The Bark Canoes and Skin Boats of North America 14

The Bark Canoes and Skin Boats of North America 14

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.