Canoes: A Natural History in North America

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.

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

A worker at Old Town Canoes puts the finishing touches on a fiberglass model.

The old-line canoe builder Old Town expanded into the fiberglass market in the 1960s. This advertisement, for its Rushton model, claimed a weight of 18.5 pounds on the 10-foot solo boat. Cost was $195.

Here a Nova Craft Moisie model tackles the rapids on Ontario’s Madawaska River.

Sometimes canoe manufacturers went to extreme lengths to tout the quality of their synthetic canoes. In this case, Old Town dropped a Tripper model off of the roof of its plant in Old Town, Maine, to show it could take a punch and more-or-less snap right back to straight again.

The Kansas-based outdoors company Coleman was a formidable competitor in the low-end canoe market by the 1970s.

The largest Kevlar canoe manufacturer in the world by the turn of the 21st century was Wenonah, with an annual output of around 10,000 boats in a good year (the company also owns Current Designs kayaks). Canoe campers love them for their light-weight, sleek design and durability.

The manufacture of synthetic canoes enjoyed a boost from the increase in interest in human-powered outdoor recreation in the 1960s and 1970s, activities that also included bicycling and cross-country skiing.

Mike Cichanowski, founder and owner of Wenonah Canoes, by the early 21st century the leading manufacturer of Kevlar canoes in North America.

Canoe racing, with both professionals and Sunday cruisers competing, remains a popular form of outdoor adventure.

Wenonah continually experimented with new models, including this solo canoe called the Vagabond, seen on the shore of Abel Lake in Virginia. Solo canoes became popular for wilderness trippers and day paddlers alike.