lashings having been again thoroughly wetted.
The headboards are now to be made. These are shaped in the form of an elongate-oval
from a wide splint of white cedar about 4 inches wide at midlength and ¼ inch thick.
The narrow end is first cut off square or nearly so; the bottom end is notched to fit in
the notch in the heel of the stem-piece and the top has a small tenon at the centerline
that will be fitted into a hole drilled or gouged in the underside of the inner gunwales
where they join at the ends. The length of the headboards in the canoe being built is
15¾ inches over all, and when they have been made for each end, they are checked as
to width and height to see that they can be fitted. Next, the extreme ends of the canoe
between the stem and the headboards are stuffed with dry cedar shavings or dry moss
so that the sides stand firm on each side of the bow outboard of the ends of the
sheathing, which ends rather unevenly, just outboard of where the headboards will
stand. This completed, the headboards are forced into position by first stepping the
heel notch in the stem-piece notch and then bending the board by placing one hand
against its middle and pulling the top toward the worker. This shortens the height of
the board enough so the tenon projecting on its head can be sprung into the small hole
under the inner gunwales, where it becomes rigidly fixed. Its sprung shape pushes up
the gunwales and makes the side bark of the ends very taut and smooth, while
supporting the gunwale ends.
Two thin strips about 19 feet long are next split out of white cedar to form the
gunwale caps; these are ¼ to ⅜ inch thick, and taper each way from about 2 inches
wide in the middle to 1 inch wide at the ends. These are laid along the top of the inner
gunwales and fastened down with pegs placed clear of the gunwale lashings. The ends
of the strips are usually secured by two or three small lashings; the caps thus formed
often stop short of the ends of the inner gunwale members. If the caps are carried right
out to the stems, as was the practice of some Malecite builders, the lashings of the
outwale are not turned in until after the caps are in place, in which case the bark deck
pieces, or flaps, are put in just before the final lashing is made.

Figure 45
Sixth Stage of Canoe Construction: canoe has been righted and placed on a
grassy or sandy spot. In this stage splints for sheathing (upper left) are fixed in
place and held by temporary ribs (lower right) under the gunwales. The bark
cover has been completely sewn and the shape of the canoe is set by the
temporary ribs. (Sketch by Adney.)
Next, the canoe is turned upside-down and all seams are gummed smoothly on the
outside. The ends, from the beginning of the seam to above the waterline, may be
heavily gummed and then covered with a narrow strip of thin bark, heavily enough
smeared with gum to cause it to adhere over the seam. In more recent times a piece of
gummed cloth was used here. Above this protective strip, the end seams are filled with
gum so that the outside can be smoothed off flush on the face of the cutwater between
the stitches. All seams in the side and bottom are gummed smooth and any holes or
patches remaining to be gummed are taken care of in this final inspection.
If the canoe is to be decorated (not many types were) the outside of the bark is
moistened and the rough, reddish winter bark, or inner rind, is scraped away, leaving
only enough to form the desired decorations. When paints of various colors could be
obtained, these were also employed, but the use of the inner rind was apparently the
older and more common method of decorating.
The paddles are made from splints of spruce or maple, ash, white cedar, or larch. Two
forms of blade were used by the Malecite. The older form is long and narrow, with the
blade wide near the top and the taper straight along each edge to a narrow, rounded
point. Above the greatest width, the blade tapers almost straight along the edge,
coming into an oval handle very quickly. At the head, the handle is widened and it
ends squared off, but the taper toward the handle is straight, not flared as in modern
canoe paddles; there is no swelling. Paddles of a shape similar to this, some without a

wide handle, were used by other eastern Indians. The more recent form of Malecite
paddle has a long leaf-shaped, or beaver-tail, blade, much like that of the modern
canoe paddle, except that it ends in a dull point; the handle is as in the old form but
the head is swelled to form the upper grip. The face of the blade, in both old and new
form, has a noticeable ridge down the centerline.

Figure 46
General Details of Birch-Bark Canoe Construction, in a drawing by Adney.
(From Harper's Young People, supplement, July 29, 1890.)
The eastern style of construction described here produced what might be called a
wide-bottom canoe with some tumble-home above the turn of the bilge, but a different
method of construction was used to produce canoes having a narrow bottom and
flaring sides. These canoes were not set up on the building bed, in the first steps of
shaping the hull, with the gunwale frame on the cover bark. Instead, a special building
frame, mentioned earlier, was used. Each tribe using the building frame had its own
style, but the variations were confined to minor matters or to proportion of width to
length.
In general, the building frame is made of two squared battens, about 1¼ inch square
for an 18-foot canoe. These, sometimes tapered slightly toward each end, are fitted
with crosspieces with halved notches in each end to fit over the top of the battens.
There may be as many as nine or as few as three of these crosspieces, with seven

apparently a common number. Where ends of the long battens join they are beveled
slightly on the inside face and notches are cut on the outside face to take the end
lashings. Each crosspiece end is lashed around the long battens, a hole being made in
each end of the crosspiece for this purpose. The lashings, commonly bark or rawhide
thongs, are all temporary, as the building frame has to be dismantled to remove it from
the canoe. Sometimes holes are drilled in the ends of the crosspieces, or in the long
battens, and in them are stepped the posts used to fix the sheer of the gunwales.
The methods of construction, using the building frame, varied somewhat among the
tribes. Since the gunwale was both longer and wider across than the building frame,
the posts for sheering were set with outboard flare. However, some builders made the
gunwales hogged by staking them out when green, and then set them above the
building frame with vertical posts. These gunwales would not be fitted with thwarts
nor would the thwart tenons always be cut at this stage. The bark was lashed to the
gunwales while they were in the hogged position with the ends secured; the gunwales
were then spread by inserting spreaders, or stays, between them, after which the
thwarts were fitted. This method required knowledge of just how much hog should be
given to the gunwales, and it must be stated that not all builders guessed right enough
to produce a good-looking sheer. Judging the hogging required in the gunwales was
complicated by the fact that most of these canoes had laminated ends in the gunwales
at bow and stern, and a quick upturn there as well. This method of construction
persisted, however, because the straight sides made easy the sewing of gores and side
panels. In some Alaskan birch-bark canoes the building frame was, in fact, part of the
hull structure and remained in the canoe. In these, the building frame was hogged and
then flattened by the ribs in construction so as to smooth the bottom bark by placing it
under tension. In some canoes the posts for sheering the canoe rested under the
thwarts rather than under the gunwales. In most canoes the building frame was taken
apart and removed from the canoe when the gunwale structure was complete and in
place, sheered.
Where large sheets of bark were available, the setting up with the building frame or
gunwale was made easier than where the bark had to be pieced out for both length and
width. If large pieces of bark could be obtained there was little or no sewing on the
bottom; only the gores or laps, and the panels, in the side required attention after the
bark had been lashed to the gunwales. In such instances, the set-up did not require
perpendicular sides, as the sides could be completed after the canoe was removed
from the building bed and the building frame had been removed from the hull. There
were many minor variations in the set-up and in the sequence of the sewing. In view
of the slight opportunities that now exist for examining the old building methods and
construction sequences, it is impossible to be certain that the one used by a tribe in
recent times was that employed in prehistoric times by their ancestors.
Instead of a laminated stem-piece, a large root whittled to the desired cross section
was sometimes used by builders among the Malecites and other eastern tribes. This

was bent into the ends while green and to it was lashed the bark, so that the stem dried
in place to the desired profile curve. No inner stem-piece was used by the Micmacs,
who formed the end structure by placing a split-root batten on each outside face of the
bark and passing the lashing around both. When a plank-on-edge was used to form the
stem-piece, as mentioned earlier, no headboard was required, as the gunwales ends
could be brought to the plank structure. In canoes having the complicated stem
structure seen in the large fur-trade canoes and some others, the headboard became an
integral part of the stem structure, rather than an independent unit, and was placed in
the canoe during building with the stem-pieces.
There was much variation in the form of gunwale structure employed in bark canoes.
A strip of bark was added all along the outwale by some tribes, so that between the
gunwale members and for a short distance below the sewing the bark was doubled; the
bottom of this strip was, in fact, a flap not secured and thus was much like the flaps at
the ends of the Malecite canoe, but without covering the top of the main gunwales.
The outwale and inwale cross sections of some canoes were almost round. The use of
a single gunwale member is commonly followed by continuous lashing of the bark
along it. On some northwestern canoes having continuous lashing, the ends of the ribs
were made in sharp points that could penetrate between the turns of root sewing,
under the gunwales. The ends of the ribs in some of these were secured more firmly
by tying them to long battens placed between the ribs and the bark cover just below
the gunwales. The northwestern canoes built in this manner had double gunwales, an
outwale and an inwale, but no bevel or notch for the rib heads. The ends of the
gunwales, inner and outer, were secured in many ways. Some, instead of being pegged
and lashed, were simply tied together; others were fastened by a rather elaborate
lashing through the bark and around the gunwales. Caps were sometimes allowed to
overlap at the ends and were pinned together with pegs or lashed. In some canoes the
outwales were lashed, rather than pegged, to the inwales, and for this and for the caps
rawhide appears to have once been widely used. In some canoes the head of the stem-
piece was bent inboard sharply and lashed to the ends of the inwales or outwales. In
many canoes the gunwales, instead of stopping short of the stem-piece, ran to it and
were lashed there.

Figure 47
Gunwale Construction and thwart or crossbar fastenings, as shown in a sketch
by Adney. (From Harper's Young People, supplement, July 29, 1890.)
At the start of ribbing out a canoe, the first two or three ribs might not be put at each
end until after the headboards had been fitted, and sometimes a rib was placed on each
side of the middle thwart, apparently to hold securely the sheathing butted amidships
while the ribbing progressed toward them from the ends. When a canoe was short and
rather wide, the ribs usually were bent by placing them inside the faired bark cover
before the sheathing was installed, there to dry and set or to season, depending on
whether they were steamed or green. Prebending the ribs, as described in the building
of a Malecite canoe, worked well only when the canoe was long, narrow, and sharp.
The spacing of the ribs was done by eye, not by precise measurement, and was never
exactly the same over the length of the canoe. Ribs near the ends were usually spaced
at greater intervals than those in the middle third of the length.
The extension of the bark beyond the ends of the inner gunwale in an eastern canoe
was often about one foot on each end, but this distance was actually determined by the
length of the bark available and by the usual reluctance of the builder to add a panel at
the end.

For the height of the end posts, in sheering the gunwales, a common Malecite
measurement was the length of the forearm from knuckles of clenched fist to back of
elbow. These posts were often left in place until the stems were fitted.
The use of a building frame is known to have been common in areas where, normally,
the gunwale frame would be employed in the initial steps in building. In a few
instances this occurred when a builder had a number of canoes of the same size to
construct. It seems probable that the use of the building frame spread into Eastern
areas comparatively recently as a result of the influence of the fur-trade canoes on
construction methods. The employment of the plank building bed in the East is known
to have occurred among individual canoe builders late in the nineteenth century as a
result of this influence.
The use of nails and tacks instead of pegs and root lashing or sewing in bark canoe
construction became quite widespread early in the nineteenth century; it is to be seen
in many old canoes preserved in museums. The bark in these is often secured to the
gunwales with carpet or flat-headed tacks, and both the outwale and the cap are nailed
to the inner gunwales with cut or wire nails. Various combinations of lashings and
nailing can be seen in these canoes, although such combinations are sometimes the
result of comparatively recent repairs or restorations rather than evidence of the
original construction. No date can be placed on the introduction of nails into Indian
canoe building, although it may be said that nailing was used in many eastern areas
before 1850.
Among the many published descriptions of the method of building bark canoes the
earliest give very incomplete information on the building sequence and usually
contain obvious errors as to proportions and materials. (An example is that of Nicolas
Denys, who, sometime between 1632 and 1650, saw bark canoes being built in what
is now New Brunswick and Cape Breton.) The best descriptions are relatively recent
and, as a result, may describe methods of construction that are not aboriginal.
The description given here is based upon notes made by Adney in 1889-90 and upon
inspection of old canoes from the various tribal areas. It was noted that, although
among canoes of the same approximate length there was some variation in dimensions
and some variety in end form, the construction appeared to vary remarkably little, and
it is apparent that the Malecites held very closely to a fixed sequence in the building
process. There was, however, great variation in detail. The number of gore slashes in
canoes 18 to 19 feet long varied from 10 to 23 on a side. The number was not always
the same on both sides of a canoe nor were the gores always opposite one another.
Canoes with long, sharp ends often had a large number of closely spaced gores in the
middle third of the length, with widely spaced gores toward the ends. Full-ended
canoes, on the other hand, had rather equally spaced gores their full length. The
amount and form of rocker was also a factor in spacing the gores, and when the rocker

was confined to short distances close to the ends there would naturally be rather
closely spaced gores in these portions of the sides.
A number of the building practices remain to be described, but these will be best
understood when the individual tribal canoe forms are examined. No written
description of building canoes can be understood without reference to drawings, and
to promote this understanding construction details have been shown on many of those
of individual canoes of each tribal type.

Figure 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).

Chapter Four
EASTERN MARITIME REGION
Study of the tribal forms of bark canoes might well be started with the canoes of the
eastern coastal Indians, whose craft were the first seen by white men. These were the
canoes of the Indians inhabiting what are now the Maritime Provinces and part of
Quebec, on the shores of the St. Lawrence River and in Newfoundland, in Canada,
and of the Indians of Maine and New Hampshire, in New England. Within this area
were the Micmac, the Malecite, and the mixture of tribal groups known as the Abnaki
in modern times, as well as the Beothuk of Newfoundland. All these groups were
expert canoe builders and it was their work that first impressed the white men with the
virtues of the birch-bark canoe in forest travel.

Micmac

The Micmac Indians appear to have occupied the Gaspé Peninsula, most of the north
shore of New Brunswick and nearly all the shores of the Bay of Fundy as well as all
of Nova Scotia, Prince Edward Island, and Cape Breton. They may have also
occupied much of southern and central New Brunswick as well, but if so they had
been driven from these sections by the Malecites before the white men came. The
Micmacs were known to the early French invaders under a variety of names;
"Gaspesians," "Canadiens," "Sourikois," or "Souriquois," while the English colonists
of New England called them merely "Eastern Indians." The name Micmac is said to
mean "allies" and not known, but this name was in use early in the 18th century, if not
before 1700.
The Micmac were a hunting people with warlike characteristics; they aided the
Malecite and other New England Indians in warfare against the early New England
colonists and in later times aided the French against the English in Nova Scotia and
New Brunswick. These Indians lived in an area where water transport represented the
easiest method of travel and so they became expert builders and users of birch-bark
canoes, which they employed in hunting, fishing, general travel, and warfare.
The area in which they lived produced fine birch bark and suitable wood for the
framework. Through experience, they had become able to design canoes for specific
purposes and had produced a variety of models and sizes. The hunting canoe was the
smallest, being usually somewhere between 9 and 14 feet long, with an occasional
canoe as long as 15 feet. This light craft, known as a "woods canoe" and sometimes as
a "portage canoe," was intended for navigating very small streams and for portaging.
Another model, the "big-river canoe," somewhat longer than the woods canoe, was

usually between 15 and 20 feet long. A third model, the "open water canoe," was for
hunting seal and porpoise in salt water and ranged from about 18 feet to a little over
24 feet in length. The fourth model, the "war canoe," about which little is known,
appears to have been built in either the "big-river" or "open-water" form, and to the
same length, but sharper and with less beam so as to be faster.
The tribal characteristics of the Micmac birch-bark canoes were to be seen in the form
of the midsection, in certain structural details, and in their generally sharp, torpedo-
shaped lines. The construction was very light and marked by good workmanship. The
distinctive profiles of bow and stern, which do not appear in the canoes of other tribes
in so radical a form, were almost circular, fairing from the bottom around into the
sheer in a series of curves. The break in the profile of the ends at the sheer, a break
that marks in more or less degree, the end profile of other tribal forms, never occurs in
the Micmac canoe. At most, a slight break in the "streamlined" curve might occur at
the point where the profile was started in the bottom, at which point there might be a
short, hard curve.

Figure 49
Micmac 2-Fathom Pack, or Woods, Canoe for woods travel with light loads, used
by the Nova Scotia Micmacs.
The form of the sheer line of the Micmac canoes apparently varied with the model: the
woods canoe had the usual curved sheer with the point of lowest freeboard about
amidships, the big river canoe had either a nearly straight sheer or one very slightly

hogged, while the open-water canoe had a strongly hogged sheer in which the midship
portion was often as much as 3 or 4 inches above that just inboard of the ends.
However, there is a possibility that, at one time, the sheer of all Micmac canoes was
more or less hogged. The little that is known of the war canoes of colonial times
indicate that they had the strongly hogged sheer that now marks the open-water
model, through it is also known that some of these were really of the big-river model,
which in later times had usually no more than a vestige of the hogged sheer.
The hull-forms of the Micmac canoes were marked in the topsides by a strong tumble-
home, carried the full length of the hull, that gave these canoes more beam below than
at the gunwale. The form of the midsection varied with the model; the woods canoe
usually had a rather flat bottom athwartships, the big river canoe a slightly rounded
bottom, and the open water canoe either a well-rounded bottom or one in the form of a
slightly rounded V. The fore-and-aft rocker in the bottom was always moderate,
usually occurring in the last few feet near the ends; however, many of the canoes were
straight along the bottom. This condition will be again referred to in discussing the
building beds used in this type. The ends were usually fine-lined; in plan view the
gunwales came into the ends in straight or slightly hollow lines. The level lines below
the gunwales might also be straight as they came into the ends, but were commonly
somewhat hollow; a few examples show marked hollowness there. Predominantly, the
Micmac canoes were very sharp in the ends and paddled swiftly. Early Micmac
canoes seem to have been narrower than more recent examples, which are usually
rather broad as compared to the types used by some other tribes.
Structurally, the Micmac canoes were distinguished by the construction of the ends
and by their light build throughout. The canoes had no inner framework to shape the
ends; stiffness there was obtained by placing battens outside the bark, one on each
side of the hull, that ran from the bottom of the cut in the bark required to shape the
ends to somewhat inboard of the ends of the gunwales at the sheer. These two battens,
as well as a split-root stem-band covering the raw ends of the cut bark, were held in
place by passing a spiral over-and-over lashing around all three. Sometimes thicker
battens reaching from the high point of the ends inboard to the end thwarts were
added, in which case the side battens were stopped at the high point of the ends and
there faired into the thick battens.

Figure 50
Micmac 2-Fathom Pack, or Woods, Canoe with Northern Lights decoration on
bow, and seven thwarts.
The gunwale structure was rather light, the maximum cross section of the main
gunwale in large canoes being rarely in excess of 1¼ inches square. These members
usually tapered slightly toward the ends of the canoe and had a half-arrowhead form
where they were joined. Old canoes had no guard or outwale, but some more recent
Micmac canoes have had a short guard along the middle third of the length. Often
there was no bevel to take the rib ends on the lower outboard corner of the main
gunwales, and the gunwales were not fitted so that their outboard faces stood
vertically. Instead, the tenons in the gunwales were cut to slant upward from the
inside, so that installation of the thwarts would cause the outboard face to flare
outward at the top. Between this face and the inside of the bark cover were forced the
beveled ends of the ribs, which were cut chisel-shape. However, some builders
beveled or rounded the lower outboard corner of the main gunwale, as described
under Malecite canoe building (p. 38). The bark cover in the Micmac canoe was
always brought up over the gunwales, gored to prevent unevenness, and folded down
on top of them before being lashed. The gunwale lashing was a continuous one in
which the turns practically touched one another outboard, though they were
sometimes separated under the gunwale to clear the ribs, which widened near their
ends, so the intervals between them were very small.

The other member of the gunwale structure was the cap; its thickness was usually ¼ to
⅜ inch, reduced slightly toward the ends. Its inboard face and the bottom were flat,
but the top was somewhat rounded, with the thickness reduced toward the outboard
edge. The cap was fastened to the main gunwales with pegs and with short lashing
groups near the ends, but in late examples nails were used. The ends of the caps were
bevelled off on the inboard side, so that they came together in pointed form. The cap
usually ended near the end of the gunwale but in some canoes, particularly those that
were nail-fastened, the cap was let into the gunwale (see p. 50) so that the top was
flush with end of the gunwale.

Figure 51
Micmac 2-Fathom Pack, or Woods, Canoe with normal sheer and flat bottom.
The ends of the gunwales were supported by headboards that were bellied outboard to
bring tension vertically on the bark cover. The heel of the board stood on a short frog,
laid on the bottom with the inboard end touching or slightly lapping over the endmost
rib. The frog supported the heels of the headboard and also the forefoot of the stem-
piece, which otherwise would have but partial support from the sewing battens outside
the ends at these points. The headboard was rather oval-shaped and the top was
notched on each side to fit under the gunwale; the narrow central tenon stood slightly
above the top of the main gunwales when the headboard was sprung into place and

was held in position by a lashing across the gunwales inboard of the top of the
headboard. The heel was held by the notch in the frog. Cedar shavings were stuffed
into the ends of the canoe between the stem-piece and the headboard to mold the ends
properly, as no ribs could be inserted there. All woodwork in these canoes was white
cedar, except the headboards and thwarts, which were maple, and the stem battens,
which were usually basket ash but sometimes were split spruce roots.
The more recent Micmac canoes usually had no more than five thwarts; this number
was found even on small woods canoes. However, old records indicate that canoes 20
to 28 feet long on the gunwales were once built with seven thwarts. The shape of the
thwarts varied, apparently in accordance with the builder's fancy. The most common
form was nearly rectangular in cross-section; in elevation, it was thick at the hull
centerline and tapered smoothly to the outboard ends; and in plan it was narrowest at
the hull centerline and increased in width toward the ends, the increase being rather
sharp at the shoulders of the tenon. In some, the tenon went through the main
gunwales and touched the inside of the bark cover; in others the ends of the thwarts
were pointed in elevation, square in plan, and were inserted in shallow, blind tenons
on the inboard side of the main gunwales. A single 3-turn lashing through a hole in the
shoulder and around the main gunwale was used in every case.

Figure 51
Micmac 2-Fathom Pack, or Woods, Canoe with normal sheer and flat bottom.

Sometimes the thwarts just described were straight (in plan view) on the side toward
the middle of the canoe, and only the middle thwart was alike on both sides. In others
the straight side of the end thwart and of that next inboard were toward the bow and
stern of the canoe. In still others, the middle thwart had a rounded barb form in plan,
with the barb located within 6 or 7 inches of the shoulder and pointed toward the
tenon; the next thwarts out on each side of the middle thwart were shaped like a
cupid's bow but slightly angular and aimed toward the ends of the canoe, and the end
thwarts were of similar plan. In one known example having such thwarts, there were
two very short thwarts at the ends of the canoe, of the usual plain form described
earlier, each a few inches inboard of the headboard. Thus this canoe had seven thwarts
in the old fashion.
The ribs, or frames, were thin, about ¼ or 5⁄16 inch thick, and across the bottom of the
canoe they were often 3 inches wide. In the topsides the ribs were tapered to about 2
inches in width; when the bottom and outboard corner of the main gunwales were not
beveled, the rib ends were cut square across on the wide face and chisel-shaped. When
the gunwale corner was beveled, the ribs were formed with a sharply tapered dull
point at the ends. From the middle of the canoe to the first thwarts each way from the
middle, the ribs were spaced 1 inch edge-to-edge. From the first thwarts to the ends,
the spacing was about 1½ inches. Most builders made the ribs narrower toward the
ends; if those in the middle of the canoe were 3 inches wide, those near the ends might
be 2½. They were shaped and placed as described for the Malecite canoe in Chapter 3.
In the construction of a Micmac canoe, the gunwales were first formed, assembled,
and used as a building frame. If the sheer was to be hogged, this was done by treating
the main gunwales with boiling water before assembly and then staking them out to
dry in the required sheer curves. The building bed was well crowned, usually 2 to 2½
inches because of the very wide bottom and the tumble-home of these canoes. Most
Micmac canoes appear to have had only slight fore-and-aft rocker in the bottom; the
bottoms of the seagoing type were often quite straight, and the other two types had a
slight rocker of perhaps 1½ inches, most of it near the ends. When the sheer was
hogged, the amount of hog was probably close to the amount of crown in the building
bed. The ends of the gunwales, when laid on the bed, were blocked up to about the
desired amount of rocker to be given the bottom.

Figure 53
Micmac 3-Fathom Ocean Canoe Fitted for Sailing. Short outwales or battens
project gunwales to strengthen the ends of the canoe. Some specimens of this type
of canoe had almost no rocker in the bottom.
The bark cover was selected with great care from the fine stand of paper birch
available to the Micmac. Except in emergencies, only winter bark was used. The cover
was gored six to eight times on each side, and most of these cuts were grouped
amidships, owing to the sharpness of the ends. The gores were trimmed edge-to-edge,
without overlap, as the Micmac preferred a smooth surfaced canoe, and the sewing
was the common spiral, over and over. The width of the bark cover was usually pieced
out amidships on each side (at least in existing models) by the addition of narrow
panels. These may not have been necessary in the very old canoes, which appear to
have been much narrower than more recent examples. The horizontal seams of the
panels were straight, or nearly so, and did not follow the sheer. The closely spaced
spiral over-and-over stitch was sewn over a batten, the lap being toward the gunwale.
As has been said, a continuous over-and-over gunwale lashing was used. The thwart
lashings were through single holes in the thwart shoulders, three turns being usual,
and two turns around the gunwale on each side were added, all passing through the
bark cover, of course. The sewing was neat and the stitches were even.
The wood lining, or sheathing, of the Micmac canoe was like that described for the
Malecite canoe in the last chapter. The sheathing was a full ⅛ to about 3⁄16 inch thick.
The strakes were laid edge-to-edge longitudinally, with slightly overlapping butts

amidships, and were tapered toward the ends of the canoe. The maximum width of
any strake at the butts was about 4 inches.

Figure 54
Micmac Rough-Water Canoe, Bathurst, N.B. (Canadian Geological Survey photo.)
In some of the rough-water canoes fitted to sail, a guard strip running the full length of
the canoe and located some 6 or 7 inches below the gunwale was placed along both
sides to protect the strongly tumble-home sides from abrasion from the paddles,
particularly when the craft was steered under sail. These strips, about 5⁄16 inch thick
and ¾ inch wide, were butted on each side, a little abaft amidships, and were held
together by a single stitch. The guards were secured in place by rather widely spaced
stitches around them that passed through the bark cover and ceiling, between the ribs
in the topsides. At bow and stern, the ends of the guards butted against the battens
outside the bark at the end profiles and were secured there by a through-all lashing.

Figure 55
Micmac Woods Canoe, built by Malecite Jim Paul at St. Mary's Reserve in 1911,
under the direction of Joe Pictou, old canoe builder of Bear River, N.S. Modern
nailed type. (Canadian Geological Survey photo.)
The proportions and measurements of the Micmac canoes appear to have changed
between the colonial period and the late 19th century. From early references, it is
apparent that the early canoes were much narrower than later ones, in proportion to
length, as mentioned earlier. An 18-foot rough-water canoe of the 18th century
appears to have had an extreme beam of between 30 and 34 inches and a gunwale
beam, measured inside the members, of 24 to 28 inches, the depth amidships being
about 18 to 20 inches. A similar canoe late in the 19th century would have had an
extreme beam of nearly 40 inches, a beam inside the gunwales of 33 or 34 inches, and
a depth of about 18 inches or less. An early woods canoe, about 14 feet long overall,
appears to have had an extreme beam of only 29 inches and a beam inside the
gunwales of about 25 or 26 inches. A woods canoe of 1890 was 15 feet long, 36½
inches extreme beam, and 30 inches inside the gunwales, with the depth amidships
about 11 inches. A big-river canoe of this same date was a little over 20 feet in
extreme length, 18 feet over the gunwales, 41 inches extreme beam, and 34 inches
gunwale width inside, with a depth amidships of about 12½ inches. An 18-foot big-
river canoe of an earlier time was reported as being 37 inches extreme beam, 30½
inches inside the gunwales, and 13 inches depth amidships. The maximum size of the
rough-water seagoing canoe, in early times, may have been as great as 28 feet but with
a narrow beam of roughly 29 or 30 inches over the gunwales, and say 24 inches
inside, with a depth amidships as much as 20 or 22 inches due to the strongly hogged
sheer there. In modern times, such canoes were rarely over 21 feet in overall length

and had a maximum beam of about 42 inches, a beam inside the gunwales of 36 or 37
inches, and a depth amidships of 16 or 17 inches.
In early colonial times, and well into the 18th century, apparently, the Micmac type of
canoe was used as far south as New England, probably having been brought there by
the Micmac war parties aiding the Malecite and the Kennebec in their wars against the
English. The canoe in the illustration on page 12 is obviously a Micmac canoe and
apparently one used by a war party. As it was brought to England in 1749 in the ship
America, which was built in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, and probably sailed from
there, it seems highly probable that the canoe had been obtained nearby, perhaps in
eastern Maine.
The small woods canoe, most commonly about 12 feet long, appears first to have been
used by all the Micmac. By the middle of the 19th century, however, this type was to
be found only in Nova Scotia, owing to the movement of most of the tribe toward the
north shore in New Brunswick, where their inland navigation was confined to large
rivers and the coast. Hence the Micmac in New Brunswick used the big-river model
and the seagoing type. The latter was last used in the vicinity of the head of Bay
Chaleur and was often called the Restigouche canoe, after the Micmac village of that
name. It was replaced by a 3-board skiff-canoe and finally by a large wooden canoe of
the "Peterborough" type with peaked ends and lapstrake planking; some of the latter
may still be seen on the Gaspé Peninsula.

Figure 56
Micmac Rough-Water Canoe fitted for sailing. (Photo W. H. Mechling, 1913.)
The use of sail in the Micmac canoes cannot be traced prior to the arrival of the white
men. The use probably resulted from the influence of Europeans, but it is possible that
the prehistoric Indians may have set up a leafy bush in the bow of their canoes to act
as a sail with favorable winds. The old Nova Scotia expression "carrying too much
bush," meaning over-canvassing a boat, is thought by some to have originated from an
Indian practice observed there by the first settlers. In early colonial times, the Micmac
used a simple square sail in their canoes and this, by the last decade of the 19th
century, was replaced by a spritsail probably inspired by the dory-sail of the
fishermen. The Indian rig was unusual in several respects. The sheet, for example, was
double-ended; one end was made fast to the clew of the sail and the other to the head
of the sprit, so that it served also as a vang. The bight was secured within reach of the

steersman by a half hitch to a crossbar fixed well aft across the gunwales. The sail,
nearly rectangular and with little or no peak, was laced to the mast, and the sprit was
supported by a "snotter" lanyard tied low on the mast. A sprit boom was also carried
by some canoes; this was secured to the clew of the sail and to the mast, a snotter
lanyard being used at the latter position.

Figure 57
Micmac Rough-Water Canoe, Bay Chaleur. (Photo H. V. Henderson, West
Bathurst, N.B.)

Figure 58

Micmac Rough-Water Sailing Canoe, Bay Chaleur. (Canadian Geological Survey
photo.)
The mast was secured by a thwart pegged, or nailed, across the gunwale caps.
Sometimes, the thwart was also notched over the caps, so that the side-thrust caused
by the leverage of the mast would not shear the fastenings. The crossbar for the sheet
was sometimes similarly fastened and fitted, with its ends projecting outboard of the
gunwales. The heel of the mast was sometimes stepped into a block, which was
usually about 5 inches square and 1½ inches thick, nailed or pegged to the center
bottom board, or sometimes it was merely stepped into a hole in the center bottom
board. The bottom boards, usually three in number were of wide, thin stock and were
clamped in place over the ribs by three or four false frames driven under the thwarts,
just as were the canoe ribs under the gunwales.

Figure 59
Details of Micmac Canoes, Including Mast and Sail.
The canoes could not sail close-hauled, as a rule, though some Indians learned to use a
leeboard in the form of a short plank hung vertically over the lee side and secured by a
lanyard to a thwart, the board being shifted in tacking. An alternate was to have a
passenger hold a paddle vertically on the lee side. There seems to have been no fixed
proportions to the area of sail used; the actual areas appear to have been somewhere
between 50 and 100 square feet, depending upon the size of the canoe. Joseph
Dadaham, a Micmac, stated in 1925 that he used "24 yards" in the sail of a "rough-
water canoe" 20 feet long and about 44 inches beam, while one 18 feet long and about

36 inches extreme beam carried "16 to 18 yards"; it is obvious that the "yards" are of
narrow sail cloth and not square yards of finished sail. In the last days of sailing bark
canoes, mast hoops and a halyard block were fitted so that the sail could be lowered
instead of having to be furled around the mast (to accomplish this the "crew" had to
stand). Dadaham also stated that for his sheet belay he used a jamb-hitch which could
be released quickly when the canoe was found to be overpowered by the wind. It
appears that during the last era of these bark canoes the rig had been improved to fit it
for open-water sailing.
The paddles used by the Micmac appear to have varied in shape. If the canoe shown in
Chapter 1 (p. 12) was indeed a Micmac canoe as supposed, the paddle shown there is
quite different from the later tribal forms illustrated above, and it is possible that the
top grips shown in the more modern forms were never used in prehistoric times, when
the pole handle shown with the old canoe may have been standard.
The Micmac canoes were decorated by scraping away part of the inner rind of the
birch bark, leaving portions of it in a formal design. It seems very probable that the
Micmac seldom used this form of decoration in early times, but later they used it a
great deal in their rough-water canoes, perhaps as a result of contact with the
Malecite. The formal designs used as decoration by the Micmac did not have any
particular significance as a totem or religious symbol; they were used purely as
decoration or to identify the owner. Such forms as the half-moon, a star in various
shapes, or some other figure might be used by the builder, but these were apparently
only his canoe mark, not a family insignia or his usual signature, and could be altered
at will.
The usual method of decoration was to place the canoe mark on both sides of the
canoe at the ends and to have along the gunwales amidships a long narrow panel of
decoration, usually of some simple form. The panel decorations are said by Micmacs
to have been selected by the builder merely as pleasing designs. One design used was
much like the fleur-de-lis, another was a series of triangles supposed to represent
camps, still another was the northern lights design, a series of closely spaced, sloping,
parallel lines (or very narrow panels) that seem to represent a design much used in the
quill decoration for which the Micmac were noted. Canoes are recorded as having
stylized representations of a salmon, a moose, a cross, or a very simple star form;
these may have been canoe marks or may once have been a tribal mark in a certain
locality. A series of half-circles were sometimes used in the gunwale panels, which
were rarely alike on both sides of the canoe, and it is probable that use was made of
other forms that have not been recorded. Colored quills in northern lights pattern were
used in some model or toy canoes but not in any surviving example of a full-size
canoe. It is quite possible, however, that such quill-work was once used in Micmac
canoe decoration. Painting of the bark cover for decorative purposes in Micmac
canoes has not been recorded.

Figure 60
Micmac Canoe, Bathurst, N.B. (Canadian Geological Survey photo.)
Historical references to the canoes of the Micmac are frequent in the French records
of Canada; it must have been Micmac canoes that Cartier saw in 1534 at Prince
Edward Island and in Bay Chaleur. The most complete description of such canoes is in
the account of Nicolas Denys, who came to the Micmac country in 1633 and remained
there almost continuously until his death at 90, in 1688. His travels during this period
took him into Maine as far as the Penobscot and throughout what are now New
Brunswick and Nova Scotia. While his descriptions are primarily concerned with the
Malecite dress, houses, and hunting and fishing techniques, his notes on birch-bark
canoes seem to indicate very clearly that he is describing a hogged-sheer Micmac
rough-water canoe. He says, for example, that the length of these canoes was between
3 and 4½ fathoms, the fathom being the French brasse, so that they ranged in length
from 16 to 24 feet over the gunwales. This gunwale length seems reasonable, since
Denys gives the beam as only about 2 English feet, obviously a gunwale measurement
in view of the great tumble-home in these canoes. That the Micmac rough-water
canoe is the subject of Denys' observations is further indicated by his statement that
the depth was such that the gunwales came to the armpits of a man seated on the
bottom. This could only be true in a canoe having a hogged sheer in the lengths given,
and is, in fact, a slight exaggeration unless the man referred to was of less than
average height. The depth would be about 22 English inches, great even for a 24-foot
canoe. Denys states that the inside sheathing of these canoes was split from cedar. He
also states that the splints were about 4 inches wide, were tapered toward the ends,
and ran the full length of the canoe. It is probable that they were butted amidships, as

in known examples; this, however, would have been covered by a rib and might not
have been noticed.
Denys says that the Indians "bent the cedar ribs in half-circles to form ribs and shaped
them in the fire." Adney believed this meant by use of hot water. However, this
bending could have been done by what was known in 17th-century shipbuilding
practice as stoving, in which green lumber was roasted over an open fire until the sap
and wood became hot enough to allow a strong bend to be made without breakage.
Wood thus treated, when cooled and seasoned somewhat, would hold the set. While it
is certain that later Indians knew how to employ hot water, it does not follow that all
tribes used this method, particularly in early times.
Denys also states that the roots of "fir," split into three or four parts, were used in
sewing. He apparently used "fir" as a general name for an evergreen. It is probable
that the roots used were of the black spruce. The technique of building he describes is
about the same as that outlined in the last chapter. He says that the gunwales were
round and that seven beech thwarts were employed, practices that differ from those in
more recent Micmac canoe building, and he notes the goring of the bark cover. Denys
states the paddles were made of beech (instead of maple as was perhaps the case) with
blades about 6 inches wide and their length that of an arm (about 27 inches), with the
handle a little longer than the blade. He also says that four, five, or six paddlers might
be aboard a canoe and that a sail was often used. "Formerly of bark," the sail was
made of a well-dressed hide of a young moose. Since it could carry eight or ten
persons, the canoe Denys is referring to is obviously a large one. In his building
description he does not mention headboards, rail caps, or the end forms. It may be
assumed that he was then describing a canoe he had seen during construction but
whose building he did not follow step by step.
De la Poterie, in his book published in 1722, gives a profile and top view of what
must have been a Micmac canoe. The probable length indicated must have been about
22 English feet overall and about 32 inches extreme beam; seven thwarts are shown.
Late in the 19th century there appears to have been some fusion of Micmac and
Malecite methods of construction, as Malecite built to Micmac forms and vice versa.
This apparently did not produce a hybrid form so far as appearance was concerned but
it did affect construction, in that inner end-frames were used and other details of the
Micmac design were altered. The Micmac, having early come into close contact with
the Europeans, were among the first Indians to employ nails in the construction of
bark canoes, and this resulted in an early decadence in their building methods. Hence,
some examples of their canoes show what the Indians termed broken gunwales, in
which the ends of the thwarts were not tenoned into the gunwales, but rather were let
flush into the top by use of a dovetail cut or, less securely, by a rectangular recess
across the gunwale, and were held in place with a nail through the thwart end and the
gunwale member.

From scanty references by early writers, it appears that a spiral over-and-over lashing
was originally used by the Micmac on the ends and gunwales. The lower edges of the
side panels were sewn over-and-over a split-root batten. In some extant examples the
gores are sewn with a harness stitch; in others a simple spiral stitch is used. The cross-
stitch does not appear to have been used by the Micmac. The gunwale caps were
certainly pegged and the ends lashed; the bark cover was folded over the gunwale tops
and clamped by the caps as well as secured by the gunwale lashings. Tacking the bark
cover to the top of the gunwales, with the cap nailed over all, marks the later Micmac
canoes. The use of nails and tacks seems to have begun earlier than 1850.

Figure 61
Micmac Woman gumming seams of canoe, Bathurst, N.B., 1913. (Canadian
Geological Survey photo.)
In spite of decadent construction methods used in the last Micmac birch-bark canoes,
the model remained a very good one in each type. The half-circular ends, sharp lines,
and standard mid-sectional forms were unaltered; the hogged sheer was retained in
some degree in at least two of the canoe types, the rough water and the big river, right
down to the end of bark-canoe building by this tribe. The very fine design and
attractive appearance of the Micmac canoe may have contributed to the early
acceptance by the early explorers and traders of the birch-bark canoe as the best mode
of water transport for forest travel.

Malecite

Another tribe expert in canoe building and use was the Malecite. These Indians were
known to the early French explorers as the "Etchimins" or "Tarratines" (or Tarytines).
Many explanations have been given for the name Malecite. One is that it was applied
to these people by the Micmac and is from their word meaning "broken talkers," since
the Micmac had difficulty in understanding them. When the Europeans came, these
people inhabited central and southern New Brunswick and the shore of
Passamaquoddy Bay, with small groups or tribal subdivisions in the area of the
Penobscot to the Kennebec. These were early affected by the retreat of the New
England Indians before the whites into eastern and northern Maine and southeastern
Quebec. As a result, the Penobscot and Kennebec Indians became part of the group
later known as Abnaki, while the Passamaquoddy Indians remained wholly Malecite
and closely attached to those living along the St. John River in New Brunswick. Like
their neighbors the Micmac, the Malecite were hunters and warlike; during the
colonial period they were usually friendly to the French and enemies of the English
settlers in their vicinity. It is not certain that the tribe now called by that name were
actually of a single tribal stock; it is possible that this designation really covers a loose
federation of small tribal groups who eventually achieved a common language. In
addition, the tribal designation cannot be wholly accurate because of the fact that
much of the original group living in New England were absorbed in the Abnaki in the
17th and 18th centuries. Therefore, the Malecite are considered here to be those
Indians formerly inhabiting valleys of the St. John and the St. Croix Rivers, and the
Passamaquoddy Bay area. The remaining portions, the Kennebec and Penobscot
Indians, must now be classed as Abnaki, of whom more later (see p. 88).
In considering the birch-bark canoes of the Malecite, it is important to understand that
this tribal form includes not only the types used in more recent times in New
Brunswick and on Passamaquoddy Bay, but also an overlapping type related to the
later Abnaki models. The old form of Malecite canoe used on the large rivers and
along the coast appears to have had rather high-peaked ends, with a marked overhang
fore and aft. The end profiles had a sloping outline, strongly curved into the bottom,
and a rather sharply lifting sheer toward each end. This form was also to be seen in
old canoes from the St. John River (the lower valley), the Passamaquoddy, the
Penobscot, and the upper St. Lawrence. By late in the 19th century, however, this style
of canoe had been replaced by canoes having rounded ends, the profiles being
practically quarter-circles and sometimes with such small radii that a slight tumble-
home appeared near the sheer. The small radius of the end curves is particularly
marked in some of the seagoing porpoise-hunting canoes of the Passamaquoddy. In
modern forms, the amount of sheer is moderate and the quick lift in the sheer to the
ends is practically nonexistent. On the St. Lawrence, the radii of the end curves are
very short and the upper part of the stems stands vertical and straight; the sheer, too, is
usually rather straight. The older type, with high-peaked ends, was also marked by
very sharp lines forward and aft, and had a midsection with tumble-home less extreme
than in the Micmac canoes. The bottom, athwartships, was usually somewhat rounded

(in coastal canoes the form might be a rounded V) and the bilges were rather slack,
with a reverse curve above, to form the tumble-home rather close to the gunwales.
The river model probably had lower ends and less rake than the coastal type, but
surviving examples of both give confusing evidence. The river canoes usually had a
flatter bottom than the coastal type, the latter having somewhat more rocker fore-and-
aft. The sections near the ends were rather V-shaped in the coastal canoes, U-shaped
in the river canoes.
The old form of small hunting canoe is represented by but one poor model (see p. 72)
in which the ends are lower and with much less rake than those of the river type. From
this very scant evidence, it seems probable that the small woods canoes were
patterned on the river canoe in all respects but the profile of the ends.

Figure 62
Malecite 2½-Fathom River Canoe, 19th Century. Old form with raking ends
and much sheer.
From the early English and French accounts, it is evident that none of the maritime
Indians used very large or long war canoes, capable of holding many men. The old
war canoes of the Malecite appear to have been either of the coastal or river types as
the circumstances of their place of building and use dictated. The slight information
available in these accounts suggests that the war canoe did not differ in appearance
from the other types of Malecite canoes, and that they were not of greater size. The
Malecite appear to have followed the same practices as the Micmac, using for war
purposes canoes of standard size and appearance but narrower and built for speed,

since a war party sought to travel rapidly to and from its objective in order to surprise
the enemy and escape before organized pursuit could be formed. The Malecite placed
four warriors in each canoe, two to paddle and two to watch and use weapons while
afloat. However, only on rare occasions were bows and arrows used from canoes
afloat; most fighting was done on land. Each canoe carried the personal mark of each
of the four warriors, apparently one mark on each flap, or wulegessis, under the
gunwales near the ends. When a war leader was carried however, only his mark was
on his canoe. After a successful raid, the Malecite used to race for the last mile or so
of the return journey, and the winning canoe was given, as a distinction, some mark or
picture, often something humorous such as a caricature of an animal. This practice,
however, was not confined to war canoes; in rather recent times it has been noted that
such pictures were placed on any canoe that had shown outstanding qualities in racing
competition or in exhibitions of skill.
When making long canoe trips, the Malecite followed the widespread Indian practice
of using the canoe as a shelter at night. When a camping place was reached, the canoe
was unloaded, carried ashore, and turned upside down so that the tops of the ends and
one gunwale rested on the ground. If the ends were high enough, as in the old
Malecite type, one gunwale was raised off the ground far enough to permit a man to
crawl under. If, as in the Micmac canoes, the ends were too low to allow this, they
were raised off the ground by short forked sticks, with the forks resting against the
end thwarts and the upper gunwale and the heels stuck into the earth. The dunnage
(provisions or other cargo) was then stowed on the ground under the ends of the canoe
and the two men would sleep under a single blanket with their feet pointed in opposite
directions, each with his head on a pile of dunnage. If there were too many men
aboard to do this, in bad weather a crude shelter was made by resting some poles on
the upturned bilge and covering them with sheets of bark; under such a shelter meals
could be cooked.

Figure 63
Old Form of Malecite-Abnaki 2½—Fathom Ocean Canoe of the Penobscots. In
the Peabody Museum, Salem, Mass.
As did many of the eastern Indians, the old Malecite tribesmen built canoes of
materials other than birch bark. When a canoe was required for a temporary use such
as in hunting, it could be made of spruce bark. (As the designs of such canoes were
rather standardized, they will be dealt with in Chapter 8.) When bark was
unobtainable, the Malecite built canoes covered with moosehide, or, in rare instances,
they built wooden dugouts.
The old Malecite river canoe shown on page 71 will serve to illustrate a description of
the details of construction that were used. These canoes were obviously built with
their gunwales (which were the length of the bottom only) serving as a building frame.
The ends of the gunwales were supported by headboards stepped on the heels of the
inner stem-pieces, and the stems raked outward from their heels. The gunwale ends
were joined to the head of the stem-piece by the outwales and the gunwale caps. Bark
was used to the ends of the canoe. One side of the bark cover was cut so that it stood
well above the sheer line from the gunwale end outboard, and the opposite side was
cut to the level of the sheer. The first piece was then folded over the opposite side and
down, so that it covered both the extreme ends of the gunwales and the top of the
inner stem-piece. Another piece of bark was then fitted over this fold, and this new
piece formed the flaps below the outwales on each side, the wulegessis. The outwales
ran past the gunwale ends and were cut off flush with the outboard face of the stem;

the caps ran likewise and covered the bark over the head of the inner stem piece. The
characteristic sheer of these canoes, where the rise toward the ends began, showed a
quick curve that faired into a rising straight line at the gunwale and then continued
straight and rising to the stem head. The wulegessis was therefore quite long. The ends
of the gunwales were not of the half-arrowhead shape, but were snied off on their
inboard sides so that they met on a rather long bevel; the lashing was slightly let in to
the outboard faces to keep it from slipping over the gunwale ends. The caps of the
gunwales were similarly reduced in width, where they came together over the ends of
the canoe.

Figure 64
Large 3-Fathom Ocean Canoe of the Passamaquoddy porpoise hunters. These
canoes were sometimes fitted to sail or outrigged for rowing. The last of this type
had much lower ends.
The main gunwale members were about 1¼ inches square amidships, tapering to ¾
inch at the ends. The lower outboard corner was beveled to take the ends of the ribs,
as shown on page 71, and the lower inboard corner was also beveled or rounded, but
to a lesser degree. The upper inboard corner, shown beveled in the drawing of figure
62, was sometimes slightly rounded, as were the outwales. Amidships the outwale was
about 1 inch deep, and it tapered toward the ends, where its depth was about ⅝ inch,
the thickness being ½ inch amidships and a scant ⅜ inch at the ends. On the canoe
shown, the cap was ⅜ inch thick, tapering to about 5⁄16 inch at the ends, and 1¾ inches
wide amidships, tapering to about ⅝ or ½ inch where the caps came together at the
ends. The top corners of the cap were beveled in the example.

The sheathing appears to have been about 3⁄16 inch thick on the average. On the
bottom and sides it was in two lengths, overlapping slightly amidships. Toward the
ends of the canoe the sheathing was tapered, maximum width of the splints being
about 4 inches amidships.
The canoe, which was 18 feet 6 inches long overall, had 46 ribs. These were about 3
inches wide and ⅜ inch thick from the center to the first thwart outboard on each side,
and 2 inches wide from these thwarts to the ends, except for the endmost five ribs,
which were roughly 1¾ inches wide. The drawing on page 71 shows the shape of the
thwarts. The ends were tenoned through the gunwales, and there were three lacing
holes in the ends of the middle and first thwarts and two in the end thwarts. The beam
of the canoe inside the gunwales was 30 inches and outside, 31¼ inches; the tumble-
home made the extreme beam 35½ inches. The canoe was rather flat bottomed
athwartships and quite shallow, the depth amidships being 10¾ inches.
The building bed must have had about a 1½ inch crown at midlength. It is probable
that the stem pieces were not fixed in place until after the gunwales had been raised to
sheer height. The gunwales were lashed with the Malecite group lashings, each of four
turns through the bark and spaced at 3 to 3½ inches apart in the midlength and at 2
inches from the end thwarts to the headboards. Two auxiliary lashings were placed
over the outwales and caps outboard of the gunwale ends, one about 6 inches beyond
the ends of the gunwales and the other against the inboard side of the stem-piece. The
end closure was accomplished by the usual spiral lashing passed through the
laminated stem pieces. The latter were split (to within about 4 inches of the heel), into
six or more laminae that were closely wrapped with bark cord. The headboards were
bellied toward the ends to keep the bark cover under tension, and the ends outboard of
the headboards were stuffed with shavings or moss.

Figure 65
Old Form of Passamaquoddy 2½-Fathom Ocean Canoe with characteristic
bottom rocker and sheer. This rather small, fast canoe for coastal hunting and
fishing was common in the 19th century.
A canoe from the Penobscot River, obtained in 1826 by the Peabody Museum, Salem,
Massachusetts, and described in The American Neptune for October 1948, shows that
the Penobscot built their canoes on the old Malecite model. The canoe is apparently a
coastal type. It has some round in the bottom amidships and V-sections toward the
ends; it is 18 feet 7 inches long overall, 37¼ inches maximum beam, 15¼ inches deep
amidships, and the ends stand 26 to 28 inches above the base line, the bow being
slightly higher and with more rake than the stern. The rocker takes place within 4 feet
of the ends, with the bottom straight for about 8 feet along the midlength. The bilges
amidship are slack, and the reverse curve to form the tumble-home starts within 6
inches of the gunwales (see drawing, p. 72.)
A much later coastal canoe of the Passamaquoddy, a porpoise-and seal-hunting canoe
built in 1873, will also serve to show the old type (see p. 73). This style of canoe was
usually built in lengths ranging from 18 to 20 feet overall, the maximum beam was
between 25 and 44 inches, and the beam inside the gunwales was between 29½ and 36
inches. The depth amidships ranged from about 18 to 21 inches, and the height of the

ends above the base was from 28 or 30 inches to as much as 45 inches. The ribs
numbered from 42 to 48 and were 3 inches wide and ½ inch thick. The sheathing was
from ¼ to ⅜ inch thick and the rocker of the bottom, from 4 to 6 inches, took place
within the last 4 or 5 feet of the ends. The midsection showed a well-rounded bottom,
a slack bilge, and the high reverse to form the tumble-home seen in the old Penobscot
canoe at Salem. These canoes were still being built well into the 1880's, if not later,
and are to be seen in some old U.S. Fish Commission photographs of porpoise and
seal hunting at Eastport, Maine. Seal-and porpoise-hunting canoes carried a sail,
usually the spritsail of the dory. While this model probably was little changed in
construction from early times, the surviving examples and models are of the period
when nails were employed. The drawing on page 74 is of a small coastal hunting
canoe of the same class, built in 1875.

Figure 66
Malecite Racing Canoe of 1888, showing V-shaped keel piece placed between
sheathing and bark to form deadrise.
The reasons for the gradual decline in the building of canoes of the old style are not
known, and the transition from the high-peaked ends to the more modern low and
rounded ends was not sudden. It apparently began in some inland areas, particularly
on the St. Lawrence and the St. John Rivers, at least as early as 1849, and the new
trend in appearance finally reached the coast about 25 years later. In the period of
transition, the high-peaked model developed toward the St. Francis type, or that of the
modern "Indian" canvas canoe, as well as toward the low-ended type.

One of the later developments took place on the St. John River, in New Brunswick,
where two Indians, Jim Paul and Peter Polchies, both of St. Marys, in 1888 built for a
Lt. Col. Herbert Dibble of Woodstock the racing canoe illustrated above (fig. 66). This
canoe, 19 feet 6½ inches long overall and only 30½ inches extreme beam, was of a
design perhaps not characteristic of any particular type of Malecite canoe, but it
nevertheless shows two elements that may have appeared during the period of change
in model. The sides amidships not only are without tumble-home, they flare outward
slightly, but tumble-home is developed at the first thwart each side of the middle and
continues to the headboards. The bottom shows a marked V-deadrise achieved by an
unusual construction in a birch-bark canoe: the center strake of the sheathing is shaped
in a shallow V in cross section, its width being about 2½ inches amidships and
tapering each way toward the ends, and its thickness along the longitudinal centerline
being about ⅝ inch and tapering to about ¼ inch at the edges; the two lengths of the
strake are butted, not lapped, amidships, though the rest of the sheathing is lapped at
the butts in the usual way and is uniformly ¼ inch thick. In this manner a ridge that
gives a V-deadrise is formed down the centerline of the bottom, though the frames are
bent in a flattened curve from bilge to bilge. The bottom has very little rocker, the rise
being only 1 inch, and this takes place in the last 2 feet inboard of the heel of the stem
piece.

Figure 67
Sharp-Ended 2½-Fathom Hunting Canoe for use on tidal river. Built by the
Passamaquoddy Indian Peter Denis, it shows what may be the primitive

construction method of obtaining a V-form in hull.
Another feature in this canoe is the end profile; the curved ends are strongly raked, the
curve used being the same as that in the old Malecite type, but with the stem-pieces
reversed, so that the quick turn is at the head, near the sheer, rather than at the heel. As
a result, the gunwales come to the ends in a straight, rising line for the last 16½ inches
rather than as a sudden lift near the ends. The stem-heads stand a little above the rail
caps. The headboards belly toward the ends and are raked in the same direction.
The use of a V-shaped keel piece in the sheathing has been found in a St. Francis
canoe from the St. Lawrence country; this may be a rather old practice. This racing
canoe is very lightly built and much decorated, the date 1888 being worked into the
hull near one end.
Another canoe having a marked V-deadrise was built sometime between 1890 and
1892 by Nicola (sometimes called Peter) Denis (sometimes spelled Dana), a
Passamaquoddy, for his son Francis, who used it at Frenchman's Bay, Maine. The
drawing above (fig. 67) shows a coastal-type hunting canoe, nailed along the
gunwales but sewn elsewhere, and painted. The craft is 15 feet 9 inches overall and 14
feet 5 inches over the gunwales. The beam amidships is 32 inches over the gunwales,
29½ inches inside. The depth amidships is 11 inches, and at the headboards, 14½
inches. The ends are of the low rounded form; the profile shows a moderate tumble-
home just below the sheer, which is a long fair curve without any quick lift toward the
ends. The construction is of the usual Malecite type described in Chapter 3. The
midsection shows a remarkable amount of V in the bottom without any tumble-home
anywhere in the topsides. The V-bottom is rounded at the apex, where the keel would
be; this is done by bending the ribs very sharply where they cross the centerline of the
hull. A narrow strake of thin sheathing runs along the centerline of the canoe, and this
is bent athwart-wise to follow the bends in the ribs there. The canoe had 46 ribs, each
2½ inches wide and 5⁄16 inch thick, tapered slightly from the middle up to the
gunwales. The gunwales, as previously noted, are nailed and the main gunwale
members are of sawed spruce. The rest of the framework is cedar.

Figure 68
Malecite 2½-Fathom St. Lawrence River Canoe, probably a hybrid model. The
high ends show a western influence.
The outside of the canoe was painted red, the inside was a pale yellow, the gunwales
and middle portions of the thwarts were cobalt blue, the ends of the thwarts were red.
The wulegessis was blue, and the "canoe mark" was a painted representation of the
spread eagle of the United States Seal, the border being in black and white and the
eagle in black, yellow, and white, holding a brown branch with green leaves. The
whole panel was outlined in red. On the side of the canoe, near the stern, was a white
swallowtail pennant on which is lettered "Frenchmans Bay" in black capital letters.
This canoe was used for fishing and also for porpoise and seal hunting.
The construction employed to form the V-bottom in a birch-bark canoe can be seen to
have been done in two ways; that described on page 76 is undoubtedly the method
used in prehistoric times, since laborious forming of a V keel-piece in the sheathing,
using stone scrapers, would be avoided. The V-bottom, it should be noted, usually
appears in canoes used in open waters, as this form tends to run straight under paddle,
in spite of a side wind, and thus requires the minimum of steering to hold it on its
course. It was this characteristic, too, that made the V-bottom suitable for the racing
canoe on the St. John River, since stopping the stroke momentarily to steer diminishes
the driving power of the stern paddler.

The various river canoes of the Malecite, built to the modern low, rounded-end
profiles, or to the short-radii and straight-line forms, held rather closely to the same
lines, that is, sharp ends with a rather flat bottom amidships and an easy bilge. Some
of the canoes retained the characteristic tumble-home, but others had nearly vertical
sides or the curve of the bilge was carried so high that it ended at the gunwales.

Figure 69
Malecite 2½-Fathom River Canoe of 1890 from the Rivière du Loup region.
Canoes in this area had straight stems and sharp lines from at least as early as
1857.
On the St. Lawrence there was apparently a canoe having rather peaked ends as well
as the rather straight-stemmed, low-ended type. A St. Lawrence River canoe found in
the Chateau de Ramezay and built sometime before 1867 provides an example of the
rather high-peaked ends. The canoe, as illustrated on page 77, has a well-rounded
bilge working into a very round tumble-home above and into a rather flat bottom
below, the tumble-home being carried into the extreme ends, so that the headboards
are rather wide. The ends round up rather quickly and then continue up to the sheer in
a very slight curve, having a very moderate tumble-home near the sheer. The latter
follows somewhat the characteristic sheer of the old Malecite canoes, but the straight
portion just inboard of the ends is much shorter, so that the quick upsweep of the sheer
begins nearer the ends and thus appears somewhat more pronounced.

The construction is in the usual manner. The rocker of the bottom is 2 inches. The ribs
are wider amidships than near the ends. The outwale is rounded on the outboard face
so that the cap is slightly narrower than the thickness of inner gunwale and outwale
combined. The headboard is rather unusual, however, as it is not bellied but stands
straight and vertical. The lashing at the upper portion of the stems is the crossed stitch,
below it is spiral. The gunwale groups are made up of six passes through the bark, and
the spaces between groups are about 2½ inches. The side panels are sewn with the
harness stitch. The canoe is 16 feet long overall and 14 feet 5 inches inside the
gunwales; the extreme beam amidships is 37 inches and inside the gunwales 32
inches. The depth amidships is about 13 inches and the height of the ends 25 inches,
with 2 inches of rocker at the headboards. This canoe, retaining the high ends, marks
the transition from the old form to the new.
A later canoe built on the St. Lawrence about 1890, probably near Rivière de Loup, is
shown above. It is 16 feet 11 inches long overall, the beam over the gunwales is 33½
inches and inside it is 31 inches, the curve of the bilge being carried up to the
gunwales. The bottom is flat for only a short width. The depth amidships is 11½
inches and the height of the ends is 20 inches, with 1 inch of rocker in the last two feet
of length. The sheer is a long fair sweep without any quick upward lift near the ends.
The headboards are very narrow and belly only very slightly toward the ends. The end
profile illustrates the short radii and straight line form that marked many of the last
Malecite birch-bark canoes of the St. Lawrence Valley. It is possible that the end-form
was copied from the white man's St. Lawrence skiff, which usually had ends that were
straight and nearly vertical, with a sharp turn into the keel.

Figure 70
Modern (1895) Malecite 2½-Fathom St. John River Canoe, with low ends and
moderate sheer, developed late in the 19th century.
Since a Malecite canoe of the form having rounded low ends was the subject used to
describe the construction of a birch-bark canoe in Chapter 3 (see p. 36), there is no
need to discuss all the details here. There was some variety in the sewing and lashing
used in Malecite canoes; the combination of cross and spiral stitches in the ends and
the use of a batten and the over-and-over stitch in the side panels are, of course, very
common in these canoes. The occasional use of other stitches in the side panels and
even in the gores would probably be normal, since individual preferences in such
details were not controlled by a narrow tribal practice.
The Malecite are known to have hauled their canoes overland in the early spring,
before the snow was entirely gone, by mounting the canoe on two sleds or toboggans
in tandem, binding the canoe to each. This was done as late as the 1890's for early
spring muskrat hunts. The Malecite also fitted their river canoes with outside
protection when much running of rapids or "quick water" work was done. This
protection consisted of two sets of battens (see p. 80), each set being made up of five
or six thin splints of cedar about ⅜ inch thick and 3 inches wide, tapering to 2 or 1½
inches at one end. These were held together by four strips of basket ash, bark cord, or
rawhide. Each cord was passed through holes or slits made edgewise through each
splint. The cords were located so that when the splints were placed on the bottom of

the canoe, the cords could be tied at the thwarts. The tapered ends of the splints were
at the ends of the canoe; the butts of the two sets being lapped amidships with the lap
toward the stern. This formed a wooden sheathing, outside the bottom, to protect the
bark from rocks and snags or floating ice that might be met in rapids and small
streams. The fitting was used also by the Micmac and Ojibway; it is not known
whether this was an Indian or European invention. The French canoemen called it
barre d'abordage and the Malecite, P's-ta' k'n; the English woodsmen called the
fitting "canoe shoes."

Figure 71
Malecite Canoe Details, Gear, and Gunwale Decorations.
The Malecite paddle was of various forms, as illustrated in figures 71 and 72, the
predominant form being very similar to the paddle now used with canvas "Indian"
canoes. The total length of the blade was usually about 28 to 30 inches; at 10 or 11
inches from the tip it was about 2½ inches wide. The handle was about 36 inches long.
At just above the blade it was 1¼ inches wide and 1 inch thick. The handle was not
parallel-sided. Near the top it widened gradually to about 2¼ inches at 2½ inches from
the top; here the cross-grip was formed. The thickness of the handle reduced gradually
from that given for just above the top of the blade to about ½ inch at about 5 inches
below the cross-grip, and widened again to ⅝ inch at the point where the cross-grip
was formed. The blade was ridged down its center. The lower end was rounded and

the lower half of the blade was approximately half an ellipse in shape. The
Passamaquoddy blade had its wide point within 7 inches of the lower tip, where it was
about 6 inches wide. The handle was about 1⅛ inches in diameter just above the
blade, and then tapered in thickness until it first became oval and then flat in cross
section. The width remained nearly constant to a point within 12 to 16 inches of the
cross-grip, then gradually widened to nearly 3 inches at the top. The blade was 33 to
36 inches long and the whole paddle somewhere between 73 and 76 inches long. The
cross-grips were sometimes round, at other times they were merely worked off in an
oval shape to fit the upper hand. The usual width of the cross-grip was just under 3
inches.

Figure 72
Malecite Canoe Details, Stem Profiles, Paddles, Sail Rig, and Salmon Spear.

Figure 73
Lines and Decoration Reconstructed From a Very Old Model of an ancient
woods, or pack, canoe, showing short ends and use of fiddlehead and fire-steel
form of decoration.
Formerly, the Malecite placed his personal mark, or dupskodegun, on the flat of the
top of his paddle near the cross-grip. The mark was incised into the wood and the
incised line was filled with red or black pigment when available. Sometimes the
whole paddle, including the blade, was covered with incised line ornamentation. This
was usually a vine-and-leaf pattern, or a combination of small triangles and curved
lines. The Passamaquoddy used designs suggesting the needlework once seen on fine
linens. Sometimes other designs showing animals, camps, or canoes were used.

Figure 74
Last Known Passamaquoddy Decorated Ocean Canoe to be built. Constructed in
1898 by Tomah Joseph, Princeton, Maine, on the same model as a canvas
porpoise-hunting canoe.
The Malecite, particularly the Passamaquoddy, were especially skillful in decorating
bark canoes, as can be seen from the illustrations (pp. 81-87). Sometimes they used
scraped winter bark decoration just along the gunwales; occasionally the whole canoe
was decorated in this manner above the normal load waterline as described on page
87. Usually, however, the bark decoration was confined to a long panel just below the
gunwales and to the ends of the canoe. The personal "mark" of the owner-builder
would usually be on the flaps near the ends, the wulegessis, meaning the outside bark
of a tree or a child's diaper, but in canoe nomenclature used to indicate the protective
cover which it formed for the gunwale-end lashings. Sometimes the Malecite placed
his mark in the gunwale decoration. Sometimes he placed a picture or a sign on each
side of the ends below the wulegessis, in about the position used for insignia on the
canvas "Indian" canoe.
The swastika was used by the Passamaquoddy in a war canoe in colonial times and
has been used later. The Passamaquoddy mark for an exceptional canoe (such as a war
canoe that won the race home) was often on the wulegessis, and on a relatively
modern canoe this mark, or gogetch, was a picture of "a funny-looking kind of doll."
A common form of decoration in Passamaquoddy canoes was the fiddlehead curve
which resembles the top of young fern shoots. This appears in numerous

combinations; often double and back to back, joined with a long bar, or "cross." This
particular combination is known as the "fiddlehead and cross" or as the "fire steel";
the latter because of a fancied resemblance of the form to the shape of the old fire-
making steels of colonial times. A zigzag line appears to represent lightning to most
Indians. A series of half-circles along the gunwales, with the rounded side down and
just touching one another at the top, having a small circle in the center of each,
represents "clouds passing over the moon." A similar series of half-circles without the
center circles might mean the canoe was launched during a new moon; the number of
half-circles shown would indicate the month.

Figure 75
Malecite Canoe Details and Decorations.
Yet there is not full agreement among Indians about the meaning of decorative forms;
the crooked or zigzag line might also mean camps or the crooked score stick used in a
Malecite game. The circle could mean sun or moon or month. A half-moon form
might also be "a woman's earring," or a new moon. A circle with a very small one
inside might be a "brooch," as well as "money." Right triangles, in a closely spaced
series along the gunwales, apparently meant "door cloth," or tent door ("what you lift
with your hand"). Shown on pages 84 and 85 are some Indian marks on the
wulegessis, based upon the statements of old Malecites or upon their sketches.

After the Malecite had become Roman Catholic, a fish on the middle panel of a canoe
meant that it had been launched on Friday. Pictures on a canoe sometimes indicated a
mythological story; a picture of a rabbit sitting and smoking a pipe on one side of the
canoe and a lynx on the other would be such a case. In Malecite mythology the rabbit
was the ancestor of the tribe. He was also a great magician. The lynx was the mortal
enemy of the rabbit, but in the mythological tales he was always overcome and
defeated by the rabbit's magic. Hence, the idea conveyed is that "though the-lynx is
near, the rabbit sits calmly smoking his pipe and as he knows he can overcome his
enemy," or, in short, "self-confidence."
The Indian's mark on his canoe or weapons is not a signature to be read by anyone.
The mark may, of course, be identified as to what it represents, but unless it is known
as the mark used by a certain man it cannot be "read." Any mark could be used by an
Indian, either because it had some connection with his activities or habits, or because
he "likes it." The stone tobacco pipe used by Peter Polchies (see p. 85) as his mark had
no known connection with this Indian's habits or activities. However, his son, of the
same name and well known also as "Doctor Polchies," took the same mark, but in his
case it had a personal meaning since he was noted locally for his skill in making stone
pipes. Another case was a Passamaquoddy who at every opportunity used to pole his
canoe in preference to paddling. As a result he had become known as "Peter of the
Pole" or "Peter Pole" and he then used as a canoe mark a representation of a setting
pole. In submitting sketches of the marking on the wulegessis of canoes to old Indians
it was seldom possible to learn the identity of the owner or builder, since the marks
were usually not known to those questioned. In more recent times, the educated
Malecite signed his name in English on his canoe and thus gave it more permanent
identification.
Figure 76
Wulegessis Decorations

"mark of Mitchell Laporte"

"that pot hanging was used by three or four generations—it was mark on John
Lolar's canoe in 1872"

"I made marks like this on wulegessis and sometimes on middle" (Charlie Bear)

"mark of Noel John Sapier" (tomahawk)

"mark of Noel Polchies" (paddle)

"mark of old Peter Polchies" (stone pipe)

"mark of Chief Neptune" (Passamaquoddy)

"mark of Louis Paul"

"canoe was finished on new moon" (Joe Ellis)

"mark of old Solomon Paul"

Figure 77
End Decorations, Passamaquoddy Canoe built by Tomah Joseph.
In duplicating a design, the Malecite apparently used a pattern, or stencil, which was
preserved to allow duplication over a long period of time. The stencil was usually cut
from birch bark, apparently an old practice, although whether it was done in
prehistoric times cannot be determined. The long contact of the Malecites with
Europeans is a factor to be considered in such matters. This is sometimes shown in
picture-writing on a canoe; one, for instance, showed a white man fishing with rod
and line from a canoe with an Indian guide. On the opposite side was the
representation of an Indian camp beside two trees, a kettle over the fire and the brave
sitting cross-legged smoking his pipe, indicating, of course, "comfort and
contentment."

Asking old Indians to identify or give the names of decorations, Adney recorded
statements which indicate their thought in regard to such matters. There were used, for
example, two forms of the half-moon or crescent; one was quite open at the points

which plainly indicated a half-moon, but the other was more nearly closed:
Mrs. Billy Ellis, widow of Frank Francis, a Malecite, said of them, "Old Indian
earrings, that is only what I can call them. Also in nose. Wild Indian made them of
silver or moose-bone, I guess he thought he looked nice; it looked like the devil." Joe
Ellis, an old canoe builder, also called this form "earrings" and when asked why an
Indian would put these on a canoe, replied "He will think what he will put on here. He
might have seen his wife at bow of canoe, and put it on [there]." Shown the right-
triangle-in-series design, Mrs. Ellis said "I fergit it but I will remember; what you lift
with your hand, we call it that—camp door" (referring to the cloth or hide hung over a
camp door, and raised at one corner to enter, so that the opening is then divided
diagonally).
In a later period, the Malecite usually confined decoration to the wulegessis and to the
pieced-out bark amidships, the panel formed on each side. The wulegessis was of
various forms; its bottom was sometimes shaped like a cupid's bow, sometimes it was
rectangular. A common form was one representing the profile of a canoe. Being of
winter bark, it was red or brown, with the part where the design was scraped showing
white or yellow. The center panel was also of winter bark, and the design on it showed
a similar contrast in color. Even when the bark cover was not pieced out, the panel
was formed by scraping all the cover except a panel amidships on each side. Old
models indicate that the early Malecite canoes may have used decoration all over
above the waterline (see p. 81) far more frequently than has been the recent custom.
The decorations were a fiddlehead design in a complicated sequence so that it bore a
faint resemblance to the hyanthus in a formal scroll, but the design apparently had no
ceremonial significance; it was used for the same reason given Adney for so many
forms of bark decoration, "it looked nice."

Figure 78
End Decorations, Passamaquoddy Canoe built by Tomah Joseph.

Figure 79
Passamaquoddy Decorated Canoe built by Tomah Joseph.
The drawings and plans on pages 71 to 87 will serve better than words to show these
characteristic designs and decorations. It is doubtful that color, paint or pigment, was
used in decorating the Malecite bark canoes before the coming of Europeans, but it
was employed occasionally in the last half of the 19th century. The beauty of the
Malecite canoe designs lay not in the barbaric display of color characteristic of the
large fur-traders' canoes, but in the tasteful distribution of the scraped winter bark
decoration along the sides of the hull. The workmanship exhibited by the Malecite in
the construction of their canoes was generally very fine; indeed, they were perhaps the
most finished craftsmen among Indian canoe-builders.

St. Francis

The tribal composition of the Abnaki Indians is somewhat uncertain. The group was
certainly made up of a portion of the old Malecite group, the Kennebec and
Penobscot, but later also included the whole or parts of the refugee Indians of other
New England tribes who were forced to flee before the advancing white settlers. It is
probable that among the refugees were the Cowassek (Coosuc), Pennacook, and the
Ossipee. There were also some Maine tribes among these—the Sokoki, Androscoggin,
(Arosaguntacook), Wewenoc, Taconnet, and Pequawket. It is probable that the tribal
groups from southern and central New England were mere fragments and that the
largest number to make up the Abnaki were Malecite. The latter in turn were driven
out of their old homes on the lower Maine coast and drifted northwestward into the
old hunting grounds of the Kennebec and Penobscot, northwestern Maine and eastern
Quebec as far as the St. Lawrence. The chief settlement was finally on the St. Francis
River in Quebec, hence the Abnaki were also known as the "St. Francis Indians."
These tribesmen held a deep-seated grudge against the New Englanders and, by the
middle of the 18th century, they had made themselves thoroughly hated in New
England. Siding with the French, the St. Francis raided the Connecticut Valley and
eastward, taking white children and women home with them after a successful raid,
and as a result the later St. Francis had much white blood. They were generally
enterprising and progressive.
Little is known about the canoes of these Abnaki during the period of their retreat
northwestward. It is obvious that the Penobscot, at least, used the old form of the
Malecite canoe. What the canoes of the other tribal groups were like cannot be stated.
However, by the middle of the 19th century the St. Francis Indians had produced a
very fine birch-bark canoe of distinctive design and excellent workmanship. These
they began to sell to sportsmen, with the result that the type of canoe became a
standard one for hunting and fishing in Quebec. When other tribal groups discovered
the market for canoes, they were forced to copy the St. Francis model and appearance
to a very marked degree in order to be assured of ready sales. It is obvious, from what
is now known, that the St. Francis had adapted some ideas in canoe building from
Indians west of the St. Lawrence, with whom they had come into close contact.
However, they had also retained much of the building technique of their Malecite
relatives. Hence, the St. Francis canoes usually represent a blend of building
techniques as well as of models.
The St. Francis canoe of the last half of the 19th century had high-peaked ends, with a
quick upsweep of the sheer at bow and stern. The end profile was almost vertical, with
a short radius where it faired into the bottom. The rocker of the bottom took place in
the last 18 or 24 inches of the ends, the remaining portion of the bottom being usually
straight. The amount of rocker varied a good deal; apparently some canoes had only

an inch or so while others had as much as four or five. A few canoes had a projecting
"chin" end-profile; the top portion where it met the sheer was usually a straight line.
The midsection was slightly wall-sided, with a rather quick turn of the bilge. The
bottom was nearly flat across, with very slight rounding until close to the bilges. The
end sections were a U-shape that approached the V owing to the very quick turn at the
centerline. The ends of the canoe were very sharp, coming in practically straight at the
gunwale and at level lines below it. The gunwales were longer than the bottom and so
the St. Francis canoes were commonly built with a building-frame which was nearly
as wide amidships as the gunwales but shorter in length.
At least one St. Francis canoe, built on Lake Memphremagog, was constructed with a
tumble-home amidships the same as that of some Malecite canoes. The rocker of the
bottom at each end started at the first thwart on each side of the middle and gradually
increased toward the ends, which faired into the bottom without any break in the
curves. The end profiles projected with a chin that was full and round up to the peaked
stem heads. The sheer swept up sharply near the ends to the stem heads. This
particular canoe represented a hybrid design not developed for sale to sportsmen, and
the sole example, a full-size canoe formerly in The American Museum of Natural
History at New York and measured by Adney in 1890, is now missing and probably
has been broken up.

Figure 80

St. Francis 2-Fathom Canoe of About 1865, with upright stems. Built for forest
travel, this form ranged in size from 12 feet 6 inches overall and 26½-inch beam,
to 16 feet overall and 34-inch beam.
The St. Francis canoes were usually small, being commonly between 12 and 16 feet
overall; the 15-foot length usually was preferred by sportsmen. The width amidships
was from 32 to 35 inches and the depth 12 to 14 inches. The 14-foot canoe usually
had a beam of about 32 inches and was nearly 14 inches deep; if built for portaging
the ends were somewhat lower than if the canoe was to be used in open waters.
Canoes built for hunting might be as short as 10 or 11 feet and of only 26 to 28 inches
beam; these were the true woods canoes of the St. Francis.
The gunwale structure of the St. Francis canoes followed Malecite design; it was often
of slightly smaller cross section than that of a Malecite canoe of equal length, but both
outwale and cap were of somewhat larger cross section. The stem-pieces were split
and laminated in the same manner, but occasionally the lamination was at the bottom,
due to the hard curve required where the stem faired into the bottom. Many such
canoes had no headboards, the heavy outwales being carried to the sides of the stem
pieces and secured there to support the main gunwales. If the headboard was used, it
was quite narrow and was bellied toward the ends of the canoe. In some St. Francis
canoes the bark cover in the rockered bottom near the ends showed a marked V. In the
canoe examined by Adney at the American Museum of Natural History, the ribs inside
toward the end showed no signs of being "broken," so it is evident that the V was
formed either by use of a shaped keel-piece in the sheathing or by an additional batten
shaped to give this V-form under the center strake. Since the V began where the
rocker in the canoe started, in an almost angular break in the bottom, it is likely that a
shaped batten had been used to form it. He could not verify this, however, as the area
was covered by the frames and sheathing.

Figure 81
St. Francis Canoe of About 1910, with narrow, rockered bottom, a model
popular with guides and sportsmen for forest travel.
The sheathing was in short lengths with rounded ends which overlapped, and it was
laid irregularly in the "thrown in" style found in many western birch-bark canoes. The
ribs were commonly about 2 inches wide and nearly ⅜ inch thick, the width tapering
to roughly 1¾ inches under the gunwales. The ends of the ribs were then sharply
reduced in width to a chisel point about 1 inch wide; the sides of the sharply reduced
taper being beveled, as well as the end. A 15-foot canoe usually had 46 to 50 ribs.
The thwarts, unlike those of the Micmac and some Malecite canoes, in which the
thwarts were unequally spaced, were equally spaced according to a builder's formula.
The ends of the thwarts, or crossbars, were tenoned into the main gunwales and lashed
in place through the three lashing holes in the ends of each thwart, except the end
ones, which usually had but two. In some small canoes, however, two lashing holes
were placed in all thwart ends. The design of the St. Francis thwart was as a rule very
plain, gradually increasing in width from the center outwards to the tenon at the
gunwale in plan and decreasing in thickness in elevation in the same direction. The
ends of the main gunwales were of the half-arrowhead form, and were covered with a

bark wulegessis, but the flaps below the outwales were sometimes cut off, or they
might be formed in some graceful outline.
The bark cover was sometimes in one piece; when it was pieced out for width, the
harness-stitch was used. In most canoes, the bark along the gunwale was doubled by
adding a long narrow strip, often left hanging free below the gunwales and stopping
just short of the wulegessis, which it resembled. It was sometimes decorated. A few St.
Francis canoes with nailed gunwales omitted this doubling piece. When used, the
doubling piece, as well as the end cover, were folded down on top of the gunwale
before being sewn into place. The decoration of the St. Francis canoes seems to have
been scant and wholly confined to a narrow band along the gunwale, or to the
doubling pieces. The marking of the wulegessis had ceased long before Adney
investigated this type of canoe and no living Indian knew of any old marks, if any ever
had been used.

Figure 82
Low-Ended St. Francis Canoe with V-form end sections made with short, V-
shaped keel battens outside the sheathing at each end. Note the unusual form of
headboard, seen in some St. Francis canoes.
The ends were commonly lashed with a spiral or crossed stitch, but some builders
used a series of short-to-long stitches that made groups generally triangular in
appearance. The gunwale lashing was in groups about 2½ inches long, each having 5
to 7 turns through the bark. The groups were about 1½ to 1¼ inches apart near the

ends and about 2 inches apart elsewhere. The groups were not independent but were
made by bringing the last turn of each group over the top and inside the main gunwale
in a long diagonal pass so as to come through the bark from the inside for the first
pass of the new group. The caps were originally pegged, with a few lashings at the
ends.
The ribs were bent green. After the bark cover had been sewn to the gunwales, the
green ribs were fitted roughly inside the bark, with their ends standing above the
gunwales, and were then forced into the desired shape and held there, usually by two
wide battens pressed against them by 7 to 10 temporary cross struts. After being
allowed to dry in place, the ribs were then removed, the sheathing was put into place,
and the ribs, after a final fitting, were driven into their proper positions. Some builders
put in the ribs by pairs in the shaping stage, one on top of the other, as this made
easier the job of fitting the temporary battens. The forcing of the ribs to shape also
served to shape the bark cover, and the canoe was placed on horses during the
operation, so that the shape of the bottom could be observed while the bark was being
moulded. Some builders used very thin longitudinal battens between the bark and the
green ribs to avoid danger of bursting the bark.
The canoe was built on a level building bed, in most instances apparently, with the
ends of the building frame blocked up about an inch. It seems possible, however, that
narrow bottom canoes may have been built with the bed raised 2 or 3 inches in the
middle, rather than employing a narrow building frame. The construction of the
building frame was the same as among the western Indians and as described in
Chapter 3.

Figure 83
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, New York. Details of Abnaki canoes are also shown.
In preparing the ribs, a common practice was the following: Assume, for example, that
there are 10 ribs from the center to the first thwart forward; these are laid out on the
ground edge-to-edge with the rib under the center thwart to the left and the rib under
the first thwart to the right. On the rib to the left the middle thwart is laid so that its
center coincides with that of the rib, and the ends of the thwart are marked on the rib.
The same is done to the rib on the far right, over which the first thwart is laid as the
measure. On each side of the centerline the points marking the ends of the thwarts are
then joined by a line across the ribs, as they lie together, to mark the approximate
taper of the canoe toward the ends, at the turn of the bilge. Each rib is taken in turn
from the panel and with it is placed another from the stock on hand to be set in a
matching position on the other side of the middle thwart, toward the stern; the pair,
placed flat sides together, are then bent over the knee at, or outside of, the marks or
lines. The ribs in the next portion of the canoe's length are shaped in the same manner,
using the lengths of the first and second thwarts as guides. Thus, the ribs are given a
rough, preliminary bend before being fitted inside the bark cover and stayed into place
to season. This method allowed the bilge of the canoe to be rather precisely
determined and formed during the first stages of construction. At the ends, of course,
the ribs are sharply bent only in the middle. Since the full thwart length makes a wide

bottom, by setting the length of the rib perhaps a hand's width less than that of the
whole thwart, the narrow bottom is formed.
The rough length of the ribs was twice the length of the thwarts nearest them.
Hackmatack was used for thwarts by the St. Francis Indians, rock maple being
considered next best. Cedar was first choice for ribs, then spruce, and then balsam fir.
Longitudinals were cedar or spruce. All canoe measurements were made by hand,
finger, and arm measurements. Basket ash strips were often used in transferring
measurements.

Figure 84
Model of a St. Francis-Abnaki Canoe Under Construction, showing method of
moulding ribs inside the assembled bark cover.
From what has been said, it will be seen that the construction practice of the St.
Francis did not follow in all details that of their Malecite relatives. The intrusion of
western practices into this group probably took place some time after the group's final
settlement at St. Francis. As they gradually came into more intimate relations with
their western neighbors and drifted into western Quebec, beyond the St. Lawrence,
their canoe building technique became influenced by what they saw to the westward.
As would be expected, the St. Francis Abnaki began early to use nails in canoe
building, but, being expert workmen, they retained the good features of the old sewn
construction to a marked degree up to the very end of birch-bark canoe construction in
southern Quebec, probably about 1915. It should perhaps be noted that what has been
discovered about the St. Francis Abnaki canoes refers necessarily to only the last half
of the 19th century, since no earlier canoe of this group has been discovered. The
changes that took place between the decline of the Penobscot style of canoe and that
of the later Abnaki remain a matter of speculation.

s: Figure 85
St. Francis-Abnaki Canoe.

Beothuk

The fourth group of Indians, classed here as belonging to the eastern maritime area,
are the Beothuk of Newfoundland. Historically, perhaps, these Indians should have
been discussed first, as they were probably the first of all North American Indians to
come into contact with the white man. However, so little is known about their canoes
that it has seemed better to place them last, since practically all that can be said is the
result of reconstruction, speculation, and logic founded upon rather unsatisfactory
evidence. The tribal origin of the Beothuk has long been a matter of argument; they
are known to have used red pigment on their weapons, equipment, clothes, and
persons. A prehistoric group that once inhabited Maine and the Maritime Provinces
appears to have had a similar custom; these are known as the "Red Paint People," and
it may be that the Beothuk were a survival of this earlier culture. But all that can be
said with certainty is that the Beothuk inhabited Newfoundland and perhaps some of
the Labrador coast when the white man began to frequent those parts. The Beothuk
made a nuisance of themselves by stealing gear from the European fishermen, and by
occasionally murdering individuals or small groups of white men. Late in the 17th
century, the French imported some Micmac warriors and began a war of extermination
against the Beothuk. By the middle of the 18th century the Newfoundland tribe was

reduced to a few very small groups, and the Beothuk became extinct early in the 19th
century, before careful investigation of their culture could be made.
Their canoes were made to a distinctive model quite different from that of the canoes
of other North American Indians. The descriptions available are far from complete
and, as a result, many important details are left to speculation. Some parts of the more
complete descriptions are obscure and do not appear to agree with one another. In
spite of these difficulties, however, some information on the canoes is rather specific;
by using this, together with a knowledge of the requirements of birch-bark canoe
construction, and by reference to some toy canoes found in 1869 in the grave of a
Beothuk boy, a reasonably accurate reconstruction of a canoe is possible.
Captain Richard Whitbourne had come with Sir Humphrey Gilbert to Newfoundland
in 1580 and revisited the island a number of times afterward. In 1612 he wrote that the
Beothuk canoes were shaped "like the wherries of the River Thames," apparently
referring to the humped sheer of both; in the wherry the sheer swept up sharply to the
height of the oar tholes, in profile, and flared outward, in cross section.
John Gay, a member of the Company of Newfoundland Plantation, wrote in 1612 that
Beothuk canoes were about 20 feet long and 4½ feet wide "in the middle and aloft,"
that the ribs were like laths, and that the birch-bark cover was sewn with roots. The
canoes carried four persons and weighed less than a hundredweight. They had a short,
light staff set in each end by which the canoes could be lifted ashore. "In the middle
the canoa is higher a great deale, than at the bowe and quarter." He also says of their
cross section: "They be all bearing from the keel to portlesse, not with any circular,
but with a straight, line."
Joann de Laet, writing about 1633, speaks of the crescent shape of the canoes, of their
"sharp keel" and need of ballast to keep them upright; he also states that the canoes
were not over 20 feet long and could carry up to five persons.
The most complete description of the Beothuk canoe was in the manuscript of Lt.
John Cartwright, R.N., who was on the coast of Newfoundland in 1767-1768 as
Lieutenant of H.B.M. Ship Guernsey. However, some portions are either in error or
the description was over-simplified. For example, Cartwright says that the gunwales
were formed with a distinct angle made by joining two lengths of the main gunwale
members at the elevated middle of the sheer. This hardly seems correct since such a
connection would not produce the rigidity that such structural parts require, given the
methods used by Indians to build bark canoes. The three grave models show that the
sheer was actually curved along its elevated middle. It is possible that Cartwright saw
a damaged canoe in which the lashings of the scarf of the gunwales had slackened so
that the line of sheer "broke" there. Cartwright is perhaps misleading in his description
of the rocker of the keel as being "nearly, if not exactly, the half of an ellipse,
longitudinally divided." The models show the keel to have been straight along the
length of the canoe and turned up sharply at the ends to form bow and stern.

Cartwright also states the keel piece was "about the size of the handle of a common
hatchet" amidships, or perhaps 1 inch thick and 1½ inches wide, and tapered toward
the ends, which were about ¾ inch wide and about equally thick. The height of the
sheer amidships was perhaps two-thirds the height of the ends.

Figure 86
A 15-Foot Beothuk Canoe of Newfoundland with 42½-inch beam, inside
measurement, turned on side for use as a camp. It gives headroom clearance of
about 3 feet, double that of an 18-foot Malecite canoe with high ends. When the
ends were not high enough to provide maximum clearance, small upright sticks
were lashed to bow and stern. The shape of the gunwales would permit the canoe
to be heeled to an angle (more than 35°) which would swamp a canoe of ordinary
sheer and depth. (Sketch by Adney.)
Nearly all observers, Cartwright included, noted the almost perfect V-form cross
section of these canoes, with the apexes rounded off slightly and the wings slightly
curved. From an interpretation of Cartwright's statements, it appears that after the bark
cover had been laced to the gunwales, the latter were forced apart to insert the thwarts,
as in some western Indian canoe-building techniques. The three thwarts are described
as being about two fingers in width and depth. It is stated that the gunwales were
made up of an inner and outer member and all were scarfed in the middle to taper each
way toward the ends, the outer member serving as an outwale or guard. Cartwright
also states that the inside of the bark cover was "lined" with "sticks" 2 or 3 inches
broad, cut flat and thin. He refers also to others of the same sort which served as
"timbers" so he is describing both the sheathing and the ribs as being 2 or 3 inches
wide. He does not say how the thwarts were fitted to the gunwales, how high the ends
were, how the ends of the gunwales were formed, nor does he give any details of the
sewing used. However, the grave models suggest the form of sewing probably used
and the approximate proportions of sheer.

An old settler told James Howley that the Beothuk canoes could be "folded together
like a purse." Considering the construction required in birch-bark canoes, this is
manifestly impossible; perhaps what the settler had seen was a canoe in construction
with the bark secured to shaped gunwales, ready for the latter to be sprung apart by
thwarts, as in opening a purse. Howley also obtained from a man who had seen
Beothuk canoes a sketch which shows a straight keel and peaked ends, confirmed in
all respects by the grave models or toys.
The toy canoes so often referred to here were found by Samuel Coffin in an Indian
burial cave on a small island in Pilley's Tickle, Notre Dame Bay (on the east coast of
Newfoundland), in 1869. Among the graves in the cave, one of a child, evidently a
boy, was found to contain a wooden image of a boy, toy bows and arrows, two toy
canoes and a fragment of a third, packages of food, and some red ochre. With one of
the canoes was a fragment of a miniature paddle. One of the canoes was 32 inches
long, height of ends 8 inches, height of side amidships 6 inches, straight portion of
keel 26 inches and beam 7 inches, as shown by Howley.
In Newfoundland there was very fine birch but no cedar. There was, however,
excellent spruce which would take the place of cedar. It seems certain, then, that all
the framework of the Beothuk canoes was of spruce. It seems likely that they were
never built of a single sheet of birch but were covered with a number of sheets sewn
together, as in other early Indian birch-bark canoes. The canoe birch of Newfoundland
grew to a diameter of 2 to 2½ feet at the butt, which would produce a sheet of birch of
6 to 7 feet width; the length would be decided by how far up the tree the Indian could
climb to make the upper cut. As has been stated, the prehistoric Indians seemingly
made little attempt to build birch-bark canoes of long lengths of bark, preferring to use
only the bark obtainable near the ground and above the height of the winter snows.
The form of the Beothuk canoes, particularly the lack of bilge and the marked V-form,
has caused much speculation. One writer assumed that the form was particularly
suited for running rapids. Actually, the Beothuk appeared to have used canoes for river
travel very rarely, as few rivers in their country were suited for navigation. Instead,
they seem to have been coast dwellers and to have used canoes for coastal travel and
for voyages from island to island.
Their canoes were undoubtedly designed for open-water navigation, and the V-form
was particularly suitable for this. The draft aided in keeping the canoe on its course
with either broadside or quartering winds, and if the Beothuks knew sail, the hull-
form would have served them well. It is quite evident that the Beothuk canoes used
ballast in the form of stones or heavy cargo. Stones would have been placed along the
keel piece and covered with moss and skins. The strongly hogged sheer was useful in
protecting cargo amidships from spray and, in picking up a seal or porpoise, the canoe
could be sharply heeled without taking in water. The V sections fore and aft were
suitable for rough-water navigation; because of its form and the weight of ballast, the

canoe would pass partly over and through the wave-top without pounding. If a wave
of such height as to overtop the gunwales just abaft the stem were met, the strongly
flaring sides would give reserve buoyancy, causing the canoe to lift quickly as the
wave reached up the sides.
The small sticks in the ends, mentioned by John Gay, served not only for lifting the
canoe but also as braces to support the canoe at a given angle when turned over ashore
to serve as a shelter. The Beothuk canoe, because of its form, was not well suited for
portaging, and it must be concluded that little of this was done. In coastal voyages, the
canoe would be unloaded and brought ashore each night to serve as a shelter.
It is believed that the gunwale lashing of these canoes was in groups, as in the
Malecite. Howley questioned an old Micmac who had seen the Beothuk lashing; he
likened it to the continuous lashing used by his own people, indicating some form of
group wrapping, at least. It is probable that the group lashings were let into the
gunwales by shallow notching at each group, a common Indian practice when no rail
cap was used, to prevent abrasion from the paddle or from loading and unloading the
canoe. The lacing of the ends appears to have been in the common spiral stitch,
judging by the grave models. These, however, show a continuous wrapping at the
gunwales, a common simplification found in Indian canoe models, representing either
group or continuously wrapped gunwales indiscriminately.
The paddle of the Beothuks had a long, narrow blade, probably with a pointed tip and
a ridged surface. The shape is nearly spatulate. The handle is missing from the grave
model but was perhaps of the usual "hoe-handled" form without a top cross-grip.
From these descriptions and on the basis of common Indian techniques in birch-bark
canoe construction, the form and methods of building the Beothuk canoe can be
reconstructed. The drawing on page 97 shows the probable shape and appearance of
the finished canoe. It seems likely that a level building bed was first prepared. The
keel, probably rectangular in cross section, was then formed of two poles placed butt-
to-butt, worked to shape, and scarfed. The fastening of the scarf was probably two or
more lashings let into the surface of the wood. These lashings are assumed to have
been of split-root material but may have been sinew. Possibly to strengthen the scarfs,
pegs were also used, a technique consistent with the state of Beothuk culture. The keel
probably had its ends split into laminae to allow the sharp bend required to form the
bow and stern pieces; and it was probably treated with hot water and staked out to the
desired profile. The main gunwales were similarly made and worked to the
predetermined sheer which, in staking out, was hogged to a greater degree than was
required in the finished canoe. The ends of the gunwales were apparently split into
laminae to allow the shaping of the sharp upsweep of the sheer close to bow and stern.
The outwales were probably formed in the same manner, after which the three thwarts
were made and the material for ribs and sheathing prepared. The ribs were apparently

bent to the desired shape, using hot water, and were either staked out or tied to hold
them in form until needed.

Figure 87
Beothuk Canoe, Approximate Form and Construction
The keel was then laid on the bed and a series of stakes, perhaps 4½ feet long, were
driven into the bed on each side of the piece in opposing pairs at intervals of perhaps 2
or 3 feet. The stakes and keel piece were then removed and the bark cover laid over
the bed. This may have been in two or three lengths, with the edges overlapped so that
the outside edge of the lap faced away from what was to be the stern. The keel was
then placed on the bark and weighted down with a few stones or lashed at the stem
heads to the end stakes; then the bark was folded up on each side of the keel, and the
stakes slipped back into their holes in the bed and driven solidly into place, perhaps
with the tops angled slightly outward. The heads were then tied together across the
work and battens placed along the stakes and the outside of the bark to form a
"trough" against which the cover could be held with horizontal inside battens. These
were secured by "inside stakes" lashed to each outside stake in the manner used in
building eastern Indian canoes (see p. 45). The bark cover now stood on the bed in a
sharp V form, with the keel supported on the bed, the ends of the bark supported by
the end stakes, and both held down by stones along the length of the keel. An
alternative would have been to fix heavy stakes at the extreme bow and stern of the

keel and to lash the stem-heads firmly to these in order to hold the keel down on the
bark.
Next the main gunwales, prebent to the required form, were brought to the building
bed and their ends temporarily lashed to stem and stern. The bark was brought up to
these, trimmed, folded over their tops, and secured by a few temporary lashings. Then
the outwales were placed outside the bark with their ends temporarily secured, and a
few pegs were driven through outwale, bark, and main gunwales, or a few permanent
lashings were passed. The bark cover was next securely lashed to the gunwales and
outwales combined, all along the sheer to a point near the ends. The excess bark was
then trimmed away at bow and stern and the cover was laced to the end pieces to form
bow and stern. This lacing must have passed through the laminations of the stem and
stern pieces in the usual manner, avoiding the spiral lashing that held the laminae
together. The ends of the gunwales and outwales were next permanently lashed
together with root or other material and to the stem and stern pieces. This done, the
gunwales were spread apart amidships, pressing the stakes outward still more at the
tops. At this point the tenons may have then been cut in the main gunwales and the
thwarts inserted. This method, incidentally, was used in building some western Indian
bark canoes.
The usual steps of completing a birch-bark canoe would then follow—the insertion of
sheathing, held in place by temporary ribs, and then the driving home of the prebent
ribs under the main gunwales, with their heads in the spaces between the group
lashings along the gunwales and against the lower outboard corner of the main
gunwale member, which was probably beveled as in the Malecite canoe. The
sheathing may have been in two or three lengths, except close to the gunwale
amidships where one length would serve. On each side of the keel piece a sheathing
strake was placed which was thick on the edge against the keel but thin along the
outboard edge, in order to fair the sheathing into the keel piece.
At some point in this process, the bark cover was pieced out to make the required
width, and gores were cut in the usual manner. In spreading the gunwales, the bow
and stern would have to be freed from any stakes, as these would tend to pull inboard
slightly as the gunwales were spread in the process of shaping the hull. The ribs could
have been put in while green and shaped in the bark cover by use of battens and cross
braces inside, as were those of the St. Francis canoes.
The sewing of the bark cover at panels and gores would take place before the
sheathing and ribs were placed, of course. A 15-foot canoe when completed would
have a girth amidships of about 65 to 68 inches if the beam at the gunwales were 48
inches, and a bark cover of this width could be taken from a tree of roughly 20 inches
in diameter. Hence, there may have been little piecing out of the bark for width. In the
form of the Beothuk canoe as reconstructed there is nothing that departs from what is
possible by the common Indian canoe-building techniques. The finished canoe would,

in all respects, agree with most of the descriptions that have been found and would be
a practical craft in all the conditions under which it would be employed.
These were the only birch-bark canoes supposed to have made long runs in the open
sea clear of the land. In them the Beothuk are supposed to have made voyages to the
outlying islands, in which runs in open water of upward of 60 miles would be
necessary, and they probably crossed from Newfoundland to Labrador.
The V-form used by the Beothuk canoe was the most extreme of all birch-bark canoe
models in North America, although, as has been mentioned, less extreme V-bottoms
were used elsewhere. The Beothuk canoe may have been a development of some more
ancient form of bark sea canoe also related to the V-bottom canoes of the
Passamaquoddy. The most marked structural characteristic of the Beothuk canoe was
the keel; the only other canoe in which a true keel was employed was the temporary
moosehide canoes of the Malecite.
The Beothuk keel piece may have sometimes been nearly round in section like the
keel of the Malecite moosehide canoe (p. 214). The two garboard strakes of the
sheathing may have been shaped in cross section to fair the bark cover from the thin
sheathing above to the thick keel and at the same time allow the ribs to hold the
garboards in place. They could, in fact, be easily made, since a radial split of a small
tree would produce clapboard-like cross sections. This construction would perhaps
comply better with Cartwright's description of the keel than that shown in the plan on
page 97.
The sheer of the Beothuk canoe is an exaggerated form of the gunwale shape of the
Micmac rough-water canoe but this, of course, is no real indication of any relationship
between the two. Indeed, the probable scarfing of the gunwales of the Beothuk canoe
might be taken as evidence against such a theory. On the other hand, the elm-bark and
other temporary canoes of the Malecite and Iroquois had crudely scarfed gunwale
members, as did some northwestern bark canoes.
Most of the building techniques employed by Indians throughout North America are
illustrated by these eastern bark canoes, yet marked variation in construction details
existed to the westward, as will be seen.

Chapter Five
CENTRAL CANADA
The Indians inhabiting central Canada were expert builders of birch-bark canoes and
produced many distinctive types. The area includes not only what are now the
Provinces of Quebec (including Labrador), Ontario, Manitoba, and the eastern part of
Saskatchewan, but also the neighboring northern portions of Michigan, Wisconsin and
Minnesota in the United States. The migrations of tribal groups within this large area
in historical times, as well as the influence of a long-established fur trade, have
produced many hybrid forms of bark canoes and, in at least a few instances, the
transfer of a canoe model from one tribal group to another. It is this that makes it
necessary to examine this area as a single geographic unit, although a wide variation
of tribal forms of bark canoes existed within its confines.
The larger portion of the Indians inhabiting this area were of the great Algonkian
family. In the east during the 18th and 19th centuries, however, some members of the
Iroquois Confederacy were also found, and in the west, from at least as early as the
beginning of the French fur trade, groups of Sioux, Dakota, Teton, and Assiniboin.
From the fur trade as well as from normal migratory movements there was much
intermingling of the various tribes, and it was long the practice in the fur trade,
particularly in the days of the Hudson's Bay Company, to employ eastern Indians as
canoemen and as canoe builders in the western areas. These apparently introduced
canoe models into sections where they were formerly unknown; as a result, the tribal
classification of bark canoes within the area under examination cannot be very precise
and the range of each form cannot be stated accurately. It was in this area, too, that the
historical canot du maître (also written maître canot), or great canoe, of the fur trade
was developed.
Most of central Canada, except toward the extreme north in Quebec and toward the
south below the Great Lakes, is in the area where the canoe birch was plentiful and of
large size. There the numerous inland waterways, the Great Lakes, and the coastal
waters of James and Hudson Bays make water travel convenient, and natural
conditions require a variety of canoe models. Hence, when Europeans first appeared
in this area they found already in existence a highly developed method of canoe
transportation. This they immediately adopted as their own, and in the long period
lasting until very recent times, during which the development of the northern portion
of this area was slow, the canoe remained the most important means of forest travel.
In the northeastern portion of the area, including the Province of Quebec (with
Labrador) from a line drawn from the head of James Bay eastwardly through Lake St.
John and the Saguenay River Valley to the St. Lawrence and thence northward to the

treeline in the sub-Arctic, dwelt the eastern branch of the far-ranging Cree tribe. Those
living on the shores of Hudson and James Bays, along the west side of the Labrador
Peninsula, were known as the Eastern, Swamp, or Muskeg Cree. To the north, at the
Head of Ungava Bay, around Fort Chimo, and to the immediate southward, were the
Nascapee, or Nascopie, supposedly related to the Eastern Cree. In southern Labrador
and in Quebec along the north shore of the Gulf of St. Lawrence and for some
distance inland, dwelt another related tribal group now known as the Montagnais.
Although the most recent canoe forms employed by these three Indian groups were
very much the same, this may not have been the case earlier. A common canoe model
in this area was the so-called "crooked canoe," in which there was a very marked fore-
and-aft rocker to the bottom without a corresponding amount of sheer; as a result the
canoe was much deeper amidships than near the ends. Another common model had a
rather straight bottom fore and aft, with some lift near the ends and a corresponding
amount of sheer. Between these was a hybrid which had some fore-and-aft rocker in
the bottom and a very moderate sheer. Not until the 1870's was any detailed
examination made of the canoes in this area; then it appeared that the crooked canoe
might be the tribal model of the eastern Cree only, while the Nascapee employed a
straight-bottom model, but it is possible that the examination was limited and that
Nascapee use of the crooked canoe was simply not observed. By 1900, however, the
crooked model was in use not only by the eastern Cree and the Nascapee but also by
the Montagnais.

Figure 88
Montagnais Crooked Canoe. (Canadian Geological Survey photo.)
In the area around Fort Chimo and at the northern ranges of the eastern Cree and of
the Montagnais the lack of good birch bark made it necessary to make up the bark
cover out of many small pieces. This not only was laborious but made a rough and
rather unsightly cover. Hence, some of the northern builders, particularly the
Nascapee, substituted spruce bark, which was available in quite large sheets. The use

of the spruce bark, however, did not cause any of these people to depart markedly
from the model or the method of constructing birch-bark canoes, as it did for the
Indians in the maritime area.
At the time (1908) when Adney was carefully observing the canoes in this area he
found that both crooked and straight-bottom canoes were being used by all three tribal
groups, but with a variation in midsection form among individual builders. Both types
were built with a midsection that had a wide bottom and vertical sides, or, as an
alternative, a narrow bottom and flaring sides. The end profile of all these canoes
showed chin. In some crooked canoes the profile was apparently an arc of a circle, but
in most canoes the form was an irregular curve. The stem met the gunwale in a
marked peak rounded very slightly at the head, as the result of the method by which
the stem was constructed, but in the hybrid model used by the Nascapee the ends were
low and not much peaked and the quick upward rise of the sheer near the ends was
lacking. In cross section all these canoes became V-shaped close to the ends,
regardless of the midsection form. For the straight-bottom canoe and in the hybrid
form this resulted in very sharp level lines, but the very great rocker of the crooked
canoe brought the ends well above the normal line of flotation, so that this type was
quite full-ended at the level line in spite of the V-section.
It is apparent upon examining the crooked canoe that there was actually less variation
in its form, in spite of differences in midsection shape, than in that of the straight-
bottom canoe, owing to its very great depth amidships in proportion to its width. This
proportion made necessary a very moderate flare in the narrow-bottom midsection and
resulted in a rather wall-sided appearance, even in this model. The hybrid form, which
fell between the extremes of the crooked canoe and the straight-bottom canoe, had a
narrow-bottomed flaring-sided midsection, and its relatively moderate depth made
obvious the flare in the topsides and thus created a distinctive model.

Figure 89
Birch-Bark Crooked Canoe, Ungava Cree. (Smithsonian Institution photo.)

Eastern Cree

The construction of canoes of the eastern Cree and related tribes seems generally like
that of the Micmac craft. Instead of the gunwale method employed in the Maritime
area, a building frame was used, and as a result the gunwales were longer than the
bottom. In constructing the crooked canoe, the building frame must be heavily
sheered, and there is evidence that the building bed was depressed amidships, rather
than raised as was usual in the east. The great amount of rocker in the bottom in this
form of Cree canoe made it necessary to block up the ends of the building frame to a
very great height, and there was no need to raise the building bed at midlength, since
the rocker extended the full length of the bottom. The bark cover had to be gored at
closely spaced intervals to allow the rocker to be formed, and even in the straight-
bottom model, the quick rise of the bottom near the ends required closely spaced gores
there. In the straight-bottom model, however, the building bed was raised at
midlength, as in eastern canoe-building, and the building frame was ballasted to a
cupid's-bow profile, when on the bed, so as to achieve the combination of straight
bottom amidships with sharply rising ends.
The gunwales were formed of the main gunwale member and a light gunwale cap, no
outwale being employed. They were joined at the ends and, after hot water had been
applied, were staked out with posts under the ends to obtain the required sheer. The
thwarts were then tenoned into the main gunwales, though occasionally a canoe was
built with "broken" gunwales, that is, the thwart-ends were let flush into the top and
covered by the caps. Some builders did not spread the gunwales and place the thwarts
until after the bark cover was lashed at the sheer; others used the eastern methods of
assembling the gunwale structure prior to securing the bark cover at sheer. The bark
cover was attached to the main gunwales with a continuous lashing, as in the Micmac
canoes, but the bark was not always brought over the top of the gunwales. As a result,
some canoes had a batten placed under the lashing, near the edge of the cover, to
prevent the lashing from tearing away. Due to the lack of good root material, the
lashing was often of rawhide. For all horizontal seams in the side panels of the bark
cover, rawhide sewing over a root batten was used. The ends of the gunwales were
supported by sprung headboards; in some canoes these were bellied toward the ends to
such a degree that they almost paralleled the end profiles.

Figure 90
Nascapee 3-Fathom Canoe, Eastern Labrador. Similar canoes, with slight
variations in model and dimensions, were used by all Ungava Indians: the
Montagnais and the Eastern, or Swamp, Crees.

Figure 91
Montagnais 2-Fathom Canoe of Southern Labrador and Quebec, showing old
decoration forms. Drawing based on small model of a narrow-bottom canoe built
for fast paddling.

Figure 92
Crooked Canoe, 2½-Fathom, of the Ungava Peninsula, used by the Ungava-Cree,
Montagnais, and Nascapee. Also built with a wide bottom and a slight tumble-
home in the topsides.

Figure 93
Hybrid Model of the Nascapee-Cree Canoe, 2-Fathom, built of spruce or birch
bark, with details of canoes and paddles.
The ends were formed by means of the same technique used for Micmac canoes; no
inside stem-piece was employed and the bark cover was stiffened by outside battens
covered by the lashing. In the Cree canoes, however, the stem battens were "broken"
sharply at the sheer to form a slightly rounded peak where the end met the gunwale
caps. The "break" in the battens was made by bending them very sharply, so that they
were almost fractured. The Cree practice also differed from that of the Micmac,
although not universally, by passing the lower end of the stem batten through the bark
cover at the point where the stem met the bottom. The slit thus made was sealed with
gum or, more recently, covered with cloth impregnated with gum. The stems were
lashed in various ways; the most common was a spiral form up to the sheer. Near the
gunwale caps crossed stitches or small, closely spaced wrappings were also employed.
The tops of the battens, forming the peak of the stem, were brought along under the
rail caps, in line with the gunwale lashings inboard, and secured with a continuous
lashing for about 6 inches. In the northern parts of the area under discussion the stem
lashing was often of rawhide.

Figure 94
Eastern Cree Crooked Canoe of rather moderate sheer and rocker. (Canadian
Pacific Railway Company photo.)
Gunwale caps were wider than the gunwales and thus gave some protection to the
lashing there. The ends of the gunwale caps were heavily tapered to allow the sharp
bends necessary to carry them out on the stems. They were pegged or nailed to the
gunwales, but at the ends were lashed; usually with two or three small group lashings
over and under the stem battens, below the caps.
The most recent canoes had canvas covers instead of bark. Nails, tacks, and twine for
sewing were used; otherwise they were built as the Indians built birch- and spruce-
bark craft, and not as white men built canvas canoes and boats.
The framework of the canoes was usually spruce or larch. Toward the south and along
the St. Lawrence some white cedar was used, and in the south maple was sometimes
used for thwarts. The ribs of the canoes inspected by Adney were usually about 3
inches wide, and a short taper brought them to about 2 inches at the ends, where they
were cut square across. They were spaced about 1 inch apart edge-to-edge amidships
and somewhat further apart toward the ends of the canoe. The canoes usually had an
odd number of ribs, as the first was placed under the thwart amidships. The last three
ribs at the ends were "broken" at the centerline to allow them to take the necessary V-
section there; but the fourth rib from each end was only sharply bent. In some canoes
the heel of the very narrow headboard was stepped on the sheathing against the

endmost rib, in others it was stepped, as in the Micmac canoes, on a frog which rested
against the endmost rib.

Figure 95
Straight and Crooked Canoes, Eastern Cree.
In more recent times the sheathing was laid in one of two ways, according to the
preference of the builder, but the existence of the two styles suggests that each was
once a tribal-group method. One method of shaping the bottom sheathing was to
employ a center, or keelson, piece in two lengths, the butts being overlapped
amidships, parallel-sided except toward the stems, where it was tapered to fit the V-
sections rather closely. The next strake outboard was short and was in the form of a
shallow triangle with its base along the middle portion of the first strakes and about
one-third the length of the bottom. Its apex was under the middle thwart. The next
strake outboard was in two lengths lapped amidships, parallel sided along the arms of
the triangular strake, and snied off at the ends to fit along the sides of the first strake.
Another strake outboard of this was similar in form and position, but longer. Thus
seven strake widths would complete the bottom sheathing. The side sheathing was
narrow and slightly tapered; each strake in two lengths overlapped slightly amidships.
The ends of the topside sheathing ran well into the ends, in most canoes, where they
apparently served as stiffening. The second method of sheathing employed parallel-
sided strakes throughout, laid side by side on the bottom, with the ends snied off to fit
the form of the bark bottom. The existence of a model canoe made about 1850 (see p.

91) supports the theory that the first method was originally the Montagnais tribal
construction and that the more primitive second method was probably Cree or
Nascapee.
The ribs were preformed and fitted to the canoe after drying out. They were bent to
the desired shape in pairs and tied with a thong across the ends to hold their shape
while drying. Some builders inserted a strut inside the bent ribs, parallel to the thong,
protecting the surface of the inner rib by a pad of bark placed under each end of the
strut. The pair of ribs might also be wrapped with a bark cord to help hold them
together. To aid in handling, one pair of ribs might be nested inside another. As in
eastern canoes the ribs under the gunwales were driven into place. At the ends they
were canted toward the center, so that in the straight-bottom models they stood nearly
perpendicular to the rocker of the bottom there; in the crooked canoe the ribs were all
somewhat canted in this manner.

Figure 96
Montagnais Canvas-Covered Crooked Canoe under construction. (Canadian
Geological Survey photo.)
The paddles used in this area were made with parallel-sided blades, the end of the
blade being almost circular. The handle might be fitted with a wide grip at the head or
it might be pole-ended. It is impossible to say how early sails were used to propel
canoes, but it is probable they were introduced by the fur traders. Square sails were
being used on the coastal canoes at the time the earliest reference was made to these
canoes, in the 1870's.
Little is known about the decorations employed by the eastern Cree. The Montagnais
birch-bark model canoe of about 1850 (see p. 91) has three small circles placed in a
triangular position on the bow and a band along the bottom of the side panels. The
circles and the bands are in red paint, but may have been intended to represent the

dark inner rind left after scraping the winter bark cover. The use of decoration in this
area after 1850 has not been noted in any available reference.
As a rule, the straight-bottom canoes were small, commonly between 12 and 18 feet
overall, and the most popular size was 14 to 16 feet overall. A canoe of this size was
usually employed as a hunters' canoe for forest travel, though it might be used
occasionally along the coasts. These canoes were light and, in this respect, resembled
the Micmac models shown in Chapter 4.
The original purpose of the crooked canoe is in question. Those travelers who saw this
canoe in use on the Hudson Bay side of the Labrador Peninsula believed that it was
designed for use in rough, exposed water. While it would be a desirable form for
beach work in surf, the high ends would make paddling against strong winds very
difficult. On the other hand the Montagnais used the crooked canoe for river
navigation, particularly where rapids were to be run, and for this work it appears to
have been well adapted. The crooked canoe was commonly built larger than the
straight-bottom model, between 16 and 20 feet in length overall, and was a vessel of
burden rather than a hunting canoe. Canoes up to 28 feet in length have been
mentioned by travelers in this area but investigation indicates strongly that these were
not the tribal form but the canot du nord, or north canoe of the Hudson's Bay
Company traders.
Along the southern borders of their territory and to the westward the eastern Cree
often built and used canoes modeled on those of their neighbors, the Têtes de Boule
and the Ojibway. Hence the tribal classification does not hold good in these localities.
Also, the eastern Cree were employed by the Hudson's Bay Company as builders of
forms of the maître canot and canot du nord that are unlike their typical tribal model.

Têtes de Boule

The Têtes de Boule, particularly the western bands, were skilled canoe builders and
had long been employed by the Hudson's Bay Company in the construction of large
fur-trade canoes. Apparently made up of bands of Indians inhabiting lower Quebec, in
the basin of the St. Maurice River and on the Height of Land, these bands had come
down to the lower Ottawa River to trade with the local Algonkin tribe there in early
times. They were known to the Algonkins, who had had some contact with
civilization, as "wild Indians." They also came into close trading relations with the
French colonists, as the Ottawa River was the early French canoe route between
Montreal and Lake Superior. Because they cut their hair short, unlike the other
Indians, these northern bands were nicknamed "Bull Heads," or "Round Heads," by
the French traders, and the tribesmen soon came to accept this rather than their own
designation of "White Fish People" as the tribal name. In more recent times, the name
has been applied to groups of Indians living in western Quebec Province, near Lake

Barrière and Grand Lake Victoria, but these do not consider themselves related to the
St. Maurice bands.
It seems apparent that the canoe models of all these groups had been altered as a result
of long contact with other tribal groups. Although the St. Maurice and the western
bands were apparently not of the same tribal stock, their relations with the Algonkin
may have brought about the use of a standard model by all.

Figure 97
Fiddlehead of Scraped Bark on bow and stern of a Montagnais birch-bark canoe
at Seven Islands, Que., 1915.

Figure 98
Disk of Colored Porcupine Quills decorating canoe found at Namaquagon, Que.,
1898. Within the 4-inch disk may have been an 8-pointed star.
The Têtes de Boule lived in an area where very superior materials for birch-bark
canoe construction were plentiful. This, with the need for canoes imposed by the
numerous waterways and the demand for canoes from white traders, made many of
the tribesmen expert builders. Their small canoes, ranging from the 8-to 12-foot
hunter's canoes to the 14-to 16-foot family canoes, were very similar in profile to the
canoes of the St. Francis Abnaki. The Têtes de Boule canoes, however, were
commonly narrower on the bottom, and in their construction a building frame was
always used. The Têtes de Boule model was straight along the bottom for better than
half the length and then rose rather quickly toward the ends. Similarly, the sheer was
moderate amidships and increased toward the ends. The stems showed a chin and

were much peaked at the gunwale ends. Most commonly the midsection had a flat
bottom athwartships and a well-rounded bilge, giving the topsides, near the gunwale,
a very slight outward flare. Some Têtes de Boule canoes had rather V-section ends in
which the endmost rib was "broken" at the centerline. As a result the lines were sharp
and the canoes paddled very easily.

Figure 99
A 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.)
For construction of the Têtes de Boule canoe, which was marked by good structural
design and neat workmanship, the building bed was slightly raised at midlength, as
was the general practice of the St. Francis builders. The building frame was usually
about 6 inches less in width amidships, inside to inside, than were the gunwales, and
from 15 to 18 inches shorter. The building frame was made quite sharp toward the
ends so that, viewed from above, it rather approached a diamond form; this produced
the very sharp lines that are to be seen in many examples of the Têtes de Boule
canoes. The building frame was of course removed from the canoe as soon as the
gunwales were in place and the bark cover lashed to them.
The gunwale structure, comprised of main gunwale members, caps, and outwales, was
the same as in the Malecite canoes. The main gunwales were rectangular in cross-
section, some being almost square, with the lower outboard corner bevelled off.
Compared to those of eastern canoes of equal length, the main gunwales were
unusually light; their depth and width rarely exceeded 1 inch, and in very small
hunter's canoes these were often only about ¾ inch. Toward the ends, they tapered to
½ inch, or even slightly less. The ends of the main gunwales, usually of the common
half-arrowhead form, were held together by rawhide or root thongs passed back and

forth through horizontal holes in the members. After being thus lashed together, they
were securely wrapped with thongs which usually went over gunwales and outwales
and through the bark cover.
The gunwale caps, also light, were usually between ¼ and ½ inch thick and from 1 to
1½ inches wide. At the ends they were tapered in width and thickness, often to 3⁄16 by
½ inch, so as to follow the quickly rising sheer there. The ends of the gunwales, caps,
and outwales required hot-water treatment to obtain the required curve of the sheer.
The caps were pegged to the gunwales and were secured at each end with two or three
groups of lashings which passed around the outwales as well, and through the bark
cover.
The outwales were likewise light battens between ¼ and ½ inch thick and from ¾ to
1¼ inches deep, the depth near the ends being tapered to ⅜ to ¾ inch so as to sheer
correctly.
The bark cover had four or five vertical gores on each side of the middle thwart, the
gore nearest each stem being commonly well inboard of the end thwarts. The side
panels were usually deep amidships and narrowed toward the ends. A root batten was
used under the stitching of the longitudinal seams of the side panels, which were sewn
with a harness-maker's stitch. The top edge of the bark cover was brought over the top
of the main gunwales, as in the Malecite canoes, and was secured by group wrappings
passing over the gunwales and outwales, under the caps. These groups were not
independent, the root thong being carried from group to group outside the bark in a
long pass under the outwales. The groups of seven to nine turns were roughly an inch
apart in many small canoes, and perhaps 1½ inches in the large craft. In the last birch-
bark canoes in which no nails or tacks were used, wrappings of root thongs began
with a stop knot, but this does not appear to have been the earlier practice.

Figure 100
Têtes de Boule Canoe.

The Têtes de Boule canoes had inside stem-pieces split, according to the size of the
canoe, in four to six laminations and lashed with a bark or root thong in an open spiral
in some canoes but close-wrapped in others. The stem-piece was as in the Malecite
canoes, except that it ended under the rail cap, and did not pass through it as in the
Eastern canoes; the heel was notched to receive the heel of the headboard. The bark
was usually lashed through the stem, as in the Malecite construction. However, in
some Têtes de Boule canoes, the stem close to the heel was not laminated and the bark
was lashed to the solid part by an in-and-out stitch passing through closely spaced
holes drilled in the stem piece. Above this, the lashing was the usual spiral which, in
at least a few instances, was passed through the bark just inboard of the stem piece.
Near the top of the stem the lashings sometimes were rather widely spaced and passed
inboard of the stem-pieces; at other times, however, these lashings were more closely
spaced and passed through the stem.
Ordinarily, at the ends of the canoe no wulegessis, or covers of bark, were used under
the gunwale caps, although in one example examined a small cover had been inserted
over the gunwale ends and under the caps, it did not extend below the outwales to
form a wulegessis. In some canoes the bark cover was pieced up at the peak of the
stems by a panel whose bottom faired into the bottom of the side panels.
A variety of methods was used to fit the gunwale caps at the ends of the canoe. Some
builders carried the cap out beyond the gunwale ends, flat, over the edges of the bark
cover and the top face of the outwale, but others tilted the cap outboard and
downward. The ends of the caps came flush with the face of the stems. In an
apparently late variation, the gunwales, instead of ending in the half-arrowhead, were
snied off the inside and a triangular block was inserted between the ends. The
gunwales were then pegged or nailed to the block and the whole secured with a root
wrapping around them, before the outwales were in place. The first turn began by
passing the root through a hole in the block near its inboard end, with a stop knot in
the root.
The ends of the gunwales were supported by a narrow headboard sharply bellied
toward the end of the canoe. The top of the headboard was notched to stand under the
main gunwales; the center portion often was carried high and ended with a cylindrical
top that was slightly swelled like the handle of a gouge or chisel. The heel was
sometimes held in the stem-piece notch with a root lashing.

Figure 101
Têtes de Boule Canoes.
The thwarts, spaced equal distances apart, were tenoned into the gunwales as in the
old Malecite canoes, and were secured with a peg and lashing through the two holes in
the thwart ends. The middle thwart was usually formed with a shoulder, viewed in
plan, that started 6 or 7 inches inboard of the inside face of the main gunwale. In form,
this thwart usually swelled outward in a straight line from the tenon shoulder, then
reduced in a curved line to about the width of the tenon tongue and, finally, increased
again in a right-angle cut to the greatest width. From here it was reduced again in a
long curve to the canoe's center line. The other thwarts usually had simple ends, wide
at the tenon shoulder and reduced in a long curve to a narrow center. In elevation, all
the thwarts were thin outboard and thick at the centerline of the canoe. The cross
section of the center thwart at the centerline was square or nearly so, the first thwart
on each side was rectangular in cross section at the center, and the end thwarts were
similar, but very thin.
The sheathing of the Têtes de Boule canoes was thin, particularly at the ends of the
strakes. The bottom was laid with a parallel-sided center strake going in first. This
strake was in two lengths in a small canoe and three lengths in a large, the butts
overlapping slightly. The rest of the strakes in the bottom were tapered toward the
ends of the canoe. At the extremities of the canoe, the narrow ends of the strakes were
very thin and overlapped along their edges, the bottom sheathing, when in place, thus
following the diamond form of the building frame. The topside sheathing was laid up
in short lengths with overlapping butts and edges in an irregular plan, those strakes
along the bilges being longer than above. Toward the ends of the canoe these strakes
were slightly tapered and the edges were very thin. The sheathing ended irregularly,
outboard of the headboards, in narrow butts as in most eastern canoes.

Figure 102
Têtes de Boule Hunting Canoe, 1½-Fathom, with typical construction details and
a paddle.

Figure 103
Têtes de Boule Canoe, 2½-Fathom, with some construction details.
The ribs, like the rest of the structure, were very light, usually ¼ to ⅜ inch thick and
from about 1¼ to 1¾ inches wide, depending upon the size of the canoe. A few
examples had ribs 2 inches wide, and still fewer had ribs up to 2½ inches wide. The
spacing was usually close, somewhat more than an inch edge to edge amidships and a
little more between the end thwarts and the headboards. The spacing amidships would
average perhaps 3¼ inches, center to center. The ends of the ribs, in the last 2 or 3
inches, were reduced in width very sharply in a hollow, curved taper to ½ to ¾ inch
wide, and were usually beveled on the inside edge. The thickness was also reduced by
a cut on the inside, so that the ends were chisel-pointed with a short bevel on the
inboard side. The rib ends were forced between the main gunwales and the bark cover,
coming home in the bevel of the lower outboard edge of the main gunwales between
the group lashings of the bark cover as in the Malecite canoes. The ribs were not
prebent but were placed in the canoe when green, treated with hot water, and then
allowed to dry into place. In preparing the rib, it was first bent over the knee. It was
the custom of some builders to place under the building frame the ribs that were to go
near the ends of the canoe, and to mark the point where they would be bent.
Sometimes the endmost ribs that were to be "broken" at the centerline to form the V-
section were split edgewise. A piece of the inner lamina was then cut out to one side
of the center so that the inner laminae would lie flat against each other, and to prevent

the inner half from buckling the rib was wrapped with a thong to one side of the
"break."

Figure 104
Têtes de Boule Hunting Canoe, 2-Fathom, with wide bottom, showing structural
details.
It does not appear to have been the common practice of the Têtes de Boule to decorate
their small canoes, though when building for white men they would decorate if the
buyer requested it.
The paddles used by the Têtes de Boule were somewhat like those of the eastern Cree
but the blade was slightly wider near the tip than near the handle. The top grip was
formed wide and thin, the taper from the lower grip to the upper one often being very
long. The paddles were usually of white birch, but maple was used in a few of the
examples examined.
The gunwales, outwales, and caps of the Têtes de Boule canoes were usually of
spruce; the ribs and stem pieces, white cedar; the thwarts, white birch; the headboards,
white cedar in all but one of the canoes inspected (in this, birch had been used). Jack
pine was used also for thwarts, and cedar was sometimes used for the gunwale
members; as would be expected, the builders used the materials that were at hand near
the building sites.

Têtes de Boule fur-trade canoes, like those of the eastern Cree, appear to have had no
relationship to the smaller tribal types, since they were constructed under supervision
of white men. They will be discussed as a group on page 135.

Algonkin

The Algonkins were a tribe residing on the Ottawa River and its tributaries, in what
are now the provinces of Quebec and Ontario, when the French first met them. They
appear to have been a large and powerful tribe and were apparently competent
builders and users of birch-bark canoes. They were not the same tribe as the Ottawa,
who controlled the Lake Huron end of the canoe route between Montreal and Lake
Superior, by way of the Ottawa River. These Ottawa were related to the Ojibway tribe
and received their name from the French, who gave the name Outaouais, or
"Ottaway," to all Indians, except the Hurons, who came from the west by way of the
Ottawa. The Algonkins, because of their location, were much influenced by the
French fur trade. Early in the 18th century they intermingled with certain Iroquois
whom they allowed to settle with them, near Montreal, at the Lake of Two Mountains,
later Oka. Thence they gradually spread out and lost tribal unity, until only small
groups were left. These lived on the Golden Lake Algonkin Reserve, Bonshere River,
Ontario; at Oka, Quebec; and elsewhere in western Quebec and eastern Ontario. It is
possible that they were the first to build fur-trade canoes for the French, but evidence
to support such a claim with any certainty is lacking.
Due to intermixing with other tribal groups and to the influence of the fur trade, in
which they were long employed as canoe men and builders, the Algonkins no longer
used a single tribal model of canoe. However, one of their models, which had high
ends resembling those of the large fur-trade canoe, may have been the tribal type from
which the fur-trade canoe was developed, as will be seen.

Figure 105

Old Algonkin Canoe.
The high-ended model, the oldest form known to have been used by this tribe, was
narrow-bottomed, with flaring sides. The canoes seen were built with careful
workmanship and in the old manner, without iron fastenings. They were light and
easily paddled, yet would carry a heavy load. The ends were sharp at the line of
flotation. The bottom was straight to a point near the ends, where it lifted somewhat.
The sheer was rather straight over the middle portion of the canoe, then lifted slightly
until close to the stem, where it rose sharply, becoming almost perpendicular at the
ends of the rail caps. The midsection was slightly rounded across the bottom, with a
well-rounded bilge and a gently flaring topside. The cross-section became V-shaped
close to the headboards. The most marked feature in the appearance of this canoe was
the profile of the ends. The stem line, beginning with a slight angle where it joined the
bottom, bent outward in a gentle curve, reaching the perpendicular at a point a little
more than half the height of the end, and from there it tumbled home slightly. In most
of the canoes examined the top of the stem then rounded inboard in a quick, hard
curve, usually almost half a circle, so that the stem was turned downward as it joined
the outwale and gunwale cap. In a variation of this stem form, the top of the stem was
cut off almost square, forming a straight line that ran parallel to the rise of the bottom
below the stems to the point where it would meet the upturned outwale and cap. The
ends of the outwales and caps were thus 3 or 4 inches inboard of the extremities. This
form of stem, particularly when to top was rounded in a half-circle, approached the
basic form of the ends of the fur-trade canoe.

Figure 106
Old Model, Ottawa River, Algonkin Canoe, combining capacity with easy
paddling qualities.
All the examples of this form of canoe that were examined were small, from 14 to a
little over 16 feet in length overall, but this is not proof that larger canoes of this type
had not existed earlier.
The later and more common form of Algonkin canoe was the wabinaki chiman. A
corruption of Abnaki, wabinaki to the later Algonkin meant the Malecite as well as the
St. Francis Indians. The wabinaki chiman was built in lengths from 12 to 18 feet.
Iroquois living in the Algonkin territory during the period built this form of canoe as
well as the older, high-ended form. The wabinaki chiman was very much like the St.
Francis and Malecite canoes in appearance, but it was not an exact copy. The
Algonkin version was commonly a narrow-bottom canoe with flaring topsides. There
was some variation in the end profiles; most had the rather high, peaked ends of the
St. Francis canoe. The sheer was rather straight until near the end, where it rose
rapidly to the stem. The stem was rounded and was faired into the bottom. The top of
the stem was often rather straight and tumbled home slightly, but on some it raked
outward, much as did the stem of some Malecite canoes.

Another form of Algonkin canoe had a low sheer with only a slight lift toward the
ends. In this canoe the stem might have a short, hard curve at the heel and an upper
portion that was quite straight and slightly tumbled home; or the full height might be
well rounded, with a slight tumble-home near the stem head.
In appearance these canoes were very like the straight-stem Malecite models. The
wabinaki chiman was unquestionably copied from the eastern canoes that came into
popularity among the Algonkin late in the 19th century, when white sportsmen were
demanding canoes of the St. Francis and Malecite models. However, the Algonkin
canoes differed somewhat from the eastern canoes not only in model but also in
methods of construction.

Figure 107
Algonkin and Ojibway Stem-Pieces, models of old forms made by Adney: 1, 2, 3,
Ojibway; 4, 5, 6, 7, Algonkin.
Algonkins used the same construction methods in both their canoe models, though the
framework was not alike in all respects. The building frame was always used. For a 2-
or 2½-fathom canoe this was made of two strips of cedar, 1½ inches wide and ¾ inch
deep, that were bent edgewise, notched, and tied together at the ends with thongs of
the inner bark of the basswood. These strips were held apart in the required shape by
cedar crosspieces 1 inch wide and 1¾ inches deep, with the ends notched ¾ inch deep
(the depth of the longitudinals) and the tops well rounded. The crosspieces, five in all,
were fastened to the longitudinals with thongs passing through holes in the ends. The
middle one was about 19½ inches between the inside faces of the longitudinals, those
on each side of it were about 15½ inches long by similar measure, and the end ones
were nearly 6 inches long and were located a foot or so from the extremities of the
longitudinals. The outside width of the building frame amidships would thus be about
22½ or 23 inches.

Figure 108
Light, Fast 2-Fathom Hunting Canoe of the old Algonkin model.
The building bed was level, with a 6-inch-wide board, some 6 to 8 feet in length, sunk
into the earth flush with the surface to insure a true line for the bottom. The outside
stakes were of the usual sort described in building the Malecite canoe (pp. 40-41). The
wedge-shaped inside stakes, or clamp pieces, were 1½ inches wide, 1 inch thick, and

20 to 25 inches long. The posts for setting the height of the gunwales at the ends and
at the crosspieces were not cut off square at the top as for the Malecite canoe, but
were notched on the outside to take the gunwales. The heights of the posts were
graduated, of course, to form the required sheer in the gunwales. Like the canoes of
the Têtes de Boule, these of the Algonkin were generally less deep amidships than the
general run of eastern canoes.
Building procedure was as follows: The gunwales were made, bent, and the ends
fastened, but instead of being mortised and fitted with thwarts, they were spread by
temporary crosspieces, or "spalls," made of a splint, or plank-on-edge, with the lower
edge notched in two places to take the gunwale members. Sometimes the spalls were
lashed, pegged or nailed to the gunwales as well. The stakes were set along the
building frame and these were generally driven sloping, so that their heads stood
outboard of the points. They were then pulled and laid aside, the building frame was
removed, and the bark cover placed on the building bed. After the building frame has
been reset in its original position and the bark cover turned up along the sides, the
stakes were again driven in their holes. The cover was then pieced out with side
panels as necessary and gored, and longitudinal strips of wood were set in place by
means of the clamp pieces, about as in Malecite construction. The gunwales were then
placed on the posts, which had been set to the required sheer, and the bark trimmed
and fitted to them. The old method was to lash the bark to the main gunwale members
and to peg on the outwales at intervals of about a foot. In earlier times most builders
inserted along the gunwales an extra reinforcing strip of bark extending a little below
the outwales, as in the St. Francis canoes, but in the nailed-and-tacked bark canoes
built during the decadent period this was sometimes omitted.

Figure 109
Hybrid Algonkin Canoes: Eastern 2½ fathom (above) and northeastern 2-fathom
adaptation, with sketches of stems used in each.
Mortises for the thwarts were next cut and the middle thwart was forced into place,
after the spall there had been removed. This required that the gunwales be spread
slightly, thus increasing the amount of sheer somewhat. Much judgment was needed
to do this correctly. The increase in the sheer lifted the ends slightly and put some
rocker in the bottom toward the ends. The building frame was lifted out before the rest
of the thwarts were placed; usually it was taken apart in the process. In forming the
ends of the bark cover, the two sides were held together by a clothespin-like device
made of two short, flat sticks lashed together.
Increasing the beam at the gunwales by fitting the thwarts after the bark cover had
been secured to the gunwales not only increased the sheer but decreased the depth of
the canoe amidships as established by the posts placed under the gunwales in setting
up. In order to retain the required sheer and the desired depth of side, the gunwales
had been sheered up at the ends while being shaped, and had also been treated with
hot water and hogged upward amidships by being staked out to dry into shape. The
spreading of the gunwales tended to lift the ends of the bottom line, a condition that
was controlled in two ways: the usual one apparently was to employ, in combination
with a level bed, a building frame slightly wider than was desired for the finished
bottom; the second way was to follow Malecite procedure and elevate slightly the

middle of the building bed while employing a building frame the width of the finished
bottom. The Algonkin procedure of spreading the gunwales during construction was
that employed in the northwest and in the building of the fur-trade canoes, as will be
seen. The amount of spread to be given the gunwales also affected the angle, or slope,
at which the side stakes were driven on the building bed. Even so, some builders who
spread the gunwales a good deal would set the stakes almost vertically, instead of at a
slant, as this made sewing the side panels easier, particularly in large canoes and in
canoes whose covers were made up of a large number of small pieces of bark.

Figure 110
Algonkin, 2-Fathom Hunter's Canoe, without headboards. Details of building
frame, stakes or posts, gauge, and stem.
The gunwales of the Algonkin canoes were made up of three members—main
gunwales, outwales, and caps. The main gunwales, usually of cedar, were rectangular
in cross section and bent on the flat. The lower outboard corner was bevelled off to
take the rib ends, as in the Malecite canoes. The gunwales were rather light ranging in
the examples found from about 1 inch square to 1 by 1⅝ inches, the ends being
tapered to a lesser size. The outwales were light battens, rectangular in cross-section,
about as deep as the main gunwales and about two-thirds their thickness or less; they
tapered in depth toward the ends to ⅜ or ½ inch in order to follow the sheer, while the
thickness might be constant or only slightly reduced. The caps, which were pegged to
the gunwales, were also light and were about equal to the combined width of the main

gunwales and outwales and had a depth of about ⅜ to ½ inch amidships. At the ends
they were tapered in both width and depth, becoming ½ inch wide and ⅜ inch deep.
The amount of taper in the ends of the gunwale members depended upon the form of
sheer; the Algonkin practice in the old form of canoe was to sheer the outwales and
caps to the top of the stem, while the gunwales sheered less and met the sides of the
stem piece at a lower point, as in the drawing (p. 116). In the wabinaki chiman,
however, the gunwales and other members, as a rule, all followed the sheer of the ends
of the canoe.

Figure 111
Algonkin Canoe, Old Type.
The Algonkins used inside stem-pieces in both models, but the stem-piece of the old
high-ended canoe was quite different from that of the wabinaki chiman, for it was
built to give a profile in which the top of the high stem ended in a line straight across
to the sheer. The piece consisted of a crooked stick, without lamination, worked out of
a thin board, ⅜ to ½ inch thick. It was shaped to the desired profile inside and out, and
was slightly sharpened, or sometimes rabbeted and sharpened, toward the outboard
face. The headboard was mounted on this stem-piece by means of the usual notch but
was not bellied; instead it stood approximately vertical and a short strut was tenoned
into both the headboard and the inside face of the stem at a point about half the height
of the stem. Sometimes two struts were used, side by side, with the outboard ends
lashed at the sides of the stem. Thus the stem-pieces and headboards were placed as a
single unit, not independently as in eastern canoes. The gunwale ends were lashed to
the sides of the stem-piece, between the strut and the stem-head, at a height
determined by the sheering of the main gunwale members. The outwales and caps did
not touch the stem-piece, ending with a nearly vertical upward sweep, a few inches
inboard. The ends of the outwales and caps were always higher than the top of the
stem-piece so that, when the canoe was turned upside down, the bark cover over the
stem-head was kept off the ground and thus preserved from damage. The top of the
stem-piece was held rigid not only by the strut to the headboard but also by the ends
of the main gunwale members lashed to it a little higher up. The headboard was in the
form of a rounded V that was widest at midheight, at the gunwales, which were let
into its sides.

When the stem-head was rounded in the style of the fur-trade canoe, the stem-piece
except near the heel was split into very thin laminations about 1⁄16 inch, or a little
more, thick. The carefully selected cedar of which these were made was treated with
boiling water, then bent to profile; the head was sharply bent over and down, inside
the stem, then sharply up again so the end stood at about right angles to the face of the
stem at midheight. The headboard was mounted as previously described, except that
the end of the stem-piece was inserted into a hole in the headboard just above the
strut. The laminations of the stem-piece were wrapped in the normal manner and the
lashing was often brought around the strut as well, up against the outboard face of the
headboard. The whole structure was thus made rigid and very strong. As in the other
form, the main gunwale members did not follow the sheer near the ends of canoe but
were secured at a point lower down on the sides of the stem-piece. In the round-head
form, however, the outwale and cap ends were fastened on the after face of the stem-
head where the laminations were curved downward as illustrated in the drawing (p.
116).
The headboards for both models were thicker than those in the eastern canoes; this
aided in holding the stem line in form. Tension on the bark cover was obtained by
making the cover V-formed toward the ends and then spreading the sides of the V
with the headboard, thus bringing pressure on the strakes of the sheathing and forcing
the sides outward in a slight curve.
The stem-pieces of the wabinaki chiman were either cut out of a thin board or
laminated. In the straight-stem form, only the forefoot part was laminated, and no
headboard was used. Ordinarily, however, the rigid headboard with a single strut was
used. The head of the stem-piece was carried through the rail caps and showed above
them; the ends of the caps and main gunwales were notched to permit this, but neither
these nor the cap extended outboard of the face of the stem.

Figure 112
Algonkin "Wabinaki Chiman."
The bark cover was lashed to the gunwales with group lashings in which the thong
was carried from group to group by a long stitch outside the cover, under the outwale.
The turns in each group were passed through five or six holes in the cover and
reinforcing piece, two turns of the thong going through each hole. The connecting
stitch between groups, which were usually about 1½ inches apart, usually passed from
the last hole in a group to the second hole in the next. Some builders laid a wooden
measuring stick along the gunwales to space the lashings; this was perhaps the
practice of many tribal groups.
The lashing of the ends of the cover was passed through the stem pieces; when the
latter were not laminated, holes through the soft, thin cedar were made by a sharp awl
and an in-and-out or harness stitch was quite commonly used. On laminated stem
pieces the form of lashing varied; in the wabinaki chiman it was commonly some
combination of spiral and crossed turns; in the old form of high-ended canoe multiple
turns through a single hole (usually at the top of the stem-head) were also used in
combination with closely spaced long-and-short turns in triangular groups near the top
of the stem profile. Below, in the forefoot, spiral or crossed stitches were used. The
ends of the outwales were lashed together with a close wrapping of turns in contact
where they turned upward sharply, and the caps were secured there by two or more
group lashings. The head of the headboard was lashed to each gunwale by passing the
thong through holes each side of the headboard; these lashings were in a long group
and were passed around gunwale and outwale before the caps were in place. With

plank stem-pieces the ends of the bark cover were slightly inboard of the cutwater
line, sometimes protected by a rabbet.
The side panels were sewn on with in-and-out stitches, back stitches, or a double line
of either. The gores were sewn spirally in the usual manner or were stitched with a
closely spaced lacing.
Some of the old Algonkin canoes examined had what appeared to be a wulegessis just
outboard of the headboards. No marking was found on these and they were too far aft
to protect the ends of the gunwales. The bark was carried across the gunwales, under
the caps, and hung down a little below the outwales. On top, it reached from the
headboard out to the lashings of the outwales, forming between the headboards and
the lashings a short deck that may have been intended to keep dirt and water out of the
ends of the canoe. Sometimes a modern wabinaki chiman has a wulegessis, copying
the Eastern practice but without markings.

Figure 113
Algonkin Canoe Decorations by Tommy Sersin (or Serzia), Golden Lake,
Ont., showing four sides of stems of one canoe. Indian shown has the eastern
headdress rather than that of the Plains Indian. Moose, bear, beaver, and
goose are shown. (Sketches by Adney.)
The thwarts were of various designs; a common one had parallel sides in plan. The old
canoes had thwarts much like those of the Têtes de Boule. The end lashings of these
were usually passed through three holes in the thwart ends, but some had only two
holes.

Sheathing was laid somewhat as in the Têtes-de-Boule canoe, with overlapping edges
and butts. The end sheathing was short and was laid first; the centerline strake was
parallel-sided to a point near the sharp end of the canoe. The strakes on each side of it
were tapered and were laid with their wide ends toward the middle of the canoe and
with the sides and narrow end lapped. In the middle of the canoe the strakes were
parallel-sided and their butts were on top of those of the strakes in the end of the
canoe. The sheathing was carried up to within about three inches of the gunwales. The
edges were not thinned or feathered as much as were those in the Têtes de Boule
canoe.
Ribs were of cedar from 2 to 3 inches wide, closely spaced and, as usual, without
taper until near the ends, which were formed with a narrow chisel edge as in the
Têtes-de-Boule canoe. The ribs were first roughly bent, using the building frame as a
general guide for length, in order to obtain a somewhat dish-shaped cross section; by
this means the width of the bottom could be established to the builder's satisfaction.
The foregoing description of building methods and construction is based largely upon
what is known of the old canoes. In later times the Algonkin copied the eastern canoes
and their procedure altered. Not only did they copy extensively the appearance of the
St. Francis and Malecite canoes, but they built some canoes much like those of the
Têtes de Boule and Ojibway. As a result, it has become difficult to determine what
their tribal practices were.
Their paddles were of the same design as those of the Têtes de Boule, round-pointed
and with the blade parallel-sided for most of its length. In portaging, the Algonkin,
like many forest Indians, placed a pair of paddles a foot or so apart fore-and-aft over
the middle thwart and those on each side of it. These were lashed in place with the
ends of a band of hide or the inner bark of a tree like the basswood or elm. This band
had been first passed around the ends of the middle thwart, outside the shoulders, and
hitched with ends long enough to secure the paddles in place. The shoulder on the
middle, thwart, a few inches inside the gunwales, was placed there for just this
purpose, not as a mere decoration, so that the line could not slide in along the thwart.
The canoe was then lifted and turned over by raising one end, or by lifting the whole
canoe, and was placed on the carrier's shoulders, so that the paddle handles were on
his shoulders. This brought the middle thwart to just behind the carrier's head. The
loop of the bark or hide cord was then placed around the forehead of the carrier in
order to keep the canoe from slipping backward. In this fashion one man could carry a
canoe for miles if the canoe were small—and all woods, or portage, canoes were small
and light. The headband was known to white men as a "tump line." The Indians used it
to carry not only canoes but other heavy or awkward loads (see p. 25).
There is no certainty about the decorations of Algonkin canoes. Some of the older
Indians claimed that the old form of canoe was often decorated with figures formed by
scraping the winter bark; usually these depicted the game the owner hunted. Five-

pointed stars, fish, and circular forms are known to have been used on the wabinaki
chiman, but it is not known whether these were really Algonkin decorations or merely
something that had been copied "because it looked good."
The Algonkin called the large fur canoes nabiska, a name which the Têtes de Boule
rendered as rabeska. The word may be a corruption of the Cree word for "strong." At
any rate, the name rabeska (sometimes pronounced ra-bas-ha), rather than the French
maître canot, was long applied by white men in the fur trade to the large canoes built
in the Ottawa River Valley for their business. In late years the rabeska was a "large"
2½-fathom high-ended birch-bark canoe, but originally it meant a fur-trade canoe,
with the characteristic ends, of from 3 fathoms upward in length.

Ojibway

The Indian bands that were called "Outaouais" by the early French do not appear to
have been an independent tribe, as has been mentioned, but were largely made up of
Ojibway from the Great Lakes region. Perhaps some Têtes de Boule were among
these bands before these people were given their nickname. The Ojibway were a
powerful tribal group, made up of far-ranging bands, located all around Lake Superior
and to the northwest as far as Lake Winnipeg. They had been in the process of taking
over the western end of Lake Superior when the earliest French explorers reached that
area; they pushed the Sioux from these forest lands into the plains area, joining with
the western Cree in this movement. In the process they seem to have absorbed both
some Sioux and some Cree bands. Within the Ojibway tribal group, later called
Chippewa or Chippeway by the English and Americans, the bands had local names, or
were given nicknames, such as the Menominee, Saltreaux, Pillagers, etc. All the
important bands within the tribal group were expert canoemen and builders. As far as
can be discovered now, the Ojibway added to their own tribal types the models of
canoes they encountered in their expansion westward. It has long been true that the
Ojibway canoe can be one of at least three forms, depending upon which area of their
territory is being discussed.
What is believed to be their old tribal form was a high-ended canoe in all respects
very much like the high-ended Algonkin type. This was the model used by the Lake
Nipigon Ojibway, north of Lake Superior in Ontario, and by those of the same tribe
that once lived near Saginaw, Michigan, as well as by the Menominee of Wisconsin.
At the late period, from the middle of the 19th century onward, for which information
was available or in which investigation was possible, it appears that the Ojibway
canoes of this high-ended model were built in larger sizes than contemporary
Algonkin canoes of like design. The Ojibway canoes had the same end structure as
these; the early examples found had "chin" in the end profiles and the tumble-home of
the stem was straight, or nearly so, between the large curve of the forefoot and the
very short hard curve at the stem head. The Ojibway used the same inner stem-piece,

laminated and brought downward abaft the stem-head and then inboard so that the end
fitted into a slot in the headboard a little above its midheight, at which point was fitted
a strut from the headboard to the back of the stem-piece. The midsection of the
Ojibway canoe was very much like that of the Algonkin; it had a narrow bottom
somewhat rounded athwartships, a well-rounded bilge, and flaring topsides.
A small Ojibway portage canoe built in the middle of the 19th century had an end
profile somewhat different from that described above; the ends were well rounded and
had a heavy chin, the stem was carried into the tumble-home with a full rounded curve
all the way to the stem-head, where the stem piece was bent in and downward very
sharply and then inboard sharply again, so that the end pierced the vertical headboard
at sheer height. The S-curve was so located that the main gunwales could be lashed to
the stem piece at the point where they paralleled it well below the stem head. In these
canoes the Ojibway followed Algonkin practice in ending the gunwales; there was,
therefore, no strut. Where this canoe was built is uncertain.

Figure 114
Ojibway 2-Fathom Hunter's Canoe, used by the eastern tribal groups. Probably
the ancient model.

Figure 115
Examples of the Old Model Ojibway 3-Fathom rice-harvesting canoe (above),
and 2-fathom hunter's canoe, showing the easy paddling form used.

Figure 116
Ojibway 3-Fathom Freight Canoe From Lake Timagami, apparently a hybrid
based on canvas canoes.

Figure 117
The Old Form of Ojibway 2½-Fathom Canoe of the eastern groups (above), and
the long-nose Cree-Ojibway canoe of the western groups.
At Lake Timagami, north of Georgian Bay in Ontario, the Ojibway used a low-ended
canoe with a remarkably straight tumble-home stem profile; the forefoot had a very
short radius ending at the bottom line with a knuckle, and the stem-head stood slightly
above the gunwale caps. The stem-piece was made from a thin plank cut to profile;
thus no lamination was necessary. The headboard stood straight, falling inboard
slightly at the head. The midsection was dish-shaped, with a flat bottom athwartships
and strongly flaring sides, the turn of the bilge being rather abrupt. The ends were
strongly V-shaped in cross-section; a number of the frames there being "broken" at the
centerline of the bottom. A canoe of this design was seen by Adney at North Bay,
Ontario, in 1925, indicating that the design may have been used in some degree
outside the Lake area in later years.
The most common Ojibway model used to the northwest and west of Lake Superior
was the so-called "long-nose" form, a rather straight-sheered canoe. The bottom, near
the ends, had a slight rocker, and the sheer turned up very sharply there, becoming
almost perpendicular at the extremities, yet the ends were not proportionally very
high. The end-profile came up from the bottom very full and round, then fell sharply
inboard in a slightly rounded sweep to join the upturned sheer well inboard. The
midsection was somewhat dish-shaped, but with well-rounded bilges, so that the flare
of the topsides was rounded and not very apparent to the casual observer. The end
section developed into a tumble-home form, so that a section through the top of the
headboard was rather oval. As a result, these canoes appeared rather clumsy and unfair
in their lines, but this apparently did not harm their paddling qualities or
seaworthiness.

Figure 118
Eastern Ojibway Canoe, Old Form. (Canadian Pacific Railway photo.)

Figure 119
Ojibway Long-Nose Canoe, Rainy Lake District.

These canoes had narrow headboards that were sharply bellied, somewhat like those
in the crooked canoes, and the belly was sufficient to allow the heel of the end-board
to pass under the bottom sheathing and inside the bark cover so that two end ribs
served to hold the heel in place. The inside stem-piece was often no more than a light
stick or rod bent to profile, with the head split and brought over the gunwale ends and
down inside, between them. Each half of the split was then lashed to its neighboring
gunwale member. A strip of bark was often placed over the end of the bark cover and
carried down the face of the stem, under the sewing. The rail caps were then brought
up over the tops of the gunwales and overlapped the top portion of the stem piece. The
heel of the stem-piece was bevelled off on the inboard side so that it could be wedged
under the headboard, inside the bark cover. These headboards, it should be noted,
were no more than a thin, narrow batten, and in some canoes the head of this batten
was lashed under the gunwale ends instead of coming up between them inboard, as
usual. A variation in the fitting of the stem head was found in a canoe at Long Lake,
Ontario; the stem head, instead of being split, was lashed between the gunwale ends
and thus was brought inboard level with the top of the gunwales.

Figure 120
Small Ojibway Canoes of the Two Tribal Forms showing (above) early trend
toward the long nose form, and the final Ojibway-Cree hybrid form combining
flaring sides amidships with tumble-home sections at ends.

The cross section of the main gunwales was round or nearly so in nearly all long-nose
canoes, and often a gunwale cap was fitted. The bark cover was secured to the
gunwales by a continuous lashing, but in at least one example, from Minnesota, the
gunwale wrappings were in groups over an outwale after the regular fashion to the
eastward. The ends of the thwarts were wedge-or chisel-shaped and instead of being
tenoned were forced into splits in the round gunwales. Many canoes had bark covers
at the gunwale ends and vestiges of the wulegessis were to be seen.
All Ojibway canoes were built with a building frame, the bed being slightly higher at
midlength than at the ends. The stakes were driven nearly perpendicular, instead of
with heads slanted outward. It is apparent from observed examples that some canoes
were built by the same procedure as the Algonkin, but that not all the long-nose
canoes were built by spreading the gunwales; some were built using the methods of
the St. Francis.
Figure 121
Ojibway Canoe Building, Lac Seul, 1918.
(See pp. 170-171 for more photos of Ojibway canoe building.)

Preparing a building site or bed; building frame in place.

Bark set up; bark staked out on building bed.

Bark cover being sewn on building bed.

Gunwales being lashed.

Securing gunwales.

Pitch being applied to seams.

Figure 122
Long Lake Ojibway Long-Nose Canoe. (Canadian Geological Survey photo.)
The lashing in the high-ended Ojibway canoes was about the same as that in the
Algonkin canoes, but in the long-nose type the workmanship was often coarse. On
many of the latter the stems were lashed by use of small groups in which two turns
were taken through each of two closely spaced holes in the bark and the connection
between the groups was made by a long spiral around the outside of the stem. This
pattern was carried down from the stem-head to about the level of the midship sheer
height; from there down around the forefoot the lashing consisted of a simple spiral.
Another style was to use widely spaced groups made up of two or three turns through

a pair of facing holes in the bark, one on each side and inboard of the stem. The turn
went around the stem, and the last connected with the next pair of holes below. A few
canoes of this style used closely spaced wrapping, as in the high-ended canoes.
The long-nose Ojibway canoe is surprisingly primitive by comparison with the
graceful and well-finished high-ended model built after the Algonkin style. Adney
believed that the long-nose type originated with the Sioux Dakotas, before the
combined Ojibway and Cree movement forced them out of the forest lands to the west
of Lake Superior. He considered it possible that both the Ojibway and Cree adapted
the Dakota model, modifying it somewhat to their methods of construction. It is true
that the western Cree built a long-nose canoe, but it had less chin than the Ojibway
model. On the other hand, the Ojibway prebent ribs in pairs like the eastern Cree, and
used spreaders in the end ribs while drying them, in exactly the same manner. A
picture taken in 1916 shows the gunwales of a Cree long-nose canoe being set; it was
laid on the ground and weighted along the midlength by stones laid on boards placed
across the longitudinals. The ends had been sheered up and were supported at each
end by a thong made fast to the gunwale end and then brought over a post, or strut, a
few feet inboard and made fast to the middle thwart.
It is unnecessary to detail the construction of the Ojibway canoes, as they employed a
building-frame, as the drawings on pages 123 to 127 show plainly enough the
pertinent details of fitting and construction. It is important to observe that the wide
variation in model and in construction details of the Ojibway canoes produced a
variety of building procedures that in the main were like those of the Algonkin and
Cree. Hence the older tribal method of construction cannot now be stated with any
accuracy.
The paddle forms used by the Ojibway groups varied somewhat. Most were made
with parallel-sided blades and oval tips. The hand grip at the top of the handle was
rectangular and was large in comparison to the grip of the eastern Cree paddles. A few
variations have been noticed; the blade of one was widest at the top, the tip was
almost squared off, and the upper hand grip was much as in the factory paddle of
today. This paddle, from an unknown locality, was used in 1849.
As in the case of the Algonkin, the eastern Ojibway built fur-trade canoes under
supervision. Though these canoes differed somewhat from those built by the
Algonkins, it is now impossible to say whether or not there was any real relationship
between them and the small, high-ended "old-form" canoe. Likewise, the Ojibway
built a version of the wabinaki chiman which seems to have influenced some types of
their own, such as, for instance, the straight-stem Lake Temagami canoe.

Figure 123
Nineteen-Foot Ojibway Canoe with thirteen Indians aboard (1913).

Western Cree

The western portion of the great Cree tribe appear to have occupied the western shore
of James Bay and to have moved gradually northwestward in historical times. Their
territory included the northern portion of Ontario and northern Manitoba north of
Lake Winnipeg, and as early as 1800 they had entered northwestern Alberta. The line
of division between the canoes of the eastern and western Cree cannot be strictly
determined, but it is roughly the Missinaibi River, which, with the Abitibi River,
empties into the head of James Bay at the old post of Moose Factory. The southern
range of the Cree model was only a little way south of the head of James Bay,
irregularly westward in line with Lake St. Joseph to Lake Winnipeg. To the west, the
Cree type of canoe gradually spread until it met the canoe forms of the Athabascan in
the Northwest Territories, in the vicinity of Lake Athabaska in northwestern
Saskatchewan.

The canoes of the western Cree, as has been noted, strongly resembled the long-nose
Ojibway model except that they had less pronounced chin. But unlike those of the
eastern Cree, their canoes employed an inside stem-piece that was sometimes a
laminated piece and sometimes a piece of spruce root. The stem head was commonly
bent sharply and secured between the gunwale ends at the point where the two
longitudinals were fastened together, much as in some Ojibway long-nose canoes. The
Cree canoe had basically the same dish-shaped midsection, but it had very full, round
bilges and the flare was so curved in the topside that it was even less apparent than in
the Ojibway model. The shorter chin of the Cree canoe also made tumble-home in the
end sections unnecessary, and cross section near the headboards was given the form of
a slightly rounded U.
The bottom had very little rocker at the ends, being straight for practically the whole
length. The stem-piece if laminated (often in only two or three laminations) came up
from the bottom in a fair round forefoot and then tumbled in by a gentle curve to the
stem-head, where it was bent sharply to pass down between the gunwale ends as
previously noted. But if the stem-piece was of spruce root, the profile was often
somewhat irregular and the chin was more pronounced. In a common style the stem
came fair out of the bottom in a quick hard curve, then curved outward slightly until
the height of the least freeboard amidships was reached, at which height another hard
turn began the tumble-home in a gentle sweep to the stem-head, where there was a
very hard turn downward. The stem-head was often split, as in some Ojibway canoes,
so that it came over the joined ends of the main gunwales and the two halves were
then lashed to the inside faces of the gunwales.
Birch bark was often poor or scarce in the territory of the western Cree, as in that of
their eastern brothers. As a substitute, they employed spruce bark and in general seem
to have achieved better results, for their spruce-bark canoes had a neater appearance.
If the canoe was built when or where root material was difficult to obtain, the western
Cree used rawhide for sewing the bark cover. When the stems were lashed with
rawhide, a stem-band of bark under the lashing was common.
The gunwales were round in cross section and were often spliced amidships. The bark
cover was lashed to these with a continuous lashing, no caps or outwales being
employed. As in the Ojibway long-nose canoe, the headboards were very narrow and
much bellied. These canoes were built with four or five thwarts; the 4-thwart type was
used for gathering wild rice, as was the Ojibway type, while the 5-thwart canoe was
the portage model. The thwarts were sometimes mortised into the gunwales, but some
builders made the thwart ends chisel-pointed and drove them into short splits in the
gunwales before lashing them, one or two holes being drilled in the thwart ends to
take the lashing thongs. When the thwarts were tenoned into the gunwales, the
builders of course made the inside of the gunwales flat.

When spruce bark was employed, its greater stiffness made it possible to space the
ribs as much as 10 inches on centers, but with birch the spacing was about 1 inch,
edge to edge. The sheathing was in short splints and the inside of the canoe was
"shingled" or covered irregularly without regard to lining off the strakes, a practice
sometimes observed in Ojibway long-nose canoes. The much-bellied and narrow
headboards were fitted as in the long-nose canoe, and the heel was secured under a
piece of sheathing and held by it and the first two ribs.
Western Cree canoes were built with a building frame, and the bed was raised in the
middle. The sewing varied. The ends were lashed with combinations of close-wrapped
turns, crossed turns, grouped, and spiral turns; the lashing commonly went around the
inside stem piece rather than through it. Side panels were sewn with in-and-out
stitches or back stitches, and the gores with the usual spiral. Gumming as a rule was
done with clear spruce gum tempered by repeated meltings.

Figure 124
Western Cree 2½-Fathom Canoe, Winisk River District, northwest of James Bay.
Built of either birch or spruce bark. Inside root stem piece, round gunwales, and
much-bellied headboard are typical.
The woodwork varied with the building site; some builders could use much cedar, but
spruce was most common and the thwarts were usually of birch. When spruce bark
was used it was never employed in a single large sheet, since it would have been
impossible to mold it to the required shape. Hence the bark cover was pieced up,

whether birch or spruce, as an aid in molding the form. Before the spruce bark was
sewed and gummed, the edges of the pieces had to be thinned to make a neat joint.
Furthermore, in the continuous lashing it was desirable to take two or three turns
through one hole in the bark cover to avoid weakening the material with closely
spaced holes.
The western Cree paddles had parallel-sided blades with rounded tips; the handle
sometimes had a ball-shaped top grip and sometimes it was pole-ended. The blade did
not have a ridge on its face near the handle. Old Cree paddles were often decorated
with red pigment bands, markings in the shape of crosses, squares in series, and dots
on the blades; the top grip might also be painted.
Many tribal groups in the western portion of the area have been mentioned—Teton,
Sioux, Assiniboine, Illinois, Huron, and many others—but no record of their canoe
forms has survived and the assigning of any model to them is pure speculation. The
fur trade alone brought about a period of tribal movement among the Indians long
enough to erase many tribal distinctions in canoes and to cause types to move great
distances.

Figure 125
An Old 6-Fathom Fur-Trade Canoe, or "rabeska," used on the Montreal-Great
Lakes run. Also called the Iroquois canoe, it approximates the canoes built for the
French, at the Trois Rivières, Que., factory and is of the style used by the North
West and Hudson's Bay Companies.

Fur-Trade Canoes

Of all birch-bark canoe forms, the most famous were the canots du maître, or maître
canots (also called north canoes, great canoes, or rabeskas), of the great fur

companies of Canada. These large canoes were developed early, as we have seen in
the French colonial records, and remained a vital part of the fur trade until well toward
the very end of the 19th century—two hundred years of use and development at the
very least. A comprehensive history of the Canadian and American fur trade is yet to
be written; when one appears it will show that the fur trade could not have existed on
a large scale without the great maître canot of birch bark. It will also have to show
that the early exploration of the north country was largely made possible by this
carrier. In fact, the great canoes of the Canadian fur trade must be looked upon as the
national watercraft type, historically, of Canada and far more representative of the
great years of national expansion than the wagon, truck, locomotive, or steamship.
Little has survived concerning the form and construction of the early French-colonial
fur-trade canoes. Circumstantial evidence leads to the conclusion that the model was a
development, an enlargement perhaps, of the Algonkin form of high-ended canoe as
described on pages 113 to 116. The early French came into contact with these
tribesmen before they met the Great Lakes Ojibway, the other builders of the high-
ended model. It is known that the Indians first supplied large canoes to the French
governmental and church authorities and that when this source of canoes proved
insufficient, the canoe factory at Trois Rivières was set up and a standard size
(probably a standard model as well) came into existence. As the fur trade expanded,
large canoes may well have been built elsewhere by the early French; we know at
least that building spread westward and northward after Canada became a British
possession.
In the rise of the great canoe of the fur trade, the basic model was no doubt maintained
through the method of training its builders. The first French engaged in bark-canoe
building learned the techniques, let us say, from the original Indian builders, the
Algonkin. As building moved westward, the first men sent to the new posts to build
canoes apparently came from the French-operated canoe factory. It would be
reasonable to expect that as building increased in the west, local modifications would
be patterned on canoes from around the building post, but that the basic model would
remain. This may account for the departures from the true Ojibway-Algonkin canoes
seen in the maître canots.

Figure 126
Inboard Profile of a 6-Fathom Fur-Trade Canoe, and details of construction,
fitting, and decoration.

Figure 127
Small 3-Fathom North Canoe of the Têtes de Boule model. Built in the 19th
century for fast travel, this Hudson's Bay Company canoe was also called nadowé
chiman, or Iroquois canoe.
In model, all the fur-trade canoes had narrow bottoms, flaring topsides, and sharp
ends. The flaring sides were rather straight in section and the bottom nearly flat

athwartships. The bottom had a moderate rocker very close to the ends. In nearly all of
these canoes, the main gunwales were sheered up only slightly at the ends and were
secured to the sides of the inner stem-piece; the outwales and caps, however, were
strongly sheered up to the top of the stem. The curvature and form of the ends, in later
years at least, varied with the place of building.
After the English took control of Canada and the fur trade, a large number of Iroquois
removed into Quebec and were employed by the English fur traders as canoemen and
as canoe builders. Though the aboriginal Iroquois were not birch-bark canoe builders,
they apparently became so after they reached Canada, for the fur-trade canoes built on
the Ottawa River and tributaries by the Algonkins and their neighbors became known
after 1820 as nadowé chiman or adowe chiman, names which mean Iroquois canoe.
These "Iroquois canoes," however, were not a standard form. Those built by the
Algonkin had relatively upright stem profiles, giving them a rather long bottom, and
the outwales and caps stood almost vertical at the stem-heads; in contrast, the
"Iroquois canoes" built by the Têtes de Boule had a proportionally shorter bottom than
those of the Algonkin, because the end profiles were cut under more at the forefoot.
Also, the outwales and caps of the Têtes de Boule canoes were not sheered quite as
much as were those of the Algonkin.
It is supposed that the Têtes de Boule were taught to build this model by Iroquois,
who had replaced the French builders subsequent to the closing of the canoe factory at
Trois Rivières, sometime about 1820. After the English took possession of Canada in
1763, the old canoe factory had been maintained by the Montreal traders (the "North
West Company"), and it was not until these traders were absorbed by the Hudson's
Bay Company that canoe manufacture at Trois Rivières finally came to a halt,
although it is probable that the production of canoes there had become limited by
shortages of bark and other suitable materials. However, the North West Company had
built the large trading canoes elsewhere, for many of its posts had found it necessary
to construct canoes locally, and when the Hudson's Bay Company finally took over
the fur trade it continued the policy of building the canoes at various posts where
material and builders could be found. This policy appears to have produced in the fur-
trade canoe model a third variant in which the high ends were much rounded at the
stem head; this was the form built by the Ojibway and Cree (see p. 139). It must be
noted, however, that the variation in the three forms of fur-trade canoe was expressed
almost entirely in the form and framing of the ends; the lines were all about the same,
though small variations in sheer, rocker, and midsection must have existed.

Figure 128
Models of Fur-Trade Canoes, top to bottom: 2½-fathom Ottawa River Algonkin
canoe, Hudson's Bay Company express canoe, 3½-fathom Têtes de Boule
"Iroquois" canoe, 3¾-fathom Lake Timagami canoe, 5-fathom fur-trade canoe of
early type, and 5-fathom Hudson's Bay Company canoe built in northwestern
Quebec Province.
Although no regulations appear to have been set up by the fur companies to govern
the size, model, construction or finish of these canoes, custom and the requirements of
usage appear to have been satisfactory guides, having been established by practical
experience. As a result, the length of canoes varied and the classification by "fathoms"
or feet must be accepted as no more than approximate.
The form of the canoe was determined by the use to which it was to be put, in trade or
in travel. Fur-trade accounts often mention the "light canoe," or canot léger, often
misspelled in various ways in early English accounts, and this class of canoe was
always mentioned where speed was necessary. Commonly, the light canoe was merely
a trade canoe lightly burdened. Due to the narrow bottom of these canoes, they
became long and narrow on the waterline when not heavily loaded and so could be
paddled very rapidly. It is true, however, that some "express canoes" were built for

fast paddling. These were merely the common trade models with less beam than usual
at gunwale and across the bottom. Some posts made a specialty of building such
canoes, often handsomely painted, for the use of officials of the company, or of the
church or government, during "inspection" trips. Not all of the highly finished canoes
were of the narrow form, however, as some were built wide for capacity rather than
for high speed.

Figure 129
"Fur-Trade Maître Canot With Passengers." From an oil painting by Hopkins
(Public Archives of Canada photo).
The fur traders used not only the so-called fur-trade canoes, of course, but they
employed various Indian types when small canoes were required. And in the
construction of the high-ended fur-trade models, they did not limit themselves to
canoes of relatively great length. Each "canoe road" forming the main lines of travel
in the old fur-trade had requirements that affected the size of the canoes employed on
it. The largest size of fur-trade canoe, the standard 5½-fathom (bottom length), was
employed only on the Montreal-Great Lakes route, in the days before this run was
taken over by bateaux, schooners, sloops, and later, by steamers. At the western end of
this route, a smaller 4-or 4½-fathom canoe came into use. The latter was used on the
long run into the northwest. Even smaller canoes were often employed by the northern
posts; the 3-or 3½-fathom sizes were popular where the canoe routes were very
difficult to operate. For use on some of the large northern lakes, the large canoes of
the Montreal-Great Lakes run were introduced. Fur coming east from the Athabasca
might thus be transported in canoes of varying size along the way.
In judging the size of the canoe mentioned in a fur-trader's journal, it is often very
difficult to be certain whether the measurement he is employing is bottom or gunwale

length. In the largest canoes, however, the 5½-fathom bottom-length was the 6-fathom
gunwale length, and the use of either usually, but not always, indicates the method of
measurement. This is not the case in the small canoe however, where the matter must
too often be left to guesswork. To give the reader a more precise idea of the sizes of
the canoes last employed in the fur trade, the following will serve. The maître canot of
the Montreal-Great Lakes run was commonly about 36 feet overall, or about 32 feet 9
inches over the gunwales, and a little over 32 feet on the bottom. The beam at
gunwale was roughly 66 inches (inside the gunwales) or about 68-70 inches extreme
beam. The width of the building frame that formed the bottom would be somewhere
around 42 inches. The depth amidships, from bottom to top of gunwale might be
approximately 30-32 inches and the height of the stems roughly 54 inches. These
dimensions might be best described as average, since canoes with gunwale length
given as 6 fathoms were built a number of inches wider or narrower, and deeper or
shallower. The earlier fur-trade canoes of the French and of the North West Company,
for example, were apparently narrower than the above.

Figure 130
"Bivouac in Expedition in Hudson's Bay Canoe." From an oil painting by
Hopkins (Public Archives of Canada photo).

Figure 131
Ojibway 3-Fathom Fur-Trade Canoe, a cargo-carrying type, marked by cut-under
end profiles, that was built as late as 1894.

Figure 132
This Type of 5-Fathom Fur-Trade Canoe was built at L. A. Christopherson's
Hudson's Bay Company posts at Grand Lake Victoria, Lake Barrière, and Lake
Abitibi. Called the Ottawa River canoe by fur-traders, it was used for fast travel
and shows the upright stems of the northwest Quebec Algonkin.

The 5-fathom size that replaced the larger canoe at the close of the bark-canoe period
was about 31 feet long over the gunwales or 30 feet 8 inches in a straight line from tip
of upturned rail cap at one stem to the other. The beam inside the gunwales was 60
inches. The width of the building frame would be between 40 and 45 inches, and the
frame when formed would be about 26 feet 8 inches long. The depth of the canoe
amidships, from bottom to top of gunwale, was approximate 30 inches and the height
of the stems about 50 inches. The overall length of such a canoe was about 34 feet 4
inches. An express canoe of this size would be about 56 inches beam inside the
gunwales or even somewhat less, and the depth amidships about 28 inches or a little
less.

Figure 133
"Hudson's Bay Canoe Running the Rapids." From an oil painting by Hopkins
(Public Archives of Canada photo).
A 4-fathom canoe measured 26 feet 8 inches over the tips of the upturned rail caps,
and 29 feet 11 inches overall. The beam amidships was 57 inches inside the gunwales
and the depth amidships to top of gunwales was 26 inches; the height of the stem was
53 inches.
A 3-fathom canoe was 19 feet 2 inches overall, 16 feet 8 inches over the ends of the
gunwale caps, 42 inches beam amidships inside of gunwales, the depth of the canoe
from bottom to top of gunwale amidships was 19 inches, and the height of the ends
was 38 inches. The building frame for this canoe was 15 feet 8 inches long and 27
inches wide.

The canoes falling between the even-fathom measurements were often of about the
same dimensions as the even-fathom size next below; a 3½-fathom canoe would have
nearly the same breadth and depth as a 3-fathom; only the length was increased. The
half-fathom rarely measured that—a canoe rated as 3½ fathom was actually only 20
feet 5 inches overall. One express canoe rated 3½ fathoms measured 20 feet 1 inch
overall, 18 feet 3 inches over the gunwale caps, 44 inches beam inside gunwales
amidships, and 21 inches deep, bottom to top of gunwale cap. The height of the ends
was 39 inches. This example will serve to indicate how inexact the fathom
classification really was. It should also be noted that the height of the ends varied a
good deal in any given range of length, as this dimension was determined not by the
length of the canoe but by the judgment and taste of the builder and his tribal form of
end. Generally, however, small canoes had relatively higher ends than large canoes, in
proportion to length, because, as will be remembered, one function of the end was to
hold the upended canoe far enough off the ground to permit the user to seek shelter
under it.

Figure 134
"Repairing the Canoe." From an oil painting by Hopkins (Public Archives of
Canada photo).
Extremes of dimension appear to have been rare in fur-trade canoes; none whose
length overall exceeded 37 feet have been found in the records, and the maximum
beam reported in a maître canot was 80 inches. When canvas replaced birch bark in
the fur-trade canoes, the high-ended models disappeared; the canvas freight canoes

were commonly of the white man's type having low-peaked ends, or a modified
Peterborough type.
Before discussing the methods of construction, the loading and equipment of the fur-
trade canoes should be described from contemporary fur trade accounts. The goods
carried in these canoes were packed into easily handled bundles, or packages, of from
90 to 100 pounds weight. Wines and liquor were carried in 9-gallon kegs, the most
awkward of all cargo to portage. In some cases the furs were packed into 80-or 90-
pound bundles in the Northwest, and were repacked into 100-pound bundles before
being placed on the large canoes of the Montreal-Great Lakes route, but bundles
lighter than 90 pounds were made up for the shipment of small quantities of individual
goods to isolated posts. The bundles, or packs, of furs were formed under screw
presses so that 500 mink skins, for example, were made into a package 24 inches long,
21 inches wide and 15 inches deep, weighing very close to 90 pounds. Buffalo hides
formed a larger pack, of course. In the canoe, packs were covered by a parala, a
heavy, oiled red-canvas tarpaulin.
Boxes called cassettes were carried; these were 28 inches long and 16 inches in width
and depth, made of ¾-inch seasoned pine dovetailed and iron-strapped, with the lid
tightly fitted. The top, and sometimes the bottom too, was bevelled along the edges.
The lids were fitted with hasps and padlocks and the boxes were as watertight as
possible. Each box was painted and marked; in these were placed cash and other
valuables. Also carried was a travelling case—a lined box for medicine, refreshments
for the officers, and what would be needed quickly on the road.

Figure 135

Hudson's Bay Company 4½-Fathom North Canoe, of the type built by Crees at
posts near James Bay in the middle of the 19th century, for cargo-carrying.
Provisions such as meat, sugar, flour, etc. were carried in tins and were stowed in
baskets which were usually of the form known to woodsmen as pack-baskets. Baskets
also served to carry cooking utensils and other loose articles. Bedrolls consisted of
blankets or robes, made up in a tarpaulin or oilskin groundsheet and were used in the
canoe as pads or seats. The voyageur's term for the canoe equipment—paddles, setting
poles, sail, mast, and yard, and the rigging and hauling lines—was agrès, or agrets.
The term pacton was applied to packs made up ready for portage; they were ordinarily
made up of two or more packages, so the weight carried was at the very least 180
pounds. No self-respecting voyageur would carry less, as it would be disgraceful to be
so weak. The pacton was carried by means of a collier, or tump-line similar to that
used to portage canoes (see p. 122). It was made of three pieces of stout leather. The
middle piece was of stout tanned leather about 4 inches wide and 18 inches long,
tapered toward each end, to which were sewn pliant straps 2 or 2½ inches wide and 10
feet long. These were usually slightly tapered toward the free ends. The middle
portion of this piece of gear was of thick enough leather to be quite stiff, but the straps
were very flexible. Sometimes the middle portion and 2 or 3 feet of the end straps
were in one piece with extensions sewn to the latter. The pacton was lifted and placed
so that it rested in the small of the carrier's back, with its weight borne by the hips.
The ends of the collier were tied to the pacton so as to hold it in place, with the broad
central band around the carrier's forehead. On top of the pacton was placed a loose
package, cassette, or perhaps a keg. The total load amounted to 270 pounds on the
average if the trail was good; the maximum on record is 630 pounds. With his body
leaning forward to support the load, the carrier sprang forward in a quick trot, using
short, quick paces, and moved at about 5 miles an hour over a good trail. A carrier was
expected to make more than one trip over the portage, as a rule.
The traditional picture of the fur-trade voyageur as a happy, carefree adventurer was
hardly a true one, at least in the 19th century. With poor food hastily prepared, back-
breaking loads, and continual exposure, his lot was a very hard one at best. The
monstrous packs usually brought physical injury and the working life of a packer was
very short. In the early days, and during the time of the North West Company, the
canoemen were allowed to do some private trading to add to their wages, but when the
Hudson's Bay Company took over this was not allowed and discipline became far
more harsh. As a result, the French Canadians deserted the trade, to be replaced with
Indians and half-breeds. The paddling race against time, to reach the destination
before the fall freeze, was labor comparable to that of a galley slave, but in a very
harsh climate. Altogether, if the brutal truth is accepted, the life of the canoeman was
far more hardship than romance.

Figure 136
Five-Fathom Fur-Trade Canoe From Brunswick House, one of the Hudson's Bay
Company posts.
The cargo of a fur-trade canoe was not placed directly on the bottom; light cedar or
spruce poles were first laid in the bottom of the canoe and then the cargo loaded
aboard. The poles prevented damage to the canoe by any undue concentration of
weight. The weight of cargo carried varied with the size of the canoe and with the
conditions of the canoe route. The canoes were usually loaded deeply, except in the
case of the light express canoe, in which the cargo was reduced for sake of rapid
travelling.
An account written in 1800 by Alexander Henry the younger gives the following list
of cargo in a trade canoe on the run to Red River in the Northwest, where canoes
under 4½ fathoms were generally used: General trade merchandise, 5 bales; tobacco, 1
bale and 2 rolls; kettles, 1 bale or basket; guns, 1 case; hardware, 1 case; lead shot, 2
bags; flour, 1 bag; sugar, 1 keg; gunpowder, 2 kegs; wine, 10 kegs. This totaled 28
pieces: in addition the crew had 4 bales (1 for each paddler) of private property, 4 bags
of corn of 1½ bushels each, and ½ keg of "grease," plus bedrolls and the canoe gear.
The trade goods carried to the posts included such items as canoe awls, axes, shot,
gunpowder, gun tools, brass wire, flints (or, later, percussion caps), lead, beads,

brooches, blankets, combs, coats, fire-steels, finger rings, guns, spruce gum, garters,
birch bark, powder-horns or cartridge boxes, hats, kettles and pans, knives, fish line,
hooks, net twine, looking glasses, needles, ribbons, rum, brandy, wine, blue and red
broadcloth, tomahawks or hatchets, tobacco, pipes, thread, vermillion and paint, and
false hair.

Figure 137
Fur-Trade Canoes on the Missinaibi River, 1901. (Canadian Geological Survey
photo.)
The tarpaulins used to cover the cargo were 8 by 10 feet, hemmed and fitted with
grommets around the edges for lashings. The cloth was treated with ochre, oil, and
wax to give it a dull red color and to waterproof it. One of the tarpaulins usually
served as the sail. The fur bales were each sacked, that is, wrapped in a canvas cover
that was sewed on and stenciled with identification and ownership marks.
The cargo manifests were not always the same. Compare the previous list with this
cargo, with which two light canoes were each loaded: 3 cassettes, 1 travelling case, 2
baskets, 1 bag of bread, 1 bag of biscuits, 2 kegs of spirits, 2 kegs of porter, 1 tin of
beef, 1 bag of pemmican for officers and 2 for the crew, 2 tents for officers, cooking
utensils, canoe equipment, and 1 pacton for each of the 9 men in each canoe.
The rate of travel varied a good deal, depending upon the condition of the waterway
and of the men. Perhaps, as an average, 50 miles a day would be the common
expectation during a 3-month run into the northwest. Traveling fast with good

conditions, an express canoe might average as much as 75 or 80 miles a day, but this
was exceptional.
The number of men required to man a fur-trade canoe varied with the use required of
the canoe, with its load, and its size. There were rare occasions in which a maître
canot had 17 paddlers and a steersman, but normally such a canoe was manned by
between 7 and 15 men, depending upon how much space aboard was required by
cargo or passengers and upon the difficulties of the route. An express canoe, traveling
light and at high speed, was manned by 4 to 6 paddlers, one of whom acted as
steersman or stern paddler, and one as the equally important bowman in river work.
The most valuable information on the construction methods of fur trade canoes was
obtained in 1925 from the late L. A. Christopherson, a retired Hudson's Bay Company
official. He had joined the Company in 1874 and retired in 1919, after 45 years
service, 38 of which he had spent in western Quebec at the posts on Lake Barrière and
on Grand Victoria. These were canoe-building posts, and Christopherson had
supervised the construction of both the 5-and 4½-fathom trade canoes. His posts had
built the nearly vertical-ended nadowé chiman, the Iroquois, or Ottawa River, type of
Algonkin canoe. The actual building was done by Indians, but the work was directed
by the Company men.

Figure 138
Fur-Trade Canoe Brigade, Christopherson's Hudson's Bay Company Post, about
1885. Christopherson in white shirt and flat cap, sitting with hands clasped. Five-
fathom canoes, Ottawa River type.
In the building the eye and judgment of the builder were the only guides, aided by the
occasional use of a measuring stick, and Christopherson made it abundantly clear that
the Company had no rules or regulations that he knew of, regarding the size, model,
and construction of the canoes, nor any standards for decoration. The model and
appearance of the canoes were determined by the preferences of the builders and the

size by the needs of the posts. For example, the 5-fathom canoe had been built at the
Grand Victoria post until it was decided there that a 4½-fathom canoe would serve.
The decoration, if any, was apparently according to "the custom of the post."
The method of construction described by Christopherson seems to be largely that of
the Algonkin, modified slightly by Ojibway practices. The canoes were built on a
plank building bed made of 2-or 2½-inch thick spruce; its middle was higher than the
ends, as were the earthen beds used in the east, and holes were bored in it to take the
stakes. A stake was placed near the end of each thwart and one between, along the
sides of the canoe. The individual builders had their preferences as to the method of
setting stakes; some set them vertically while others bored the bed so that the stakes
stood with their heads pointed outward. A post might have two or more building beds,
one for each size, or model.
Canoes were always built by means of a building frame. This was made with four or
five crosspieces that determined the fullness or fineness of the bottom of the canoe
toward the ends. By altering the lengths of the end crosspieces, the degree of fullness
in the lines of the finished canoe could be predetermined. As a result the bed, which
was usually about 18 inches wider than the building frame, might have the shape of its
frame marked on it twice, with two sets of holes for stakes. Otherwise, the alteration
in the building frame would require a special bed to be used. In addition to the
alteration in the ends of the building frame, there could also be variations in its width
amidships. Christopherson's posts commonly built canoes intended for fast travel, so
most of them were narrower in beam at the gunwale and across the bottom than were
the fur-trade canoes of the period, and the building frame was likewise narrower.
The length of the building frame used in these canoes was the same as the bottom
length, or a little longer than the distance between the two headboards of the finished
canoe. Thus, in a 5-fathom canoe the bottom length would be 30 feet, and in a 4½-
fathom canoe, 27 feet; the beds would be some 6 feet longer than these lengths.

Figure 139.
Forest Rangers, Lake Timagami, Ontario. (Canadian Pacific Railway Company
photo.)
As the canoes at Christopherson's were built for speed and rarely measured more than
48 inches beam between the gunwale members, the building frame was about 32
inches wide amidships, or approximately two-thirds the beam inside the gunwales in a
5-fathom canoe. The beam of his 4½-fathom canoes was less, say 42 inches inside the
gunwales and 27 or 28 inches across the building frame, with a depth, bottom to top of
rail cap, of between 19 and 21 inches. A 5-fathom canoe of this narrow model would
carry nearly 2½ short tons with a crew of six, while the smaller model would carry
nearly 2 tons. However, the capacity of a wide canoe was much greater. A 6-fathom
canoe, the Rob Roy, built by another post about 1876 to bring in the bishop for the
consecration of a church at the Lake Temiscaming post, was described by
Christopherson as being about 6 feet beam on the gunwales. Considered a fine
example of a freight canoe, the Rob Roy was afterwards loaded with 75 bags of flour,
totaling 3½ tons deadweight, and carried as well a crew of seven and their provisions
and gear.
The bark cover was commonly in two lengths on the bottom of the canoe, summer
bark being used. The post maintained a supply of bark for canoe building and sheets 4
fathoms in length and 1 in breadth were not uncommon. Such sheets would have been
ample for the cover of a small canoe but would not be expended so needlessly; hence,

the canoes, large or small, had two lengths of bark in their bottoms. The lap was
toward the stern. In what appears to have been a local characteristic of the canoes built
at Christopherson's posts, the bows were indicated by making the thwarts toward that
end slightly longer than those toward the stern, so that the forebody was fuller at sheer
than the afterbody; the canoe master could thus instantly see which end was the bow
without having to examine the bottom or the bark cover.
The two pieces of bark sewn together were placed on the building bed and the
building frame placed on it and weighted down, in the usual manner. The stakes were
then set in the holes in the bed and the bark secured to them with the usual inside
stakes, as well as with the clothespin-like clamps used by the Algonkin and other
Indian canoe builders. The end stakes were set in a peculiar manner: a short pair were
set with their heads sloping inboard, for use later to support the sheering of the
outwales, and a long pair were set raking sharply outboard to help support the bark
required for the high ends. As the bark cover was made up, pieces were worked into
the ends to allow the high ends to be made. The side panels often seen on the eastern
Indian bark canoe were used, and the bark doubled at the gunwales. The doubling
pieces were put on about 6 inches wide and trimmed off after the outwales were in
place. The pieces were widest amidships, and when trimmed would extend about two
inches or a little more below the outwales, narrowing somewhat toward the ends.
Longitudinal battens to fair the bark along the sides were placed as usual in canoe
building.
The main gunwales were originally made of white cedar, but when this became scarce
at the posts, whipsawed spruce was used instead. The gunwales were rectangular in
cross section, with the outer lower corner beveled off. The cross section of the inner
gunwale member was smaller, in proportion, than the outwale, compared to a small
eastern Indian canoe. The gunwales were bent "on the flat" in plan, and were sheered
"edge bent." The tenons for the thwart ends were cut slanting, so that when the
gunwales were made up they stood at a flare outward toward the top edge. The
gunwales had much taper toward the ends as it was usual to work in some sheer in
these members. The canoes built at Christopherson's posts, unlike some other trade
canoes, had a good deal of sheer at the ends, as the main gunwales rose nearly to the
top of the stem.
The manner of forming the gunwales varied somewhat. If the stakes around the
building frame had been set to stand vertically, it was necessary to assemble the
gunwales with temporary crosspieces, or false thwarts, each shorter by several inches
than would be the finished thwart in their place, or twice the amount of flare desired.
After the gunwale assembly had been set above the building frame on the usual posts
to determine its height above the building bed, the bark cover would be lashed to each
gunwale member. This done, each crosspiece would be removed in turn and replaced
with its corresponding thwart. By this means the gunwales would be spread and, in the
process, lowered in proportion to the change in beam. This would usually make too

much sheer. Therefore, if the gunwales were to be spread as a result of the side stakes
standing vertically, they had to be formed with some reverse sheer amidships. This
was done as usual, by first treating each member with hot water and then weighting it
on a long plank, or unused building bed, over a block placed under it at midlength.
The height of the block would determine the amount the sheer was "humped" in the
middle, usually only an inch or so. The gunwale ends were also treated with hot water
and sometimes were split horizontally to get the required sheer there; they were then
bent up and held, while drying and setting, by a long cord that was stretched between
them and placed under tension by means of a strut, about 4 feet long, placed under the
cord at midlength and stepped on the gunwale member being bent. However, if the
side stakes were set sloping outward, it was unnecessary to hump the sheer amidships.
The reason why many builders preferred to set the stakes on the bed vertically was
that it made easy the goring and the sewing of the bark cover side panels; if the bark
available for the cover required little sewing, the sloping stakes might be preferred. It
appears, however, that the usual procedure was to set the stakes vertically and to
spread the gunwales, since good bark was usually available. A good deal of judgment
was required to estimate the amount of hump or reverse to be worked into the gunwale
members; too much would leave a hump in the sheer of the finished canoe and not
enough would cause too much dip amidships. Before being bent to sheer, the gunwale
members were worked smooth with a plane or with scrapers made of glass or steel.
The building frame was taken apart and removed from the canoe after most of the
thwarts were in place.
The ribs Christopherson called "timbers" and the sheathing, "lathing." The ribs,
commonly of cedar, were usually ¼ to ⅜ inch thick, and were 2½ to 3¼ inches wide
in most canoes, with a long taper so that near the ends the width was about half that at
the middle, and at the ends they tapered almost to a point. Some large canoes had ribs
4 inches wide at the centerline, amidships, but these appear to have been unusual. The
ribs were placed on the building frame at their proposed position and the width of the
frame at that point was marked on each. After being cut to about the required length
and tapered, the ribs were then treated with hot water, and were then usually bent over
the knee in pairs, the marks determining where the bending was to be done. In a
freight canoe the ribs amidships would be nearly flat across the bottom but in a fast
canoe they would be slightly rounded. The parts of the rib nearest the ends were not
bent, and thus the rib would appear dish-shaped when in form. Each pair while drying
was sometimes held by cords tied across the ends, or the ribs might be inserted in
about their proper location in the unfinished canoe and held in place by battens and
struts until they took their final set. The ribs at the extreme ends were often "sprung"
or "broken" at the centerline to get the V-section required there, particularly in a
sharp-ended express canoe.

Figure 140
Fur-Trade Canoe Stem-Pieces, models made by Adney: 1, Algonkin type; 2,
Iroquois type, Ottawa River, old French; 3, Christopherson's canoes.
The sheathing was about ¼-inch thick and was laid according to the tribal practice of
the builder; Christopherson appears to have followed the Algonkin practices generally
in this as in other building matters at his posts.
Whereas Malecite practice was to lash the bark cover to both inwale and outwale, in
the western type of canoe the cover was lashed to the main gunwale first, owing to the
spread gunwales, and the outwale was then pegged to the gunwale and also lashed, the
ends being wrapped with figure-eight turns. All gunwale lashing in fur-trade canoes
was in groups. Because of the sheer at the ends, the outwales were split horizontally
into four or more laminae, and the splitting extended almost to the end-thwart
positions. In a few canoes outwales were omitted or were short and did not extend
beyond the end thwarts, but this practice was relatively uncommon. The outwales
were usually rectangular in cross section and much tapered toward the ends.
The rail caps were also rectangular in cross section, but often they had the outboard
upper edge rounded off or beveled. The caps were pegged at 1-foot intervals to the
main gunwales, but at the ends they could only be lashed to the outwale, as both

outwales and caps were so sharply upswept at the ends that they stood almost
vertically. The ends were squared off and stood a little above the top of the stems, so
that when the canoe was placed upside down as a shelter for the paddlers and packers
it rested upon these members rather than on the sewing of the bark cover on the tops
of the stems, as was usual with all the high-ended Algonkin and Ojibway canoes.
The stem-pieces and headboards were assembled into single units, as shown on pages
149 and 151, before being installed during construction. The stem-pieces were of
white cedar, about four fingers deep fore-and-aft and laminated, and about ¾ to 1¼
inches wide, depending upon the size of the canoe and the judgment of the builder. In
Christopherson's area the stem-piece was relatively short, the head coming up and
around and ending at a point far enough under the rail-cap ends for it to be securely
lashed to these members and to the outwale ends. It was bent by use of hot water and
the laminae were secured by wrapping the stem piece with fine twine. The stem was
stiffened by stepping the headboard on its heel in the usual manner, and the two were
held in the required position by two horizontal struts, the outboard ends of which were
lashed to the sides of the stem piece well up above the heel; the inboard ends were
pegged at the sides of the headboard, in notches, or were passed through the
headboards in slots and the strut ends secured with wedges athwartships on the
inboard face of the headboard. The result was a rigid and strong end-frame. More
complicated bending was employed at some posts, where the building of fur-trade
canoes followed Algonkin or Ojibway practices. In these, as has been mentioned, the
stem-pieces were brought down and around under the stem-head to the back or
inboard edge of the stem-piece and lashed, then brought inboard horizontally to end in
a hole in the headboard, between struts placed as in the Christopherson-built canoes.
Another method was to bring the stem-piece around the stem head and down and
around outboard to the inboard face of the stem, where the end was split and each half
lashed to the sides of the stem-piece. In this case there was a lashing between stem-
piece and the headboard, placed where the reverse was made, inboard and below the
top of the stem, well up on the headboard. The heel of the headboard and stem-piece
were pegged together.
Struts were not required with this construction, described earlier (on p. 123) as the
Ojibway method. In bending the stem-piece, the reverse curve around the stem-head
was formed over a short strut that was removed when the stem-piece was dried and set
to shape. As a variety of forms were used in shaping these stem-pieces, it was the
ingenuity of the builder that decided just how the end of the stem-piece was best
secured and how the whole was to be braced. These details will be better understood
by reference to the plans and illustrations on pages 134 to 151.
The headboards were not sprung or bellied, but stood nearly vertical in the canoes.
The inboard face was often decorated; in the old French canoes and in those of the
North West Company, the board was carved or painted to represent a human figure, le
petit homme, which was often made in the likeness of a voyageur in his best clothes.

In some canoes, only a human head was used, or the top of the headboard, or "button,"
was decorated with a rayed compass drawn in colors.
The thwarts were usually rather heavy amidships and were made in various forms to
suit the taste of the builder. They were commonly of maple, but Christopherson's
canoes had spruce or tamarack thwarts, the latter being his preference. These thwarts
were not intended to be used as seats, though the sternman, or steersman, often sat on
the aftermost one. The paddlers often used seats in the large canoes; these were planks
slung from each end by cords made fast to the gunwales. These cords allowed the
height of the seats to be adjusted; the paddlers usually knelt on the bottom of the
canoe with hips supported by the seat. The seats were usually slung before the
thwarts, except amidships, where the space was taken up by passengers or cargo.
The factors often took great pride in the appearance of the canoes from their posts and
many, like Christopherson, had the craft gaily painted in a rather barbaric fashion.
Christopherson's canoes did not use any of the circular decoration forms; his canoes
usually had painted on them, he recalled, such names as Duchess, Sir John A.
MacDonald, Express, Arrow, and Ivanhoe. The ends were often painted white, with
the figures or letters on this background. The Company flag was often painted on the
stern with the initials of the Company, H.B.C., said to mean "Here Before Christ" by
disrespectful clerks. Many posts used such figures as the jackfish, loon, deer, wolf, or
bear, on the bow. The rayed circular devices appear to have been long popular and
were said to have been introduced by the French. There is no record of any device
being officially required in any district but the cassettes of certain districts were
marked with distinctive devices at one time; Norway House used a deer's head with
antlers, Saskatchewan two buffalo, Cumberland a bear, Red River a grasshopper, and
Manitoba a crocus.

Figure 141
Fur-Trade Canoe Stem-Pieces, models made by Adney: 1, Têtes de Boule type; 2,
Ojibway form; 3, old Algonkin form.
During Christopherson's long service he knew the canoes built in his vicinity at such
nearby building posts as Lake Abitibi, Lake Waswanipi, and Kipewa, in western
Quebec; and Lake Timagami (Bear Island), Matachewan on Montreal River,
Matagama (west of Sudbury), and Missinaibi, in nearby Ontario. These were but a
few of the building posts, of course, for canoes were built at numerous posts to the
west and northward.
When portaged, the large canoes might be carried right side up or upside down, the
former being more usual method. The canot du nord was often light enough to be
carried by two paddlers, one under each end, with the canoe right side up and steadied
by a cord tied to the offside gunwale and held in the carrier's hand. The maître canot
required four men to carry it. Various methods were used. One was to lash carrying
sticks across the gunwales near the ends and to carry the canoe right side up with a
man on the end of each stick. Another way was for the men to distribute themselves
along the bottom of the canoe, near the ends, and to use steadying cords. Or the canoe
might be carried upside down with the men carrying it by placing one shoulder under
the gunwales at convenient places. When a bad place in the portage was reached, the
whole crew might have to turn to. The method of portaging had to meet the physical

limitation of the portage path and the matter was not so much one of standard
procedure as of improvisation of the moment.

Figure 142
Portaging a 4½-Fathom Fur-Trade Canoe, About 1902, near the head of the
Ottawa River. Shows an unusually large number of carriers; four would be the
normal number. (Canadian Pacific Railway Company photo.)
The voyageur was particular about his paddle; no man in his right mind would use a
blade wider than between 4½ and 5 inches, for anything wider would exhaust him in a
short distance. The paddle reached to about the users' chin, when he stood with the tip
of the paddle on the ground in front of him. Longer paddles, about 6 feet long, were
used by the bow and stern men, the two most skillful voyageurs in the canoe and the
highest paid. These men had, also, spare paddles whose total length was 8 feet or
more; these were used in running rapids only. The paddles were of hardwood, white or
yellow birch or maple, as hardwood paddles could be made thin in the blade and small
in the handle without loss of strength, whereas softwood paddles could not. The
blades were sometimes painted white, the tips in some color such as red, blue, green
or black, but other color combinations were often used.
In Christopherson's service, sail was rarely used, as the canoemen were unskilled in
handling it and loss had resulted. In early times, however, it appears to have been
much used on the Great Lakes routes by the French and the North West Company. A
single square-sail was the only rig employed; the canoes could not be worked to
windward under fore-and-aft sails.
During the great seasonal movements the trade canoes moved in fleets called brigades,
the usual brigade in early times being three or four canoes, but later, when the needs
of the individual posts had grown, the brigade could be of any necessary number of

canoes to carry in the required supplies and goods or to bring out the season's catch of
furs. The leader of the brigade was the conducteur or guide; sometimes he was the
post's factor. In French times the maître canot would be loaded with 60 pieces, or
packs, to the total of about 3 short tons and half a ton of provisions, and eight men,
each with an allowance of 40 pounds for gear, so that the whole weight in the canoe
would be something over 4 short tons. An example of such a canoe measured, inside
the gunwales, 5½ fathoms long and 4½ feet beam. The usual brigade of four of these
canoes would thus carry roughly 12 short tons of goods.
The Company would send one brigade after another, at close intervals of time, until
the whole seasonal movement was in progress. Those brigades going the greatest
distance were started first. Although cargoes left the coast from early spring on to late
summer, the great canoe movement took place towards the fall. Canoe travel north
and northwestward from the Great Lakes had to be carefully timed, as goods had to be
accumulated at the base posts on the Lakes and the brigades placed in movement at
the last safe date which would permit them to reach their destination before the first
hard freeze-up. The base posts were those where the run of the maître canot ended and
that of the canot du nord began, the places where reloading for the individual trading
posts in the Northland was necessary. The late start was usually desirable in order to
await the arrival at the base posts of all the goods required, for movements of freight
were uncertain before the days of railroads and steamers.

Figure 143
Decorations: Fur-trade Canoes. (Watercolor sketch by Adney.)
In the late 18th and early 19th centuries, before the whole canoe trade fell under the
control of the Hudson's Bay Company, it was the custom to distribute 8 gallons of rum

to each canoe for consumption during the run, and it was also the custom for all hands
to see how much of this they could drink before starting out. This grandiose
undertaking usually began as soon as the local priest, who gave his blessing to the
canoemen, had left the scene. The magnificent drunk lasted one day and the next
morning the crew had to be underway. The first day's run, old accounts repeatedly
show, not only was short but was often beset by difficulties.
The era of the bark trading canoe did not close with a dramatic change. Its ending was
a long, slow process. By the last decade of the 19th century the bark trading canoe had
disappeared from most of the old routes, and even in the Northwest it had been almost
wholly displaced by York boats, scows, bateaux, and canvas or wooden canoes of
white-man construction. By the beginning of the first World War, the maître canots
and canots du nord were finished, except as curiosities—hardly even as these, for not
one was preserved in a museum.
Indeed, so complete was the disappearance of the fur-trade canoe that any attempt to
record its design, construction, and fitting would have been almost hopeless, had it not
been for the notes, sketches, and statements of such men as L. A. Christopherson,
aided by a few models and pictures, and for the memories of a few Indian builders
who had worked on the canoes.

Chapter Six
NORTHWESTERN CANADA
Indians of the Northwest Territories and the Province of British Columbia in Canada,
and the States of Alaska and Washington, built bark canoes that may be divided into
three basic models.
The first may be called the "kayak" model, a flat-bottom, narrow canoe having nearly
straight flaring sides and either a chine or a very quick turn of the bilge. These bark
canoes were low-sided and were usually partly decked. A number of tribal groups
built canoes of this model, the variation being relatively minor. The rake and form of
the ends varied somewhat as did the amount of decking; there were also some slight
variations in structure and method of construction. While these bark canoes had some
superficial resemblance in general proportions to the Eskimo kayaks, it is necessary to
point out that they did not, particularly in Alaska, have the same hull form as the
seagoing kayaks in that area. In fact, the single-chine form of the Alaskan version of
this canoe appears only in the kayaks of northern Greenland and Baffin Island. The
Alaskan seagoing skin kayaks are all multi-chine forms that approximate a "round-
bottom" hull. It has been thought that the flat-bottom seagoing kayak form may have
existed in the Canadian Northwest, at the mouth of the Mackenzie; a kayak so
identified is in the collections of the U.S. National Museum (see p. 202), but there is
now doubt among authorities as to the correctness of this identification. As will be
shown later, it seems probable that it has been improperly assigned to the Mackenzie
delta and is, in fact, an eastern Eskimo model.
The second model used in the Northwest area was a narrow-bottom flaring-sided bark
canoe with elevated ends, having, perhaps, a faint resemblance to the Algonkin-Cree
canoes of the old type. Here too there was some variation among the canoes of tribal
groups, mostly in the shape and construction of the ends and in the fitting of the
gunwales. Most of the canoes of this type had stem-pieces formed of a plank-on-edge,
but in a few examples the stem-pieces were bent. This model was built by the same
tribal groups in Canada that built the kayak form, the explanation being that the kayak
form was the hunting while the second model was commonly the family or cargo
canoe. In Alaska, however, only the kayak-form was used and the family, or cargo,
canoe was merely an enlargement of it.
The third model may be called the "sturgeon-nose" type; in this the ends were formed
with a long, pointed "ram" carried well outboard below the waterline as an extension
of the bottom line of the canoe. Primitive in both model and construction, it was built
in a rather limited area in British Columbia and in the State of Washington. The last

canoes built on this form were canvas-covered; in earlier times spruce or pine bark
was usually employed.
The birch in most of the Northwest is a small tree and the bark is of poor quality for
canoe building; hence, in many areas spruce bark was commonly employed in its
place; a single tribal group might build its canoes of either, depending upon what was
available near the building site. However, near the Alaska coast, where kayak-form
bark canoes were used and good birch was usually not available, some tribes used seal
or other skins as a substitute. In the framework spruce and fir were most commonly
employed, but occasionally cedar was available and was used.
The canoe-building Indians in northwestern Canada were mostly of the Athabascan
family and included the Chipewyan or "Chipewans," the Slave or "Slavey" (=
Etchareottine), the Beaver (= Tsattine), the Dogrib (= Thlingchadinne), the Tanana (=
Tenankutchin), the Loucheux, the Hare (= Kawchodinne), and others. Some of these
tribal groups built not only bark canoes but also dugouts. There were also some
Eskimo people who built bark canoes for river service, as well as skin canoes, on the
same model as the bark kayak-form.
In the vicinities of Lake Athabasca and Great Slave Lake, the Chipewyan employed
not only their own models of canoes but also that of the western Cree. The latter had
invaded Chipewyan territory before the arrival of the first white men in the Northwest
and undoubtedly had influenced canoe-building technique during the long period of
the fur trade that followed. It is therefore not possible to say where the influence of
Chipewyan building techniques ends and that of the Cree and the eastern Indians, as
introduced through the fur-trade canoes, begins. This raises the question whether the
high-ended Athabascan canoe is itself the result of influence. One may infer from
Samuel Hearne's description of his travels in this area, in his Journey ... to the
Northern Ocean,[1] that only the kayak-form then existed, for this type is the only one
he describes, and he describes it in great detail. However, Alexander Mackenzie, in an
entry in his journal for June 23, 1789, refers to the "large canoe" in a manner
indicating that it was a local type. It may well be that then, as later, the kayak-form
and cargo canoe existed side by side, or it may be that Mackenzie was referring to a
large kayak-form canoe like the family canoe of the Alaska Yukon Indians. Perhaps
the reason that Hearne did not mention the "large canoe" is that the people he met on
his way to the Coppermine River, and on his way back by way of Lake Athabasca to
Hudson Bay, did not then use canoes of the second model.
[1] See bibliography.

Figure 144
Chipewyan 2-Fathom hunter's canoe (top), with bent stem piece, and Athabascan
2½-fathom canoe with plank stem piece. Plank and bent stem pieces were both
employed in Athabascan canoes. Spruce or birch bark were used without
alteration of the design or basic construction methods.

Narrow-Bottom Canoe

Because the variations in the second model, the Algonkin-Ojibway type, are relatively
slight, it will be easiest to describe this first. The canoe is known to have been built
extensively by the Chipewyan, Dogrib, and Slave. The sizes most common were 16 to
22 feet over the gunwales, with a beam of between 36 and 48 inches. The sheer was
usually rather straight, the sharp upward turn to the end taking place very close to the
gunwale ends. Most of the bottom was straight; the rocker, if existing, occurred close

to the ends of the canoe and was moderate. The midsection was dish-shaped and
nearly flat across the bottom, with a rather slack, well-rounded bilge and almost
straight flaring sides, the amount of flare being usually great. The bottom apparently
was never dead flat athwartships, for in all known examples it was somewhat rounded.
Near the ends the sections were in the shape of a V with apex rounded; the form of the
ends was sharp and without hollow either at the gunwale or at the level lines. The ends
of the canoes were never lofty and many had end profiles that were very long fore-
and-aft and showed a marked angularity. Inwales and outwales formed the gunwale
structure; some canoes also had gunwale caps which stopped well short of the end
profiles. The ends of the inwales were carried to the stem-pieces; they were sharply
tapered and curved to sheer, and were elaborately cross-wrapped to secure them there.
The end profiles were formed of a thin plank-on-edge in most canoes, but some had
stem-pieces split into laminae in the usual fashion and bent. In all cases headboards
were employed; the heads were forced under the inwale ends and against the inside
face of the stem-piece. The gunwale lashings were in groups, although some canoes
exist in which the outwale was omitted and the lashing was continuous; these canoes
usually had laminated bent stem-pieces and their stem lashing was identical with that
of the Algonkin-Ojibway fur-trade canoes. This departure, it is reasonable to assume,
was the result of outside influence on the Athabascan technique. When the stem-piece
was of thin plank, the bark was usually fastened to it by multiple turns of two thongs
passed, one from each side, through the bark and through holes bored in the stem.

Figure 145

Athabascan Cargo or Family Canoes With Bent Stem Pieces, Chipewyan 2½-
fathom (top) and Dogrib 3-fathom. These canoes were covered with spruce or
birch bark.
The end profile varied with the tribe of the builder. Chipewyan canoes had a very long
end profile fore-and-aft; the heel was angular, and the outline of the stem then swept
forward in an easy curve to a height about two-thirds the depth of the canoe
amidships, then began to tumble in a little, the curve becoming gradually sharper until
the head was reached. The stem-head in its fore-and-aft length was almost one third
the height of the ends and was roughly parallel to the bottom of the canoe directly
beneath it. Because of the rocker of the bottom, the after end of the head was thus
lower than the fore end. The sheer was faired up to the after end of the head in a short,
quick curve. Usually the outwales were cut off short of this point, but in some canoes
they were brought up along with the inwales to the stem-head. Wedges were used in
making up the gunwale-end lashings in both the Chipewyan and Dogrib canoes; these
served to tighten the lashings and formed a sort of breasthook. In a few examples of
the Athabascan type, the stem-pieces were of cedar root without lamination; this use
of the roots enabled the angular form of the plank-on-edge stems to be retained. It
cannot be determined whether the root stem-pieces were part of the old Athabascan
technique or were an importation from the western Cree. The lashing in these canoes
followed the forms used in the fur-trade canoes—long-and-short turns in groups
generally triangular in shape, with a spiral turn between groups.

Figure 146
Plank-Stem Canoes of Hybrid Forms, 3-Fathom Slavey (top) and 2½-fathom
Algonkin-type Athabascan, probably the results of the influence of fur-trade
canoe-building.
The canoes of the Dogrib were practically identical with those of the Chipewyan
except that the end profiles were usually slightly deeper fore-and-aft; also the Dogrib
canoes were perhaps more often of birch bark, judging from the remaining canoes and
models. The form of the ends in the Dogrib canoes was such that they often appeared
higher than they really were, as the stem-heads stood some distance above the ends of
the sheer, an effect which was heightened by the small fore-and-aft depth of the stem-
heads.
The large canoes of the Slave had the same hull characteristics as the others but
differed in end profiles and did not have rail caps. In the Slave canoe, the ends were
formed of thin plank and in profile were almost upright and slightly curved. The stem
line came out from the bottom in a sharp, almost angular curve and ascended with a
slight sweep to a point about level with the gunwale amidships (in some, to within a
few inches of the stem-head); from there a tumble-home carried it to the stem-head,
which was short fore-and-aft and slightly crowned, the inboard end dropping
vertically downward inside the gunwales. The headboards were under the gunwale
ends. Inwales and outwales were both carried to the stems but the end lashings were
quite short. There were no rail caps. The bark cover was lashed to the stem with an in-
and-out stitch from side to side through holes in the plank. The sheer was brought up
nearly to the top of the stem in a rather long, easy sweep beginning inboard at the
endmost thwart.
The gunwale members in all these Athabascan canoes were quite light compared with
their Eastern counterparts. A reinforcing strip of bark was placed under the outwales
so as to hang down below them some four inches or so amidships and less toward the
ends; this was sometimes decorated with a painted zigzag stripe or with widely spaced
circles. The end lashings of the gunwales were protected by short bark deck pieces
inserted under the caps. The edges of these deck pieces were trimmed flush with the
outboard edges of the caps, so that no wulegessis resulted.
In spruce-bark canoes, because the bark was stiff the ribs were spaced 6 to 8 inches,
whereas in birch-bark canoes the ribs were spaced about as usual, 1 to 2 inches edge
to edge. In the Dogrib and Slave canoes the ribs were without taper; in the Chipewyan
there was usually a slight taper from the bottom to the gunwale end. The ends of the
ribs were forced under the gunwales in the usual manner employed in the east, the
gunwales being rectangular in cross-section, with the lower outboard corner beveled.
The thwarts were all parallel-sided, but tapered toward the ends, in elevation. The
thwart ends were tenoned into the inner gunwale and usually had two holes in each

end for the lashings.
In the bark cover the horizontal sewing was often over root battens. In many canoes
rawhide was used in much of the lashing and sewing, and in the last-built bark canoes
the end lashings of the gunwales were often protected by a decking formed of a small
triangular sheet of metal, obtained from a large can and crimped along its edges so as
to clamp the bark and main gunwales. When this metal deck-piece was used, the cap
and outwale ended against the inboard edge of it.
For use in open water these canoes were often fitted with a blanket square-sail. The
sapling serving as a temporary mast stood in a hole in the second thwart, and was
stepped on a block, or board, pegged or lashed to the ribs.
The sheathing of all canoes of this class was of the same form—wide, short strakes
amidships, narrower short strakes afore and abaft. The midship strakes were often
quite short and their ends were over the longer end strakes. The end strakes were, of
course, tapered toward the stems. The placing of the strakes was often irregular, with
the result that the butts were somewhat staggered. Some canoes had four strakes to the
length, but three appears to have been most common.
The large canoe was employed on the large lakes of the Mackenzie region; smaller
canoes of the same general form, 14 to 16 feet in length and 30 to 40 inches in beam,
were used on the large rivers and streams. In the smaller canoes of this class, the flare
of the topsides was often less than in the larger craft. The Cree in this area,
particularly to the south of Great Slave Lake, also employed the Athabascan form.
This class of canoe, in general, appears to have been strongly affected by outside
influence; consequently this description must be understood to cover existing canoes
and models, not pure Athabascan canoe building.
The usual construction methods were employed in building this class of canoe; the
stakes around the building frame were set vertically, and when the bark cover was
lashed to the gunwale members (inwale and outwale together) the gunwales were
spread and the thwarts inserted in their tenons. Skill was required in preshaping the
gunwale members, which, as in the fur-trade canoes, had to be arched in sheer
amidships to allow for the change in sheer caused by spreading the gunwales in
construction. The building bed was also arched at midlength to allow for the lifting of
the ends that occurred in spreading the gunwales with the bark cover attached.
A typical large Chipewyan canoe of this class was 21 feet 4 inches in overall length,
43 inches beam and 14 inches in depth amidships. A smaller Dogrib canoe of the same
class was 14 feet 7 inches in overall length, 31¼ inches beam, and 11½ inches in
depth. However, these smaller canoes appear to have been relatively uncommon, and
the average large canoe was about 20 feet long.

Kayak-Form Canoe

The kayak-form canoe was widely employed in the Northwest and was highly
developed in both model and construction. It was essentially a portage and hunting
craft, ranging in length from 12 to 18 feet and in beam from about 24 to 27 inches,
with a depth between 9 and 12 inches. In areas where the kayak form was used as a
family and cargo canoe, the length would be as great as 20 or 25 feet and the beam
might reach 30 inches. Except in the family or cargo canoe, which had none, there
was usually some decking at the ends, most of it forward. Some tribal groups built the
kayak form with its greatest beam at midlength, but the most common form had its
greatest beam abaft midlength and its greatest depth there likewise. Many of the kayak
forms had unlike end profiles, so that there was a distinct bow in appearance as well
as in fact.
There was much variety in end profile, and the canoes of each tribal group were
usually identifiable by this means. The kayak-form bark canoes of the lower Yukon
and neighboring streams had a short overhang, formed in a curved rake and alike or
very nearly so, at bow and stern. On the upper Yukon and adjoining streams the
canoes had much rake at both ends, the rake being straight from the bottom outward
for some distance, then curving rather markedly. The bow rake was usually greatest,
but the stern might be higher by one or two inches. The bottom was without rocker,
being straight or even slightly hogged in most of these canoes. The sheer was straight
to the point where the rake began, then rose in a easy sweep to the ends. The end
decks on the upper Yukon canoes were short, those on lower Yukon canoes were much
longer; on the latter the bow deck was nearly a third the length of the canoe, on the
former about a fifth. In the Mackenzie Basin, the kayak-form canoes had a moderate
rake, curved in profile, at bow and stern and a rather low stem-head; the depth at the
stern was noticeably greater than at the bow, and the deck forward was commonly a
little less than a fourth the length of the canoe. In these canoes the greatest beam in
most cases was abaft midlength, and this was also true of the lower Yukon canoes. On
the upper Yukon and in some of these canoes on the lower Mackenzie, the greatest
beam was amidships and the depth at bow and stern were equal.

Figure 147
Eskimo Kayak-Form Birch-Bark Canoe From Alaskan Coast, with long foredeck
batten-sewn to the gunwales, no afterdeck, and rigid bottom frame.
The variation in depth at bow and stern in some of the kayak-form canoes seems to
have been related to the position of the greatest beam; when the beam was abaft the
midlength, the greatest depth was aft, whereas when the greatest beam was amidships,
the depth at the ends was equal. With the beam abaft midlength, the weight of the
paddler trimmed the canoe by the stern somewhat, hence greater depth aft than
forward was necessary to make the canoe run easily and turn readily in smooth water.
In the sea kayaks of the eastern Eskimo, on the other hand, the depth and the draft
were greatest forward, to bring them head to the sea when paddling ceased. The
Alaskan sea kayaks were commonly of equal draft at bow and stern or might have a
slightly greater draft aft than forward.
A third variation of the kayak form existed in British Columbia in early times, and
apparently was employed by the Beaver, Nahane, and Sekani. It was an undecked
bateau-shaped canoe having a fair sheer in a long sweep from end to end, the stem
profiles were nearly straight, the ends were raked rather strongly, and the bow was
somewhat higher than the stern. The beam was greatest slightly abaft midlength. It is
estimated that canoes of this type, which has long been extinct and now can only be
reconstructed from a model, were about 14 feet 8 inches long and 30 to 36 inches in
beam, and probably were built of both spruce and birch.
The gunwales of the kayak-form canoes were formed by inwales and outwales; no
caps were employed. In the Alaskan types and in the extinct British Columbia bateau
variation, the gunwale lashings were continuous, but in the Mackenzie models the
lashings were in groups. Inwales and outwales in all the kayak forms ran to the stem-
pieces, which were plank-on-edge of a thickness that varied according to tribal
practice. No headboards were employed. The gunwale members were rectangular in
cross-section and were bent square with the flare of the sides. The ends sometimes
were swelled and rounded, and in the bateau variation the gunwales, in cross section,
appear to have been rounded. Six thwarts appear in most of the kayak forms but the
Loucheux model had five and the bateau variation seems to have had but three.

Figure 148
Athabascan Hunting Canoes of the Kayak Form, showing characteristic hull
shape. These canoes were light, handy, and fast.
Reinforcing bark was placed under the outwales in all Mackenzie Basin canoes, but
not in the Alaskan or in the bateau variation. The ribs in all these canoes were small,
usually about ½ inch square, and widely spaced, about 9 to 14 inches on centers. No
ribs were placed in the rake of the ends. The ends of the ribs were chisel-pointed and
were forced between the inwale and outwale, against the inside of the bark cover. In
some canoes, however, the ribs near the ends of the canoe were forced into short splits
on the underside of the inwale. The thwart ends might also be forced into short splits
on the inside face of the inwales or might be tenoned there; in any case a single
lashing was used at the thwart ends. Thwarts were parallel-sided in plan and slightly
tapered toward the ends in elevation; no shoulders were used. In the bateau variation,
a heavy thwart was placed directly under the middle thwart with its ends against the
side battens, apparently to act as a spreader. Each end was notched over the side
battens and was held by two lashings to the bottom crosspiece below it. This structure
was probably made necessary by the fragile construction of this form of canoe. In all
kayak forms there was no complete sheathing—the one, two, or three narrow battens
to a side above the chine were held in place only by the sprung ribs (without lashings);
in the bateau form, however, the side batten was lashed to each frame after the manner
of of an Eskimo sea kayak.
The characteristic detail in the structure of the bark kayak-canoe, including the bateau
variation, was the bottom framing. It was variously formed, according to tribal
designation. The bottom framing was made up of five or six longitudinal battens (four
in one extinct form of canoe). In the Yukon canoes six rectangular battens, all of about

the same cross section, were used with the narrow edge outboard. These battens were
held rigidly to form by thin crosspieces, or splints, about ¼ by 1 inch forced
athwartships through short splits in the battens and pegged at the ends on the chine
battens. The ends of the four inner longitudinals were cut off on the snye to bear on
the inside face of the chine battens (in some instances they were cut short of this). The
chine ends were beveled together or lashed to the sides of the stem-pieces. But in the
Mackenzie form of canoe, the longitudinals had no cross-members and, like the side
battens, were held in place by the pressure of the sprung ribs against the bark cover.
There was a difference in the form of midsection: in the Yukon canoes the bottom
athwartships was flat, but in the Mackenzie canoes there had to be some rounding
there. At least one exception existed in the Mackenzie Basin, where the Loucheux
canoe was formed on the Yukon bottom. Another is to be seen in an old model of an
extinct Athabascan kayak form, which has only four longitudinals and chine members
that are very wide and rounded only on the outboard face. Between the chine battens
are two light rectangular battens. These are all held together by a few splints and by
lashings which pass around each individual batten, thus serving both as lashing and
spreader. This canoe has what is apparently a very narrow bottom compared to known
types. In some of the Eskimo-built birch kayak forms, the separators between the
bottom battens were rectangular blocks held in place by a thong threaded through two
holes in each batten and block, to make a round turn, and tied at one chine.

Figure 149
Extinct Forms of Canoes Reconstructed From Old Models, showing variations
in the bottom frame construction and the effects of hull form. Dimensions are
estimated from the sizes of canoes in the area of each example.
In some bateau variations of the kayak-form canoe, the longitudinals were secured by
crosspieces, the ends of which were tenoned into the inside faces of the chine battens.

The three inner battens were below the cross pieces. As a result, their bottoms were
slightly below the bottom of the chine members, so that in this canoe two chine lines
show through the bark cover on each side of the canoe.
From tribe to tribe the method of building the kayak-form canoe varied somewhat, but
generally the following procedure was employed. On a smooth, level piece of ground
the form of the canoe was staked out in the usual manner, using a building frame, with
the stakes sloped outward at the top to match the desired flare of the sides.
Stem and stern posts were shaped of cedar by charring and scraping. The gunwales
were made in the same manner and were then lashed at the desired heights on the
stakes. Next, the bark cover was formed, usually of two or more sheets sewn together.
This was placed inside the stakes and the building frame was forced down on it and
weighted with stones. The ends were then trimmed and the sides were gored, sewn,
and trimmed to fit the gunwales, to which the bark was laced. The stem and the stern
post were then placed and lashed to the gunwales and secured to the bark by lashing,
in some instances through holes in the posts. The bark at this stage was usually quite
dry and stiff and the gunwales could be freed from the side stakes.
The bottom frame, assembled before other construction had started, was hogged; the
middle was placed on a log or block and the ends weighted. Hot water was often
applied to set the bottom frame.
Next, the bark cover was thoroughly wetted with boiling water to make it pliable and
elastic. The building frame and stones were now removed, the bottom frame was
substituted, and its ends fastened or engaged to the heels of the stem and stern posts.
The bottom frame was then forced flat and held there by stones. This stretched the
bottom bark longitudinally, and increased the sheer slightly toward bow and stern. The
hogged bottom frame was known as a "sliding bottom" by some Indians.
The transverse frames, or ribs, had been prebent in the usual manner before assembly
began; a few of these were now put in place, the ends being forced under the gunwales
between their outer faces and the bark, or into a groove on the underside of the
gunwale. This stretched the bark transversely and vertically. Once the bark had been
forced into form by this method, the remaining ribs were added, and these now held
the hogged bottom down so that the weights or stones could be removed. The canoe
was then turned over, the seams gummed, and any tears or rents repaired.
This method of building usually produced a slight hogging in both bottom and in the
sheer amidships, but when the canoe was afloat and loaded the light, flexible
construction caused the hogging to disappear. The kayak-form canoes of the Dènè
tribe appear to be the most highly developed of all in this type.
The decks of many of the kayak-form canoes were made of a triangular sheet of bark
cut with the grain of the bark running athwartships, so that it could be held in place by
the curl of its edges, which clamped under the outwales, as well as by three lashings.

The edges were curled by passing a glowing brand along them. One lashing was
around the stem-head and two were at the inboard end of the deck, around inwale and
outwale. If the inboard end of the deck was not on a thwart it was stiffened by a batten
lashed on top of the deck athwartship, at the deck end, to serve as an exterior deck
beam and breakwater in one. If the deck end was on a thwart, a batten might be
pegged athwartship on top of the deck; sometimes this batten was rolled in a sheet of
bark first. Another method was to use a small sheet of bark tightly rolled, with its free
edge tucked under the deck end and secured at the ends of the roll by the deck-
gunwale lashings there. Some canoes had their decks lashed over battens for a short
distance along the gunwales. In some Mackenzie Basin kayak forms, the end of the
deck at the stem-head was protected by a small paddle-or leaf-shaped piece of bark
placed under the lashing there and shaped to reach a little over onto the stem piece so
as to seal the seam.
The fitting of the bark cover of the kayak-form canoes was not the same in all types.
In the Mackenzie canoes the bottom, which might be in three, four, or five pieces
sewn together, was alike on both sides; to it the side pieces were sewn at, or just
above, the chines. The sides were made up of deep panels, five to nine to a side. There
were no horizontal seams other than the one near the chines.
In some Yukon canoes, however, the bottom sheet was often made of three pieces and
covered not only the bottom but also a portion, such as the after two-thirds, of one
side. The forward portion of that side would then be covered by a single large panel or
perhaps two, so that the horizontal seam on that side would run from the stem aft to
the inboard end of the foredeck and would be just above the chine. On the opposite
side a sheet would cover the bottom there and the bow topside from the stem aft for a
short way. Deep panels would then cover the rest of that side to the stern, so that the
horizontal seam there began forward at the sheer, some feet abaft the bow, and swept
downward in a gentle curve to near the chine and then ran aft to the stern in a long
sheered line just above the turn of the bilge, rising slightly as it neared the stern.
Hence the foremost of the panels on that side was nearly triangular and the others
were nearly rectangular. Inside, at the chine, was placed a reinforcing strip of bark
wide enough to reach 3 inches beyond both sides of each chine longitudinal and
running the length of the bottom; or if a seam near the chine permitted, the side and
bottom pieces were overlapped. As has been noted, in the Yukon canoes a reinforcing
piece at the outwale was not used, but was in the Mackenzie canoes; it extended down
the side about 3 inches below the underside of the outwale amidships and ran to the
ends of the canoe, or nearly so, tapering with the outwales to a width of about 1½
inches at bow and stern. In these canoes much of the lashing at stem and stern was
double-thong; the longitudinal sewing was often over a batten in the usual spiral
stitch, and a simple spiral stitch was also used to join the panels, although in-and-out
stitching might also be seen in some canoes.

In many of the kayak-form canoes two ribs often stood noticeably close together
amidships, and the rest stood parallel to the rake of the end on their side, respectively,
of the middle ribs. However, not all these canoes had such double ribs; some were
framed out in the usual manner, with the ribs widely spaced and canted toward their
respective ends of the hull, away from the midship of the canoe.

Figure 150
Kayak-Form Canoes of the Alaskan Eskimos and Canadian Athabascan Indians:
chine form of Eskimo birch-bark canoe (above) and the dish-sectioned form of the
Canadian Athabascans.
In most of these canoes the paddler sat on a sheet of bark secured on the bottom; this
was held in place by one or two false ribs having their ends under the inner gunwales
and their middle forced down against the bark on the bottom framework. In place of
bark, some Eskimo builders of the type used thin splints of wood laced together by
two or three lines of double-thong stitching athwartships, which was passed through
two holes in each splint. This might be loose or held in place by a false frame.
The paddle was single-bladed and the same as that used with the second class of
Mackenzie Basin canoe (fig. 151). The blade was parallel-sided with the point formed
in a short straight-sided V-form; The blade of Yukon paddles was often taper-sided
toward the point, which was a rounded V. Other variations in blade form existed,
however, and the narrow leaf-shaped blade was used in some areas in Alaska. In the
Mackenzie paddles the handle ended in a knob, but in Alaskan versions it ended in a
cross-grip like those of paddles used with some Alaskan sea kayaks. The Eskimo
double-blade paddle was used with the kayak-form canoe by some paddlers; Hearne
mentions its use.

Some of the kayak-form canoes were decorated; in Alaska this decoration often took
the form of a line of colored beads sewn along each side of the afterdeck at the
gunwale, or it consisted of a few oval panels of red, blue, or black paint along the
sides or centerline of the afterdeck. In some Mackenzie kayak forms the decks were
painted in various designs; a rather common one seems to have been two or more
bands of paint around the deck edges, along the gunwales, ending at bow and stern
with a full round sweep. Painted disk designs appeared on some of the large Algonkin-
Ojibway canoes of the second type.
A number of kayak forms became extinct before any accurate, detailed records of their
shape and construction had been made; models of some of these canoes exist but are
not to scale and are untrustworthy as to detail, since they are often simplified. One
model of the extinct British Columbia bateau form, for example, showed but three
longitudinals in the bottom, though the probable size of the canoe undoubtedly would
have required a greater number. On the other hand, the model may have represented a
spruce-bark canoe constructed for temporary use, in which case a simplified
construction might have been employed. One can only speculate which it was. Models
of some kayak-form Yukon canoes show the decks lashed to the gunwales with a very
coarse spiral stitch not recorded for any of the observed full-size canoes; thus it may
be a model-maker's method of securing the decking firmly rather than an actual
practice used on full-size canoes.

Figure 151
Kayak-Form Canoe of British Columbia and upper Yukon valley. Shows hogged
bottom, usual in the type with a rigid bottom frame, which becomes straight or
cambered when canoe is afloat and manned. Original in the Museum of the
American Indian, New York.
It now remains only to give short descriptions of the various kayak-form canoes that
have been observed.

The ends of the Eskimo-built canoes of the lower Yukon had a short rake, the heel of
the end profile breaking out of the bottom line at a slight angle and sweeping upward
and outward in a gentle curve, often becoming almost straight near the stem head. The
bow and stern were nearly the same height, the bow being a little higher, about half
the midship depth above the sheer amidships. The sheer at each end was almost dead
straight until within a few inches of the end; thence it swept up sharply with the inner
gunwale ends, broadened, resting on the inboard side of the stem piece. The extreme
ends of the inner gunwales were thus at the extreme stem-head. The stem-pieces were
of plank, the cutwater portion outside the bark cover being sharpened the full height of
the stems. These lower Yukon canoes had three side battens above the chine piece, but
not all ran the full length in one piece; some were in two, in which case the ends
merely ran past one another for a few rib-spaces and were neither butted nor lapped.
The forward deck extended nearly one-third the canoe's length and had a batten across
the inboard deck-end; the after deck reached to the after thwart. Adney's model of
such a canoe shows the after deck lashed to the gunwales with spiral turns over a
batten along the deck edges and finished toward the stern with chain stitching, but no
such arrangement was seen in any full-sized canoe.
The form of these Eskimo-built canoes was nearly that of a double-ended flat-bottom
skiff; the bottom being flat athwartships and without rocker fore-and-aft. The sides
flared and were nearly straight. The turn of the bilge was quite sharp, the chine having
a very short radius. In plan, the canoe showed no hollow in the ends, which were
convex both at gunwale and on the bottom frame. In some of the full-sized canoes
inspected there appeared to be a slight hog ranging from ¼ to ⅜ inch in the bottom,
but there was no evidence to suggest that this was a result of the drying and shrinkage
of the canoe structure with age. Hearne's drawing of a kayak-form canoe shows an
impossible amount of hog in the bottom, and he indicates that some hog was
intentional in building. This would disappear when the canoe was loaded afloat owing
to the light and flexible structure, and it is evident that the builders usually sought to
have the bottom slightly hogged.

Figure 152
Construction of Kayak-Form Canoe of the lower Yukon, showing rigid bottom
frame. (Smithsonian Institution photo.)
The kayak-form canoes of the lower Yukon and neighboring streams all appear to
have been small canoes "tailored" to their owner's weight and height: 14 to 15 feet in
overall length, 2 to 2¼ feet wide, and 10 to 12 inches deep. The bottom frame was
from 12 to 14 inches wide amidships.
The kayak-form canoes of the upper Yukon Valley and those used in northern British
Columbia and in Yukon Territory had ends with a long rake that came up in a straight
line from an angular break at the bottom line to the height of the sheer amidships or
thereabouts; there a gradual upward curve continued to the stem-head. The stern was 2
inches or so higher than the bow, and the rake of the latter was usually about an equal
distance longer than that of the stern. The sheer was nearly straight, with only about 2
inches of sag from the heel of the stem to that of the stern. Beyond the heels, the sheer
lifted in a fair sweep, becoming sharper toward the ends, where the broadened inwales
were secured on top of the stem and stern pieces. There was no rocker in the bottom,
and some examples showed as much as ⅜ inch of hog amidships. The bottom was flat
athwartships and the almost straight sides flared a good deal. The turn of the bilge was
on a very small radius and in some canoes appeared angular. The bow deck was
usually just under one-fifth the length of the canoe. Most of the canoes did not have a
stern deck, at least on the Yukon headwaters, but on those that did, it was about one-
ninth the length of the canoe. The greatest beam was abaft amidships and the canoe

was usually about 1½ inches deeper at the heel of the sternpost than at the heel of the
stem. In plan, the ends (at gunwale and bottom frame) were convex; the gunwale ends
alone might appear slightly hollow close to the posts in some examples. The canoes in
Alaska and British Columbia and at the headwaters of the Yukon had a rigid bottom
structure, with the splint spreaders usually numbering five.
The 1-man hunting canoes were commonly 18 to 19 feet long, 24 to 27 inches beam,
and usually 10 to 11 inches deep amidships. The single example of a family or cargo
kayak-form that has been measured from this area was 20 feet 1 inch overall and 30¼
inches beam over the gunwales. It was 18 inches wide on the bottom frame, 13 inches
deep amidships, 14 inches deep at heel of stem, and 16 inches at heel of stem-post.
Height of the stem was 29 inches, of the stern 30½ inches, the after rake was 38
inches, and the fore rake 40½ inches. The canoe had no decks and was rather sharp-
ended.
The kayak-form canoe of the Athabascan Loucheux had a rigid bottom-frame; the
bottom was flat athwartships and it had no fore-and-aft rocker. The sides were flaring
and slightly curved. Both ends were alike, and the canoe was unusual in having only
five thwarts, with one amidships. The stem was short in rake and curved; the stem
profile came out of the bottom line in a fair, quick curve which became vertical at a
height of little more than two-thirds the depth amidships of the canoe. The height of
the stem was almost twice the midship depth. Between the end thwarts the sheer was
straight, thence it swept upward in a gradually sharpening curve to the inboard stems;
the inwale ends stood vertical on the face of the stem, with their ends brought to the
top of the stem-head. The stem-pieces were of unusually thick plank, with the head
broadened and the cutwater part outside the bark cover sharpened until near the head,
where it gradually became as wide as inboard. The gunwales were lashed with
continuous turns, as in the Alaskan canoes. In plan, the gunwales and bottom frame
were full-ended and convex. These canoes were decked equally at both ends. The
deck extended inboard far enough to just cover the end thwart, to which, in the
example seen, it was lashed with four simple in-and-out passes of rawhide thong. The
chine-pieces of the bottom were lashed to the sides of the stem-pieces. The covering
was birch bark. Two battens on each side were employed with the usual six
longitudinals in the bottom frame. These canoes were well-built and their ends
resemble those of the seagoing kayaks used at the mouth of the Mackenzie, but these
for at least the last 70 years of their use were round-bottomed. The Loucheux canoes
were small, usually about 15 feet long, 30 inches wide, and about 12 inches deep
amidships.
The Chipewyan kayak-form canoe was of loose-batten bottom frame construction,
with its beam well aft of amidships. Its bottom was slightly rounded athwartships,
with a slight rocker fore-and-aft; the sides flared outward and were nearly straight;
and the turn of the bilge was almost angular. The bow and stern were of the same
general shape; the end profile came out of the bottom line with a quick hard curve and

then fell outboard in a long sweep that gradually straightened near the head. The rakes
were short, however, and the stem was noticeably lower than the stern, the difference
being as much as 6 inches in some canoes. The sheer was nearly straight to the end
thwarts and thence it curved up in an easy sweep to the ends of the canoe. The canoes
were markedly deeper at the stern than at the bow; the difference being as much as 1½
inches in some examples.
This kayak-form was very sharp-ended; the gunwales in plan often showed a slight
hollow and the chine members came to the posts in an almost straight V. As a result,
the end ribs were often intentionally "broken" to form a narrow-based, angular U. In
some Eskimo-built kayak forms, a similar result in hull section was obtained in the
endmost frames by stepping short struts in splits, or tenons, on top of the chine
members and on the underside of the main gunwales. This construction was
occasionally found in some of the lower Yukon kayak forms. The Chipewyan kayak
forms were decked at both ends. The fore deck was slightly more than one-fourth the
length of the canoe and extended inboard to the second thwart; the after deck was
about one-tenth, and came inboard to the end thwart. No breakwater batten or bark
was employed. There were two battens on the sides, above the bilges.
The gunwale wrappings were in groups. The bark cover was not folded over the top of
the inner gunwale but, as usual in the Northwest canoes, was trimmed evenly with the
top of the inwale and outwale. Reinforcing bark along the gunwales extended
downward about 1½ inches below the bottom of the outwales amidships and about 1
inch at the ends. Of the bottom longitudinals, the keel and chine-pieces were roughly
rectangular in cross-section, laid on the flat, and the intermediate two battens were
round; the ends of the keel piece were merely butted against the stems, no lashing
being used. The stem piece was thick plank and was sharpened outside the bark cover
to form a cutwater. The stem lashing was of the usual two-thong form, and a batten
was used in the longitudinal seams of the bark cover. The thwarts, six in number, were
tenoned through both inwale and outwale and pegged between them. No thwart
lashings were used. The decks often were not lashed into place, being held only by the
curling of the edges of the bark sheets.
This canoe was a very good one; it was light and was fitted to the owner's build. In
size it would be between 12 and 14 feet long and 20 and 24 inches wide over the
gunwales, and the width of bottom over the chine members amidships would be 11 to
12 inches. The greatest beam would occur 7 to 8¼ feet abaft the stem. The depth at
heel of stem would be 8½ to 9½ inches and at heel of stern, 10 to 11 inches. The
amount of bottom rocker would be between ¾ and 1 inch, with its low point about
amidships. The cover was usually birch bark, but sometimes spruce bark was used.

Figure 153
Model of an Extinct Form of Birch-Bark Canoe, Athabascan type, of British
Columbia. In Peabody Museum, Harvard University, Cambridge, Mass.; entered
in the museum catalog as of 1849.
Another kayak-form canoe of unknown tribal designation from the Mackenzie Basin
was 13 feet 3 inches long, 27 inches beam over the gunwales, 8½ inches deep
amidships, 8¾ inches deep at heel of stem, 10 inches deep at the aftermost thwart, and
with about ⅜ inch of rocker in the forebody, none in the afterbody. The greatest beam
occurred 7 feet 2 inches from the stem. The width amidships of the bottom framework
of loose longitudinals was 13 inches. The length of the rake foreward was 12 inches
and aft, 12 inches. The fore deck extended inboard to the second thwart, where a roll
of bark formed a breakwater. The after deck extended inboard to the aftermost thwart.
Between the end thwarts the sheer was practically straight; at the ends it rose gently,
becoming almost a straight line as it came to the stem and stern, and without the usual
upward hook in the ends of the gunwales.
This was a very light and well-built canoe with a birch-bark cover, a slightly rounded
bottom athwartships, slack bilge, and flaring sides showing some curve in cross-

section. The ends were rather sharp, the gunwales coming in to them almost straight,
in plan, as did the chine members. The stem and stern pieces were of wide plank
sharpened along their outboard edge outside the bark cover, for their whole height, to
form cutwaters. The stem and stern profiles were about the same as those of the
Chipewyan canoes.
An old model in the Peabody Museum of an undecked kayak-form canoe of
Athabascan construction represents a high-ended canoe having ends with a slight rake
and a straight cutwater. This form of canoe has long been extinct, and no description
of an actual canoe of the form exists. Judging by the model it had a very narrow flat-
bottom and rounded flaring sides.
The extinct bateau variant has already been described (pp. 159-161); it might be
considered a primitive form of the kayak-form bark canoes, were it not that no
intermediate type, between the bateau and the later and highly developed bark kayak-
form, has been found; as a result, any such statement can be no more than speculation.

Sturgeon-Nose Canoe

In southern British Columbia and in northern Washington, the ram-ended or sturgeon-
nose canoes were built. These were the canoes of the Kutenai, also spelled
"Kootenay," and of the Salish tribal groups. Used on rivers and lakes, they were
constructed of the bark of birch, spruce, fir, white pine, or balsam, whichever was
available at the building site. Wherever possible a panel of birch bark was worked in
along the whole length of the gunwales. The hull form of these canoes varied
somewhat, perhaps by decision of the builder, or perhaps by local tribal custom. The
ends were formed with a marked "ram," the stem profiles running down and out to the
"nose" in a straight or nearly straight line. In some examples the stem profiles were in
a hollow curve, starting down from the gunwales rather steeply and then curving
outward more gently to the nose. Most examples had a bottom that was straight or
slightly hogged, while those with the hollow curve in the ram often had a slight
rocker. It is believed that the intention was always to have the bottom straight but that
in construction the center of the canoe lifted somewhat, thus showing a slight hog in
the bottom line. The effects of loading and use on the light and flexible structure of
these canoes would cause the bottom to rocker and the outboard ends to lift, thus
causing the hollow in the ram profiles. These effects of loading are confirmed by tests
with models of this form of canoe.
The midsection was usually quite round, almost U-shaped, on the bottom, but some
canoes showed the bottom slightly flattened and the sides flared out somewhat.
Toward the ends, the U-shape became marked, and near the gunwale ends the sides of
the U fell inboard slightly as they came to the gunwales, the bottom of the U having a
hard turn. In plan, the gunwales approached the stems without hollow, being nearly
straight or even slightly convex. The ram was long and sharp in its lower level lines

and this, with the form of midsection, made this model a fast-paddling canoe, though
rather unstable. Most of these canoes had but one thwart, placed at midlength, but
some have been found with three thwarts and a thong tie across the gunwales, close to
the stems, as well.
No stem-pieces were used; the bark ends were closed by two outside battens, one on
each side, whose heads were carried some 3 inches above the gunwales. A cutwater
batten was placed over the edges of the bark between the battens, and the three were
lashed together, with the bark, by a coarse spiral wrapping or by group ties. The bark
cover was not sheathed inside; instead, six battens, ⅜ by 1½ inches, were placed on
each side of the keel piece, which measured about ½ by 3 inches and tapered toward
the ends. The battens, widely spaced, ran well into the ram ends, and were held in
place, like sheathing, by the pressure of the ribs. The ribs, spaced 8 to 12 inches on
centers, were often split saplings; sometimes they were shaped to approximately ¼ by
¾ inch. The batten nearest the gunwale on each side was lashed to every rib. In some
canoes the heads of the ribs were brought up between the inwale and outwale, inside
the bark cover, with their ends against the cap. The stitching of the longitudinal seam
of the topside panel was passed around these frames and so helped to secure them. In
one example, the ribs were passed through the bark cover just below the horizontal
seam of the topside panel; there a turn of the stitching was passed around each rib;
then the rib was brought inboard again in the seam by being passed between the edges
of the bark cover and the panel. In many canoes there were no ribs in the ram ends,
but this was not universal practice; small light ribs were sometimes placed there, with
their heads caught in the closure lashing of the end.

Figure 154
Bark Canoe of the Kutenai and Shuswap, about average in size and proportion.
Original in the Museum of the American Indian, New York.
The canoes had 3-part gunwales consisting of inwale, outwale, and cap, but in many
the arrangement of these was such that this nomenclature is misleading. In the latter
construction, a lower inwale was used, as in the above drawing; rather small in cross
section, it was almost square, with rounded edges. The rib ends, after passing through
slits in the bark cover below the lower inwale, continued upward past it, outside the
bark cover. Above the lower inwale and inside the bark cover was a larger upper
inwale; this was flat on the outboard and bottom sides, the top and inboard sides being
rounded into one another. The outwale, roughly rectangular in cross section, clamped
the bark cover and heads of the ribs between it and the upper inwale. The ribs and
bark were trimmed off flush with the tops of the outwale and upper inwale. The thwart
amidships was caught, at the ends, between the lower and upper inwales. The gunwale
members and bark cover were secured by group lashings of small extent and rather
widely spaced.
The methods of fitting the thwarts differed in this class of canoe, and it cannot be
determined with certainty whether this variation was tribal or the choice of the
individual builder. In canoes having the lower inwale arrangement there was but one
thwart amidships. As has been said, its ends were caught between the upper and lower
inwales. Directly beneath it was a rib whose head was not brought up outside the bark
cover but, after being secured to the uppermost sheathing batten, was brought around
inboard in a quick hard turn and secured along the underside of the thwart with a close
spiral lashing. Under this rib at the topmost batten was secured a short false rib head
by forcing the beveled foot of the false rib between the batten and the true rib, after
lashing; the head of the false rib was then brought up through and outside the bark
cover in the customary manner, or it might be forced under the lower inwale, inside
the bark cover. In this construction, the endmost ribs were at the gunwale ends, and
the heads of these were lashed to the stem battens outside the gunwale ends, on the
outside of the bark cover.
Figure 155
Ojibway Canoe Construction. (See pp. 122-131.)
(Canadian Geological Survey photos.)

Peeling bark.

Staking out bark.

Assembling bark over on building site.

Making root thongs.

Setting ribs inside bark cover with a mallet.

Fitting gunwale caps on new canoe.
In canoes having the usual gunwales of inwale, outwale, and cap, the inwale and
outwale were roughly rectangular, with their top sides horizontal, and the cap, very

small and light, was flat on the bottom and rounded on top. In this construction, the
rib heads usually were clamped between the inwale and outwale, inside the bark
cover.
The ribs of the ends were lighter than those of the main body and more closely spaced,
say 2 or 3 inches apart. These began about 8 or 9 inches inboard of the gunwale ends;
the heads did not reach the gunwales, but instead were caught in the horizontal seam
of the side panel and then cut off. Usually three ribs were so fitted. The rest of the end
ribs, usually eight in number, either had their heads caught in the stem lashings or
were made up as hoops with the heads overlapped and lashed together, the ribs being
placed so that the overlap came to one side or the other of the canoe. Each hoop was
usually caught by a turn in the end-closure lashing.
To strengthen the ram, the lower ends of the three stem battens were lashed to the
extremities of the inside keel-piece, which was brought through the bark cover at this
point. The opening resulting from this was sealed with gum or pitch. Minor variations
in construction have been noted in the canoes exhibited in museums; in one, for
example, only every fourth rib was caught in the topside panel stitching.
In canoes having the usual arrangement of gunwale members, with the cap over the
ends of the ribs, the ends of the thwart were sometimes carried some 6 to 8 inches
beyond the gunwales, at each end, and much reduced in thickness by cutting away
about half the depth of the thwart. This part was then wrapped tightly around the
inwale, brought inboard along the underside of the thwart, and there lashed. Examples
show that the amount of end brought inboard under the thwart varied with the builder.
It should be added that the thwarts were usually no more than barked saplings and
were obviously installed in the canoe when green and treated with hot water so they
would not break when wrapped around the inwales. In canoes having three thwarts, all
were fitted in this manner, but often the thwarts on each side of the middle were also
wrapped in a long spiral with a thong whose ends were tied to each gunwale. In 3-
thwart canoes, there was commonly a cross tie, located roughly 12 inches from the
gunwale ends and consisting of three or more turns of cord, or thong, around the
gunwale members on each side and athwartships, secured by turns of the ends around
the cross tie. In one canoe there was a thwart amidships and one at one end, about
halfway between the middle thwart and the gunwale ends; at the other end were two
cross ties, one replacing the thwart and another a foot inboard of the ends of the
gunwales. In this canoe the ribs at the gunwale ends were hoops and there were only
three hoop ribs in the ram ends.
One canoe, from Stevens County, Washington, had a peculiar double framing. The
sheathing battens, instead of being on the inside of the bark cover, rested on light ribs,
spaced about 6 inches apart, that ran only far enough up the sides to have their ends
caught in the stitching at the bottom of the topside birch-bark panel along the
gunwales. The longitudinal battens were placed inside these, with the batten nearest

the gunwale lashed to the light ribs. Inside these battens and spaced about a foot apart
was another set of ribs whose heads were secured between the inwale and outwale
inside the bark cover; each of these inside ribs was also lashed to the uppermost
batten. Only the keel batten was under the small ribs. The thwart ends were wrapped
around the main gunwale members, and the stem battens were secured to the birch
topside panels by but one group lashing, near the gunwales. The bottom cover was
stiff pine bark.
The topside panel of birch bark was placed in these canoes so that its grain was
horizontal instead of the usual vertical. Presumably this was done as a maintenance
solution: the panel was much easier to repair or replace than the bottom bark; and by
having the panel placed in this weak mode, it would split before the bottom bark if too
much pressure were brought on the framework in loading.
These canoes paddled well in strong winds and in smooth water, and worked quietly
in the marshes where they were much used. Canvas canoes of the same model
replaced the bark canoes, indicating that the model was suitable for its locality and
use. These sturgeon-nose canoes were so different from other North American bark
canoes that they have been the subject of much speculation, particularly since ram-
ended canoes, though of different construction, existed in Asia.
The size of the Kutenai-Salish sturgeon-nose canoes varied; the most common size
appears to have been between 14 and 20 feet over the ends of the rams, 24 to 28
inches beam, and with a depth ranging from 12 to 13 inches amidships and from 14½
to 17½ inches at the ends of the gunwales. However, records exist that show rather
large canoes were built on this model, 24 feet over the rams, 48 inches beam and 24
inches depth.
The building methods of this type of canoe have never been reported. Probably some
kind of a rough building frame was used. Perhaps this was comprised of a couple of
the battens and the keel piece, weighted with stones. The building bed was probably
level. The main gunwale members were apparently made up temporarily and the bark
cover shaped and staked out. From that point the work may have followed the usual
canoe-building practices except that the ends could not be closed until the framing
there was complete, otherwise it would have been impossible to fasten the small ribs
in the rams. The structure of these canoes appears to have been almost entirely cedar,
except for the bark and lacings which, in some instances, were partly some bark fiber
as well as roots. In general, the construction of this class of canoe did not match in
quality that of the other bark canoes of the Northwest.

Figure 156
Indians with Canoe at Alert Bay, on Cormorant Island, B.C.

Chapter Seven
ARCTIC SKIN BOATS
Howard I. Chapelle
Among the three primitive watercraft of North America (the others being the dugout
and the bark canoe of the American Indians), the Arctic skin boats of the Eskimos are
remarkable for effective design and construction obtained under conditions in which
building materials are both scarce and limited in selection. The Arctic skin boat is
almost entirely to be found in the North American Arctic from Bering Sea to the East
Coast of Greenland. In Russian Siberia, only in a small area of the eastern Arctic lands
adjacent to the North American continent are any employed.
These craft, an important and necessary factor in the hunting lives of most Eskimo
tribal groups, have long attracted the attention of explorers and ethnologists, and many
specimens have been deposited in American and European museums. Like bark
canoes, they have unfortunately proved difficult to preserve under conditions of
museum exhibit. As a result, examples of once numerous types have become so
damaged that they no longer give an accurate impression of their original form and
appearance, and some have so deteriorated that they have had to be destroyed. Among
the latter may have been examples of types long since out of use. One such type was
represented by a single kayak, now destroyed; as a result this form has become
extinct, and only a poor scale model remains to give a highly unsatisfactory
representation of it.
In 1946 the late Vilhjalmur Stefansson, who was then projecting his Encyclopedia
Arctica, asked me to prepare for it a technical article on the Arctic skin boat. The
decision of the sponsors to discontinue the publication, after the first volume had
appeared, prevented appearance of the article, but in 1958, through the kindness of Dr.
Stefansson, it was returned to the author for publication by the U.S. National
Museum. I have since revised and added to it, after receiving criticisms and
suggestions from Henry B. Collins, of the Smithsonian's Bureau of American
Ethnology, from John Heath, and from other authorities.[2]
[2] For their aid to him the author takes this occasion to extend particular thanks. He also
thanks his Smithsonian Institution colleagues in the Division of Ethnology, U.S. National
Museum; members of the staffs of The American Museum of Natural History and The
Museum of the American Indian in New York, of the Peabody Museum at Harvard, and of
the Stefansson Library at Dartmouth; and the Washington State Historical Society and
Museum, and others in the Northwest who gave both aid and encouragement.

The object of the study, as will be seen, was to measure the skin boats and to make
scale drawings that would permit the construction of a replica exact in details of

appearance, form, construction, and also in working behavior. Special regard was
given to the diversity of types with respect to hull form and construction methods; but
questions of ethnic trends, tribal migrations, and such matters, being outside the scope
of the study, were not considered. Wherever possible, full-size craft were used as the
source, but where only fragments existed, these had to be supplemented by reference
to and interpretation of models of the same type.
In spite of the difficulty of locating skin boats of some Arctic areas, examples of most
of those mentioned by explorers since 1875 have been found and recorded, so that, as
far as possible, every distinctive tribal type of Arctic skin boat which in 1946 was
represented by museum exhibits in the eastern United States is represented in plans
here.

Figure 157
Eighteenth-Century Lines Drawing of a kayak, from Labrador or southern
Baffin Island (according to Dr. Kaj Birket-Smith of the Danish National
Museum). Note the long stem that is characteristic of present day kayaks from
Labrador. The lettering apparently reads:

From Strait's Snt. David
A Canoe—N.B. The sections are 2 feet asunder from forward
Length 21'-6"
Breadth 2'-1½"
Depth 0'-8¼"

(Courtesy National Maritime Museum, Greenwich, England.)

With the material available it was not possible, of course, to explore all the individual
types and forms in full; hence, the geographical range of a type can be stated only
approximately, owing to the overlapping of tribal groups and the almost constant
migratory movement of the Eskimo. Originally the 2-and 3-cockpit kayaks of Russian
colonial Alaska had been omitted as being probably the results of Russian influence.
John Heath, however, believing attention should be given to this type, has very kindly
prepared for me a fine draught of such a kayak, or "baidarka" (other spellings of this
name are common); this is shown on page 197.
Although the scale drawings accurately represent the form and details of construction,
they necessarily idealize somewhat the primitive boat design. Also, in showing the
hull-form, the usual method of projecting the "lines" of the hull was discarded as
unsuitable. Instead structural features have been emphasized, with the result that
"round"-bottom kayaks appear as multi-chine hulls, as they properly are. In view of
the fluid state of design in Eskimo craft it is obvious that the examples shown
represent the stage of development at the given date, though the alteration in most
designs has been so gradual that the representation could serve to illustrate with
reasonable accuracy a tribal or area type for a decade or more.
The Eskimos have produced two types of skin boats that have proved remarkably
efficient craft for small-boat navigation in Arctic waters: an open boat ranging from
about 15 to approximately 60 feet in length for carrying cargo and passengers for long
distances, and a small decked canoe developed exclusively for hunting. With few
exceptions these Arctic skin boats are wholly seagoing craft.
The open boat, called the umiak, is propelled by paddles or oars or sail or, in recent
years, by an outboard gasoline engine, or it may be towed. While fundamentally a
cargo carrier the umiak has been employed by some Eskimo in whaling and in walrus
hunting. For these purposes a faster and more developed design is used than that used
only to carry families, household goods, and cargo in the constant Eskimo search for
new hunting grounds. To a far greater degree than any other boat of similar size, this
Eskimo boat is characterized by great strength combined with lightness.
The decked hunting canoe, the kayak, is propelled by paddle alone when used for
hunting and fishing, but is occasionally towed by the umiak when the owner travels.
The kayak is perhaps the most efficient example of a primitive hunting boat; it can be
propelled at high speed by its paddler and maneuvered with ease. These hunting
kayaks are commonly built to hold but one person, though one group of Eskimo built
the kayaks to carry two or three. The kayak, remarkable for its seaworthiness,
lightness and strength, has been perhaps one of the most important tools in the Eskimo
fight for existence. Few tribes have been unacquainted with its use. Because of its
employment, the kayak often has to be designed to meet very particular requirements
and so there is greater variation in its form and dimensions than in the umiak.

Seagoing skin boats have not been common outside the Arctic in historical times. In
fact only the European Celts are known with certainty to have used such craft. The
Irish, in particular, employed large seagoing skin boats as late as the reign of Queen
Elizabeth of England; a drawing of one preserved in the Pepysian Library was
reproduced in the Mariner's Mirror (vol. 8, 1922, facing p. 200). Although there can
be little doubt that large seagoing skin craft had been more widely used in prehistoric
times, the perishable nature of the skin covering and the light framework probably
account for the lack of any archeological remains that would indicate its range. The
availability of the materials required in its construction, however, suggest that its use
could have been very widespread. The long voyages made by the Irish, in the dawning
of recorded history, could well have made its design and construction known to others.
There are still many skin boats in use by primitive people and even a few survivals in
Europe, but with the exception of the Irish "curragh," these craft are designed for
inland waters and are either rather dish-shaped, or oval in plan, like half a walnut
shell. In design they are related to the coracle of ancient Britain rather than to a
seagoing skin boat of the Irish or Eskimo type. Both the Irish curragh and the British
coracle, now, of course, are covered with canvas rather than hide.
Traditions of long voyages by the ancient Irish in the skin-covered curragh make it
apparent that such voyages were relatively common, and the design and construction
of existing models of the curragh and umiak indicate that these voyages could have
been made with reasonable safety. Compared to the dugout canoe, the skin boat was
far lighter and roomier in proportion to length and so could carry a far greater load
and still retain enough freeboard to be safe. The size of the early skin boats cannot be
established with certainty; the modern Irish curragh is probably debased in this
respect, but early explorers of Greenland reported umiaks nearly 60 feet in length and
there is no structural reason why the curragh could not have been as large or even
larger.
Compared with the curragh, the umiak is lighter, stronger, and more resistant to shock.
The curragh was built with closely spaced bent frames and longitudinal stringers to
support the skin cover, whereas the umiak has very widely spaced frames and few
longitudinals, giving the skin cover little support. The difference in construction is
undoubtedly a result of the type of covering used, for the curragh was covered with
cattle hides, which were less strong than the seal or walrus skins used by the Eskimo.
The strong and elastic skin cover of the umiak and the lack of a rigid structural
support gives this boat an advantage in withstanding the shocks of beaching or of
working in floating ice; and because of its relatively light framework and the method
of securing the structural members, its frame is far more flexible than that of the
curragh, adding to this ability.
The skin cover of the curragh was made watertight by rubbing the hides with animal
fat, and the sewn seams were payed with tallow. The Eskimo soak the skin cover of

the umiak with animal oil and pay the seams with blubber or animal fat. Both
treatments produced a cover initially watertight but requiring drying and reoiling to
remain so. Under most climatic conditions in the North Atlantic or Pacific the oiled
skins remain watertight from four days to a week. This period can be lengthened by
various methods; skin boats travelling in company can be dried out in turn by
unloading one and placing it aboard a companion craft. There is evidence of other
methods of treating the skin covering; waterproofing it with melted tallow, for
example, or with a vegetable gum or a resin such as pitch, would enable it to remain
watertight for a much longer time, though such treatments would make the covering
less elastic. Pitch was also used at one time in curragh building, and it would be
unwise to assume that the oil treatment used by the Eskimo was their only method of
producing watertight skin covers in the period before they were first observed by
Europeans.

Figure 158
Western Alaskan Umiak with eight women paddling, Cape Prince of Wales,
Alaska, 1936. (Photo by Henry B. Collins.)

Figure 159
Western Alaskan Umiak being beached, Cape Prince of Wales, Alaska, 1936.
(Photo by Henry B. Collins.)

Figure 160
Repairing Umiak Frame at St. Lawrence Island, Alaska, 1930. (Photo by Henry B.
Collins.)

Figure 161
Eskimo Woman Splitting Walrus Hide to make umiak cover, St. Lawrence
Island, Alaska, 1930. (Photo by Henry B. Collins.)
The fundamental difference between the construction of the curragh and that of the
umiak lies in the type of longitudinal strength members and the transverse framing
used. The curragh, like the birch-bark canoe, depended entirely upon its gunwales for
longitudinal strength, whereas the umiak has a strong keel, or, properly, a keelson
since the keel was inside the skin cover. The curragh used longitudinal battens to
support the skin cover. The umiak, on the other hand, has in its chine timbers rather
strong longitudinal members that give additional strength to the bottom. Its transverse

frames, unlike those of the curragh which were continuous from gunwale to gunwale,
are in three sections, two side pieces and a floor, or bottom, member and the frame
members are joined to gunwale, chines and keelson by lashings of sinew, whalebone,
or hide, a method that, together with three-part frames, gives great flexibility to the
framework. The frame of the early curragh may have been lashed, but because of the
other fundamental differences in design and construction it was less flexible than that
of the umiak.
The basic features of the umiak frame are not found in the kayak, the structure of
which in most types approaches that of the curragh. The gunwale is the strength
member in the kayak, and some types have a rather extensive longitudinal batten
system as well. In only a few types of kayak is the keelson an important strength
member, and even here the gunwales are of primary importance. The hypothesis has
been offered that this indicates a different parentage for the kayak than for the umiak,
and that the umiak represents the earlier type, it being argued that this type of boat
was the one more required in migratory periods, and so would be first developed.
Such theories should be accepted with caution, however, as the fundamentally
different use requirements for the two types of craft might readily explain the
variation in their principles of construction. Hunting would also have been necessary
during migrations, as existence depended upon food; the earlier appearance of the
umiak cannot be assumed on such limited grounds.

Figure 162
Fitting Split Walrus-Hide Cover to umiak at St. Lawrence Island, Alaska, 1930.
(Photo by Henry B. Collins.)

Figure 163
Outboard Motor Installed on Umiak, Cape Prince of Wales, Alaska, 1936. (Photo
by Henry B. Collins.)

Figure 164

Launching Umiak in Light Surf, with crew of 12 men. (Note outboard motor
attached), Cape Prince of Wales, Alaska, 1936. (Photo by Henry B. Collins.)
Eskimo skin boats possess remarkable advantages for their employment and
conditions of use. Their hulls are light in weight, simple to build, and relatively easy
to repair, yet they are highly shock resistant. They can carry large loads, yet are fast,
they are capable of being propelled by more than one means, and they are
exceptionally seaworthy.
Floating ice is considered a major hazard to craft of all sizes, but the umiak, for
example, can resist the shocks of ramming the ice to a degree beyond the tensile
strength of the skin covering, by reason of the method of attaching the skin cover to
the framework of the hull, and to some extent the form of the boat itself. The skin
cover of the umiak is not rigidly attached to the frame in a number of places, but
rather is a complete unit secured only at the gunwales and to the heads of stem and
stern. This permits the skin cover to be greatly distorted by a blow, so that the
elasticity of the material at point of impact is assisted by the movement of the whole
skin cover on the frame. Also, the frame itself is flexible and allows distortion and
recovery not only within the limits of the elasticity of the wooden frame but also by
the movement of the lashed joints in the transverse frames. Some kayaks have similar
characteristics, though their small size and the light weight of both boat and loading
make its resistance to shock of far less importance than that of the umiak.
Light weight is a highly desirable characteristic for small craft in the Arctic, since it
permits the boat without the aid of skids or other mechanical contrivances to be
removed from the water and carried over obstructions, and to be transported either by
sledge or by manual portage over long distances. Lightness is obtained in the Eskimo
skin boats by the small number and small size of the wooden structural members used
in their construction. The resulting light weight hull permits heavy loading in
proportion to the size of the boat, and it allows building with a minimum of material,
in a country where such materials as wood are scarce and hard to obtain.
For all small craft in Arctic waters, where distances between sources of supply may be
great and the time that the water is open to navigation is relatively short, speed is an
important and desirable attribute that permits movement with a minimum of effort.
The exigencies of Arctic travel make it further desirable that small craft be capable of
propulsion under paddle, oars, sail, or low-powered gasoline motors. The umiak,
because of its form and weight, can be modified to meet this requirement without loss
of other desirable attributes, and to a slightly lesser degree, the same may be said of
the kayak.
Simplicity in construction and repair are also basic requirements in the Arctic, where
an emergency may make it necessary to repair or rebuild a damaged boat out of
materials available nearby with the minimum of tools and under adverse weather

conditions. The Eskimo has produced a boat construction that, as will be seen from
the descriptions that follow, to a high degree meets this requirement.
Exceptional seaworthiness is required, as most Arctic waters are subject to violent
storms; the Arctic skin boats have been developed with forms and proportions to meet
this condition. In this matter, the light and flexible hull structure gives a special
advantage. The kayak, in its highest state of evolution and in skillful hands is perhaps
the most seaworthy of all primitive small craft. The umiak is a close second, but of the
two, the kayak is safer under all conditions of Arctic travel.
The load-carrying capacity of skin boats has been mentioned. The Eskimo umiak is
notable in this respect, exceeding the curragh and even craft produced by modern
civilization. The umiak possesses this advantage because of its very light hull weight
in combination with a nearly flat bottom and flaring sides. The resulting hull-form
allows heavy loading with relatively little increase in draft, as the flaring sides cause
the displacement to increase rapidly with the slightest increase in draft. Though a
similar form exists in the lumberman's drive boat, the greater hull weight of this type
makes it inferior to the umiak. Light draft when loaded has very definite advantages in
the Arctic, for it allows loading and unloading on the beach or afloat, and allows the
boat to be beached at points where this would not be possible with a deeper hull. The
light draft also makes the umiak easy to propel manually.
The imperative need for very efficient watercraft has made the Eskimo seek
improvements, and as his needs altered, so have his skin boats. Consequently the
designs of these craft have gone through numerous changes since the first of the types
were placed in American museums. It is noticeable that, among other changes, the
amount of freeboard of umiaks has been altered as their owners met new conditions
imposed by longer voyages, heavier cargo, and the outboard motor. The high-sided
umiak, while suited for heavy loads and very seaworthy, was almost impossible to
paddle or even row against a strong gale. When this condition had to be met, the
freeboard and flare were reduced to minimize the windage. In recent years umiaks
have appeared with round bottoms to give greater speed under paddle, the resulting
boat being an enlarged kayak in construction. These changes to meet differing use
requirements are not necessarily basic improvements, for they result in the sacrifice of
some of the other qualities of the type. Nevertheless, they indicate the fluid state of
primitive boat design in the Arctic, a condition that has been accentuated in most areas
by the increasing influence of white men, their boats and their motors.

Figure 165
Umiaks on Racks, in front of village on Little Diomede Island, July 30, 1936.
(Photo by Henry B. Collins.)

The Umiak

The umiak was undoubtedly more widely employed by the Eskimo before the coming
of the white man than existing records indicate. It was a type of boat most necessary
for family migration by sea, and with it the early Eskimos could establish themselves
on islands far from the mainland and could cross large bodies of water. From some
areas where early explorers mention having seen the type, the umiak has disappeared;
this suggests the possibility that tribes now unacquainted with the umiak had at some
time in the past reached a location where such a boat was no longer necessary.
The umiak was common in open waters and was found from Kodiak Island through
the Aleutians and north and eastward along the west and north coast of Alaska to the
mouth of the Mackenzie River. On the Siberian coast, opposite Alaska and for a short
distance westward, the umiak was also employed. From the Mackenzie eastward to
Hudson Bay the umiak has not been employed in recent times, though it is highly
probable that it was used in the migrations that populated this part of the Arctic coast
with Eskimo. Early explorers found umiaks in use along the northwestern coast of
Hudson Bay and Foxe Basin; the umiak disappeared from these areas during the last

century, but its use continued in Hudson Strait and in Greenland, where it became
highly developed.
Among the various tribes of Eskimo known to have employed the umiak in the last
century, the form of the hull varied a good deal, as did its dimensions. In general its
form was something like that of the lumberman's "drive boat," except that most
umiaks had a slight V-bottom and were quite different from it in the shape of the bow
and stern. The size of the umiak does not seem to have been established by a set of
measurements as distinct as that used in the building of kayaks, but rather as the result
of utilizing material available locally, with due regard to the intended use of the craft
for relatively heavy transport. Such matters as the flare of the sides, rake and shape of
bow and stern, and width varied from tribe to tribe. The Asiatic and Alaskan umiaks
were usually rather sharp-ended, with little spread to the gunwales at bow and stern;
one of the Asiatic types has the gunwales brought round in a full curve at the ends of
the boat. In the East the umiaks have rather upright bows and sterns and the gunwales
are often rather wide apart to form square ends to the hull. Some of the western
umiaks were navigated with paddles only; with others, before the appearance of the
Russians in the area, both oar and sail may have been used. In the East the umiaks
were being paddled, rowed, and sailed when white men reached the Arctic in the 17th
century.
The Greenland umiak frame is much heavier and more rigid than the Alaskan. In
comparing eastern and western umiaks the frame of the eastern umiak seems to be
somewhat better finished, but the models of the western umiak are undoubtedly the
better. The eastern umiak is not intended for use in hunting but is primarily a cargo
carrier; its use has been confined to women and its chief employment is moving the
family and household effects from one hunting ground to another. While it is highly
probable that this condition is the result of the disappearance of whaling in this region,
the use of the umiak as a hunting boat ceased so long ago that the eastern umiak
model may have degenerated to a great degree. It has been otherwise in the western
Arctic where the use of the umiak in hunting has continued and the boats have been
managed, to a very great extent, by the men. As a result, the boats are held in greater
respect by their builders and the better models have survived. The tribal distinctions
between the western umiaks are therefore more marked than in the east; including
Siberia, at least three basic models and a very large variety of tribal variations, are to
be found, as can be proved by existing models. In the east only two basic and distinct
umiak models are known to have existed, the Baffin Island type used on both the
north side and on the Labrador side of Hudson Strait, and the Greenland type. In the
latter, there were slight tribal distinctions it is true, but these were minor.
The Asiatic umiaks may be classed into two types, the Koryak type of Eastern Siberia
and the Chukchi model of the Siberian side of Bering Strait. The Koryak umiaks
illustrated by Jochelson show a highly developed boat, rather lightly framed compared
to boats on the American side. In profile the bow has a long raking curve and the stern

much less; as a result the bottom is rather short compared to the length over the
gunwales. Viewed in plan, the gunwales are rounded in at bow and stern to form
almost a semicircle. At the bow the gunwales are bent around a horizontal headboard
tenoned over the stem head but at the stern there is no headboard. The sheer is
moderate and very graceful. The flare of the sides is great and there appears to be a
little V in the bottom transversely. There is also a slight fore-and-aft rocker in the
bottom. The construction is similar to that of the Alaskan umiaks except that the
Koryak umiaks have double-chine stringers and also a double riser, or longitudinal
stringer, halfway up the sides. The riser is not backed with a continuous stringer, as is
the chine; instead three short rods are lashed inside the side frame members. The side
stringers do not reach bow and stern. The four thwarts are located well aft, and
between the first and second thwarts is a larger space than between the others, for
cargo. The boats are rowed, two oarsmen to a thwart. The cover was formerly walrus
hides split and scraped thin but more recently the skin of the bearded seal has come
into use. A rectangular sail of deer skin is sometimes lashed to a yard and set on a
tripod mast about amidships. Two legs of the mast are secured to the gunwale on one
side, the remaining leg is lashed to the opposite gunwale. Judging by the drawing
made by Jochelson[3] this umiak is perhaps the most graceful of all those known
today.
[3] Reproduced in James Hornell, Water Transport (Cambridge: University Press, 1946),
p. 160.

Figure 166
Umiak Covered With Split Walrus Hide, Cape Prince of Wales, Alaska. The
framework can be seen through the translucent hide cover. (Photo by Henry B.
Collins.)
The Asiatic Chukchi umiak is somewhat similar to that used on the American coast
but with less beam in proportion to its length and less flare to the sides. The skin cover
is of bearded seal. Bogoras measured an example and found her 35 feet 9 inches long,
4 feet 6 inches wide amidships, 2 feet 6 inches wide on the bottom over the chines.

(An Alaskan umiak measured 34 feet 9 inches long, 8 feet 2 inches wide at gunwales
and 2 feet 8 inches over the chines.) The Chukchi also use a very small hunting
umiak, 15 to 18 feet long and having two or three thwarts, much like the small hunting
umiaks once used in the Aleutians. The larger Chukchi umiaks have rectangular sails
set on a pole mast; some boats carry a square topsail. The sails are lashed to their
yards and the lower sail, or "course," is controlled by sheets and braces. The topsail,
when used, has braces only. The sails were formerly of reindeer skins, but now drill is
used. These umiaks were formerly paddled, as indicated by their narrow beam, but
since the advent of the white man oars have come into use, and it is quite certain that
the topsail also is the result of white man's influence, if not the whole rig.
In stormy weather some of these umiaks and also some of those in Alaska employ
weather cloths, 18 or 20 inches high above the gunwales, raised on short stanchions
lashed to the hull frames. The ends of the stanchions are inserted in slits in the top of
the weather cloth, and in fair weather the cloths are folded down inside the gunwale
out of the way. Also in some of these Asiatic and Alaskan umiaks, inflated floats, of
seal skin, are lashed to the gunwales to prevent capsizing in a heavy sea.
The Alaskan umiaks varied much in size but are rather similar in form. The small
hunting umiaks used by the Aleuts are about 18 feet long, while the large cargo
carrying umiaks range up to about 40 feet long, so far as available records show. They
are marked by heavily flared sides and often have a rather strong sheer; a few,
however, are rather straight on the gunwales. Nearly all existing models and boats
were built since 1880; and no information is now available on the forms and
dimensions of earlier craft.
On page 184 is a drawing of a small umiak, used in walrus hunting, from the Alaskan
coast in the neighborhood of the Aleutians. In the U.S. National Museum are the
remains of a similar boat obtained in 1888 from Northern Alaska. This type of small
umiak is also employed in fishing and is rather widely used as a passage boat for short
voyages along shore. These craft, propelled by paddles, are primarily fast, handy
hunting canoes rather than boats for migration or cargo-carrying. For this reason they
are quite sharp-ended and shallow. The construction of this example will serve to
illustrate the methods common to this type.
The umiak shown is 20 feet 8½ inches over the headboards, 4 feet 9½ inches extreme
beam and 17⅜ inches depth—apparently an average-sized boat of her class. The width
of the bottom over the chine members is 2 feet 7 inches. The keelson is rectangular in
section and in two pieces, hooked-scarphed together; each piece is shaped out of the
trunk of a small tree with the root knees employed to form the bow and stern posts.
The floor timbers are quite heavy and support the chine members by having the floor
ends tenoned into the chine pieces. At bow and stern the chines are joined to the
keelson in a notched scarph; at these places the keelson is sided rather wide to give
good bearing. It is evident that this portion of the boat's structure is the first built and