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Canoes: A Natural History in North America

Mark Neuzil and Norman Sims 2016
This is the story of the canoe, that singular American artifact so little changed over time. Featured here are canoes old and new, from birch bark to dugout to carbon fiber; the people who made them; and the adventures they shared. With features of technology, industry, art, and survival, the canoe carries us deep into the natural and cultural history of North America.

Follow author Mark Neuzil on Twitter: @mrneuzil

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  • 9780816681174 (hardcover)
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  • Literature
  • Native American Studies
  • Regional Studies
  • Cultural Studies
  • History
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  • Foreword1
  • Introduction8
  • Chapter 1: Dugout Canoes26
  • Sidebar: Napolean Sanford5
  • Chapter 2: Birch-Bark Canoes43
  • Sidebar: Elm-Bark Canoes2
  • Sidebar: The Oldest Birch-Bark Canoe2
  • Chapter 3: The Fur Trade31
  • Sidebar: The Algonquin Fur Trade3
  • Sidebar: Frances Anne Hopkins1
  • Chapter 4: All-Wood Canoes54
  • Sidebar: Jule Fox Marshall6
  • Chapter 5: Wood-and-Canvas Canoes56
  • Sidebar: Tom Seavey4
  • Sidebar: Canoe Sails2
  • Chapter 6: Synthetic Canoes30
  • Sidebar: Canoe Patents5
  • Sidebar: Canoes in Wartime2
  • Sidebar: Square-Stern Canoes3
  • Chapter 7: The Human-Powered Movement32
  • Sidebar: Paddles2
  • Sidebar: Canoe Packs2
  • Chapter 8: Canoe Tripping25
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  • Adney, Edwin Tappan11
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A watercolor painting of two people paddling through rapids in a birch-bark canoe.

Canoe in Rapids

From Foreword

Winslow Homer, Canoe in Rapids, 1897. Watercolor over graphite on off-white wove paper, 35.4 × 53.3 cm (13 15/16 × 21 in).

Canoeists paddling a Wenonah Kevlar canoe above a rapids in the Boundary Waters Canoe Area.

Shooting the Rapids

From Introduction

Canoeists paddling a Wenonah Kevlar canoe above a rapids in the Boundary Waters Canoe Area.

Canoeists in a birch-bark canoe near Steamboat Rock, Wisconsin Dells.

Steamboat Rock

From Introduction

Photograph by H. H. Bennett, canoeists in a birch-bark canoe near Steamboat Rock, Wisconsin Dells.

Sigurd Olson’s Border Lakes Outfitting Company supplied paddlers with the necessary gear during the 1940s. Here a canoe is retrieved from the company warehouse, April 4, 1940.

Border Lakes Outfitting Company

From Introduction

Sigurd Olson’s Border Lakes Outfitting Company, April 4, 1940.

An oil painting of four canoes traveling past Picture Rock.

Picture Rock at Crooked Lake (Return of the Voyageur)

From Introduction

Francis Lee Jaques, Picture Rock at Crooked Lake (Return of the Voyageur), 1947. Oil on canvas, 83.8 x 106.6 cm.

Myron Nickerson, a former employee of J. Henry Rushton appears on the far right in this 1894 photograph. Nickerson’s livery on the Grasse River in Canton, New York, offered rentals of Adirondack guideboats, Rushton-style pleasure rowboats, small skiffs, and canoes. Nickerson holds a double-bladed canoe paddle in a boat that has also been fitted with non-feathering guideboat-style oars.

Myron Nickerson

From Introduction

Myron Nickerson, a former employee of J. Henry Rushton appears on the far right in this 1894 photograph.

This map of Maine’s Moosehead Lake and the headwaters of the Aroostook and Penobscot Rivers was drawn in 1880 by W. R. Curtis to accompany Canoe and Camera, a book by Thomas Sedgwick Steele. It was one of the first maps prepared expressly for canoeists.

Map of Maine’s Moosehead Lake

From Introduction

Map of Maine’s Moosehead Lake and the headwaters of the Aroostook and Penobscot Rivers, drawn in 1880 by W. R. Curtis.

An oil painting of a figure portaging a canoe.

Crossing the Shallows, Snake River

From Introduction

Mark Hamel, Crossing the Shallows, Snake River, 2014. Oil on mounted linen, 40.64 × 50.8 cm.

Canoeing became a more popular pastime in the twentieth century after the establishment of several national parks throughout North America. Here, two paddlers are photographed in 1952 at Banff National Park in Alberta, Canada.

Two Paddlers at Banff National Park, Alberta

From Introduction

Two paddlers are photographed in 1952 at Banff National Park in Alberta, Canada. Photograph by Gar Lunney, National Film Board of Canada Collection, Library and Archives of Canada, R1196-14-7-E.

A black-and-white photograph of two people poling a dugout canoe on the Columbia River in 1900.

Log Canoe on the Columbia River

From Chapter 1: Dugout Canoes

Lee Moorhouse, Log canoe on the Columbia River, ca. 1900.

This woodcut illustration of a Taino dugout canoe first appeared in Girolamo Benzoni’s La Historia del Mondo Nuovo in 1562. It is titled Modo di nauigare nel Mare di Tramontana, or “navigating into the north wind.” Since the canoe and paddle shapes are not accurate, this illustration probably came from Columbus’s written description rather than from personal contact.

Modo di nauigare nel Mare di Tramontana

From Chapter 1: Dugout Canoes

Woodcut illustration of a Taino dugout canoe, Girolamo Benzoni’s La Historia del Mondo Nuovo, 1562.

A Florida dugout canoe and typical Timucua houses are shown in a 1591 engraving by Theodor de Bry after Jacques Le Moyne.

Florida Dugout Canoe and Typical Timucua Houses

From Chapter 1: Dugout Canoes

Florida dugout canoe and typical Timucua houses, 1591, engraving by Theodor de Bry after Jacques Le Moyne.

Dugout canoes are still used in daily life throughout the Americas. This contemporary dugout was photographed at Playa de San Mateo del Mar near Oaxaca, Mexico.

Contemporary Dugout at Playa de San Mateo del Mar

From Chapter 1: Dugout Canoes

Contemporary dugout photographed at Playa de San Mateo del Mar near Oaxaca, Mexico.

Inscriptions on bone from the Late Classic Era Mayan burial site at Tikal (c. 800–c. 1000 CE), redrawn by Linda Schele, artist and Mesoamerican scholar. These and several other images document Mayan canoe transport.

Mayan Bone Inscriptions

From Chapter 1: Dugout Canoes

Inscriptions on bone from the Late Classic Era Mayan burial site at Tikal (ca. 800–ca. 1000 CE), redrawn by Linda Schele, artist and Mesoamerican scholar.

The Putun were a group of Chontal Maya from the Gulf Coast of what are today the Mexican states of Tabasco and Campeche. They were the star navigators of the Mayans. Called the “Phoenicians of Mesoamerica,” to them goes the credit for the maritime trading empire along the Caribbean west coast. This fresco featuring dugout canoes is from the interior of the Temple of the Warriors at Chichén Itzá.

Fresco Featuring Dugout at Chichén Itzá

From Chapter 1: Dugout Canoes

Fresco featuring Putun dugout canoes, interior walls of the Temple of the Warriors, Chichen Itza.

Map of Caribbean.

Map of Caribbean

From Chapter 1: Dugout Canoes

Map of Caribbean.

This drawing by John White dates between 1585 and 1593, and was probably intended to display a bounteous scene to encourage English colonists. Inscribed “The manner of their fishing.” The Algonquin of North Carolina used dugout canoes to harvest fish from February to May. The word “cannow” is written on the hull of the boat.

The Manner of Their Fishing

From Chapter 1: Dugout Canoes

Drawing by John White (~1585–1593), inscribed The manner of their fishing and A Cannow.

In one of the earliest views of New York, this woodcut by Kryn Frederycks, titled T’ Fort Nieuw Amsterdam op de Manhatans, depicts native dugouts amidst European sailing vessels, ca. 1626.

T’Fort Nieuw Amsterdam op de Manhatans

From Chapter 1: Dugout Canoes

Kryn Frederycks woodcut titled T’ Fort Nieuw Amsterdam op de Manhatans, ca. 1626.

A dugout next to an oyster house on the water near New Haven, Connecticut, 1872.

Oyster Dugouts

From Chapter 1: Dugout Canoes

The oyster industry of the East Coast relied on dugout canoes to navigate the rivers of Connecticut during the nineteenth century. This photograph dates to 1872 and depicts a dugout next to an oyster house near New Haven.

Archeologists Melissa Memory, Donna, Ruhl, and Ray McGee examine a dugout canoe found during a drought in 2000 at Newnans Lake, Florida. The canoe is one of the longest and better-preserved dugouts from the lakebed. More than 100 dugouts were discovered ranging in age from 500 to 5,000 years old. Photograph by Jeff Gage/Florida Museum of Natural History.

Newnans Lake Dig

From Chapter 1: Dugout Canoes

Archeologists examine a dugout canoe found during a drought in 2000 at Newnans Lake, Florida.

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