Canoes: A Natural History in North America

Tom Seavey attaching the extended outwale to the canvassed Veazie canoe.

Lateen sail design illustration by Todd Bradshaw for an Old Town wood-and-canvas canoe.

A Rushton batwing sailing canoe in front with a lateen-rigged sailing canoe behind it.

Canoes in a splash of colors await paddlers on Moraine Lake at Banff National Park in Alberta, Canada.

The pioneering chemist Stephanie Kwolek holds the liquid crystal polymer that became Kevlar.

Kevlar fibers are used in a variety of applications, perhaps most famously in bullet-proof vests.

The Souris River Canoe factory in Atikokan, Ontario, Canada, produces several popular canoe tripping models made of Kevlar fibers and epoxy resin.

With the Second Industrial Revolution in full swing, boat builders began experimenting with materials they hadn't used before, such as aluminum. The French racing yacht Vendenesse, built for a Count, was one such attempt.

With the construction of the Vendenesse, it was probably inevitable that the French navy would take an interest in aluminum boats. One result was Le Foudre, a torpedo boat tender (actually made in Britain) with a skin of sheet aluminum thicknesses varying from 1 mm. to 5 mm.

Prior to the development of hard-topped automobiles, it was a bit of a problem to travel with a canoe on a soft-top car. One solution, which limited the use of all of the car doors, was to strap the boat on side-saddle, such as this wood-and-canvas model.

After World War II, Americans enjoyed an increase in leisure time (and more spending money) as the economy started to hum.

Leroy Grumman is an important name in the history of canoeing due to his company’s development of the aluminum canoe as a way to keep his factories busy after the second world war.

Grumman canoes, because of their low cost and nearly maintenance-free existence, became a common choice of canoe liveries by the 1950s.

The Canadian artist and author Bill Mason did as much to popularize recreational canoeing as anyone.

With Grumman’s success, other companies involved in aluminum production saw an opening in a new market.

Homer Dodge, with his wife and frequent canoeing companion Margaret Wing Dodge, helped popularize canoeing in the United States; he was sponsored by Grumman for a time.

In 1967, Minnesota-based Alumacraft (shown here as Aluma Craft Apex Co.) was apparently shoveling canoes out the door as fast as they could be produced.

Grumman shipped canoes by truck, among other means, to retailers large and small across the United States from its plant on Long Island.

Canoes, as popular as they were, became symbols for benefits like quiet, smooth rides—on calm days, of course.

Around 1917, the Haskell Manufacturing Company of Ludington, Michigan, debuted a composite canoe called the V’neer.