Published in Points East Magazine, June 2019
I watched as the canoe was lashed to the truck roof racks. The new owner used a long length of heavy rope, he he threw up and over the upturned hull, then pulled down and around the racks, knotted at various stages and then repeated in a different direction several times until the boat was secured in a massive web of line. It was definitely not going to fall off.
The buyer handed me a small fan of shiny new bills, shook my hand and drove off into the deepening gloom of an early January evening.
The canoe was gone, leaving behind a pair of empty sawhorses in the back yard, half a can of red epoxy paint and nearly a half century of memories.
My family comes from the Midwest. We moved from Ohio to New Hampshire in the 1970’s. I was seven at the time. My parents were weary of the flat landscape and poor aquatic environment. In Akron, the only swimming option was a private club that had a small, muddy man-made pond.
My father had purchased the canoe several years earlier. It was a 16-foot 1947 Old Town wood and canvas Yankee model, originally painted a deep blue. I have no recognition of it until we moved to New Hampshire, probably because it got little use in Ohio.
After our move, however, the canoe became a prominent part of our summer life. There were dozens of bodies of water, large and small near our home in Antrim. Lakes, ponds, rivers, streams and bogs. We were dazzled by this wealth of clean, beautiful water and we managed to drop the canoe into most of them during my childhood.
Our favorite swimming and boating location was a lake about 10 minutes from our home. We were there several times a week during the summer and we often brought the canoe with us, cinched tightly to the car’s roof on a pair of steel racks using pieces of chain encased in old garden hose. An S-hook on one end and a turnbuckle on the other completed the rig. This was an extremely secure arrangement, applying sufficient pressure not only to keep the boat in place at most any speed, but also generate a small cracking sound as the turnbuckle was tightened.
Getting the canoe on the roof was a bit of weightlifting craft. At 80 pounds it was easiest with two people. My father did it solo. With the boat sitting upright on the ground, he would grab the gunwales at a point near the stern. Then he would lift and twist so that the boat was now hull up, bow on the ground, and stern over his head. He would walk his hands forward until he reached the yoke fastened in the center of the boat and settle it on his shoulders. Leaning back, he’d raise the bow, then walk the boat over to the car and slide it from his shoulders onto the roof rack. It was an impressive sight to my young eyes and I remember clearly the day when I had grown enough to do the same. I was so enthralled with this act that I once turned down the assistance of a lovely young woman who offered to help me place the canoe on the car. “No, that’s OK, I can handle this myself,” I told her. I was so proud. And so stupid.
As young children, my siblings and I sat on the ribs in the bottom of the boat while our parents paddled on the cane seats. As we got older, we would graduate to paddler in the bow, and then, finally, we were allowed to take the canoe out on our own. It was a rite of passage that marked our growing independence. There was no formal training, just the “OK” from our parents the first time we asked to take the boat out. The canoe was also our first opportunity to take someone on a “date.” While we were too young to drive, we were old enough to bring the object of our summertime affection on a cruise around the lake, out of sight of our parents.
Despite its pedigree, the canoe was not treated gently. When not in the water, it was stored outside, upside down on a pair of sawhorses. It was dragged over rocks. As teenagers we delighted in swamping it repeatedly.
The rough use and lack of maintenance extracted a toll on the vessel, particularly the canvas, which eventually began to rot and leak. Replacing the canvas properly required skills that we lacked and money my father didn’t want to spend. The thought of preserving the historical accuracy of a 30-year-old wooden boat was never considered.
So one fall, we brought the canoe into the basement, removed the shredded canvas and spent the rest of the winter applying fiberglass cloth and resin to the canoe’s wooden planks.
Although we had never worked with fiberglass, we figured out the basics. Mix the resin with hardener, place cloth and apply as quickly and smoothly as possible before everything sets.
The results were better than one might expect, if far from professional. The hull ended up with a slightly bumpy appearance, similar to the rind of an orange. The bright red tint we had mixed into the ended up being more raspberry-colored. We didn’t get around to replacing the partially rotted decks fore and aft, opting instead to use auto body filler for those voids.
But in the end, the boat was solid, waterproof and back in service.
As our family matured, the canoe spent more time on the sawhorses and less time in the water. I graduated from high school and went to college, as did my siblings. Our parents divorced and the canoe went with my father to his new house, where it was relegated to the ground behind the garage.
Several years after leaving college and working at my first job in Maine, I visited my father where I saw the canoe languishing in the weeds. I asked if I could take it home with me. “Sure” my father said, and help me put her on top of my car.
She was in bad shape. While our fiberglass job had held up (the discoloration had gotten worse), several years on the ground had rotten the gunwales. The decks, which we had never repaired, were in even worse shape. Fortunately I live only three hours from the Old Town factory where she had been built and where replacement pieces could be purchased. Once again, the canoe spent the winter in my basement for an overhaul.
My boatbuilding skills had not improved in the 20 years since my father and I had done the fiberglass job, but the results were adequate, if not elegant. Everything fit. A few extra screws were required to help keep everything together, and, when I ended up with a few gaps that couldn’t be closed by skill, I filled them with wood putty, an improvement, I thought, over the Bondo. I also sanded and painted the lumpy hull, covering the now translucent purple color with a true bright red. She looked fabulous.
In the years since the canoe has transported my wife and I on many adventures along rivers, through lakes and ponds. We are particularly fond of boggy areas where we can push through a stand of lily pads and watch herons. We have beached her for picnics and raced thunderstorms home. We have watched dragonflies alight gently on the gunwales as we glide upon dark water. We’ve driven along dirt tracks, looking for secret places where we can drop her in the water.
When we bought a summer cabin, we brought the canoe to the home inspection and paddled along the shore of the pond to explore the body of water before closing the deal.
The canoe has been a loyal and relatively undemanding part of our household. But time and the elements are not kind to either people or wooden vessels. The boat was still stored outside and even with occasional painting of the hull and applications of polyurethane, the gunwales and decks began to rot again. We don’t get out as much either – my wife has arthritis and I have back issues, which make it difficult to get the boat to the water. The days of hoisting the canoe over my head and onto the car are gone. I purchased a small trailer to tow her, and an electric trolling motor to extend our “cruising range,” but even with those concessions, she got less and less use. And as I get older, I realize more and more how much my possessions own me, not the reverse.
So this fall I hauled the canoe into my garage, flipped her over, and for the last time sanded and painted the lumpy hull my father and I put on 40 years ago. I applied a fresh coat of polyurethane to the gunwales. Then I took pictures and placed her on Craigslist. I wasn’t particularly optimistic, nor concerned she’d be leaving my yard soon.
Two months later, I received a call from a potential buyer. He had driven from Rhode Island to deliver a wooden launch and didn’t want to go home empty-handed. He gave her a quick once-over and the deal was sealed. She’ll be well used he told me, noting that he enjoys winter canoeing along the tidal rivers in Rhode Island.
I watched her leave with mixed emotions. Sad to see a significant chunk of my childhood gone. Relieved of the duty to maintain her. Guilt that I had not checked with my siblings about selling the boat. Pleased by the cash in my hand.
I was also comforted, knowing that the real significance of the canoe, the memories she helped to create, are still with me. That she will be used and will help create memories for someone else. And also that I can take the remains of that last can of paint to be recycled and reclaim the use of the sawhorses … maybe for another boat.