100 year old stripper pirogue

[seedtick]

thought ya'll might want to see this one...........

A gentleman from MS brought this old pirogue by for friend Keith and I to patch. A tree had fallen on it and and crushed one end.

It's over 100 years old and made with 3/4" thick strips edge nailed to each other with square (handmade) nails. Over the years it's been patched with wood splines, lead, window caulk, bondo and a few other things we can't identify. We got it jacked back together, epoxied the broken ends, filled in the missing parts and glassed the outside. We left some of the old caulking that was in good shape as it will be painted.

 

[islandpiper]

tick, I don't usually take a second look at a 100-year old stripper.........but this time I'm glad I looked.

Nice job. piper

 

[bearridge]

Sho looks like a canoe ta me. :wink:

 

[seedtick]

yer right does look like a canoe in the picture

but when you get up on it, it's awful narrow - only one butt wide

the bottom is rounded but there's some Chitimacha Indians down on the coast that build pirogues with round bottoms so they don't pull a vacuum when you run on a mud bank. A dugout will have a rounded bottom and this was built at a time when dugouts and plank boats co-existed

the man that owned it called it a pirogue and it's been in his family since the late 1800's

i don't really know technically what it is, other than a very old, interesting build

can't wait to get it in the water, reckon it'll be pretty squirrely

 

[oldsparkey]

BOY... I sure hope it stays around for anouther 100 years , it is really nice.

Chuck.

 

[Bilgerat]

Very cool! 8)

Please, more pictures!

Mike

 

[Jimmy W]

I am sorry to hear that it will be painted that old wood looks good as it is.

 

[seedtick]

know what you mean, i hate to paint it too

but the owner is wanting to keep it looking as "original" as possible....

 

[gbinga]

Doesn't really seem like a canoe shape... the lines are very pretty. I bet it will move through the water like a dream.

From what I've seen and read, "pirogue" means a small, shallow water, easily constructed boat for paddling. There doesn't seem to be any real definition.

Of course if you are building a pirogue right now, then what we see from Uncle John / JEM / Ron Chapman seems to be the standard. But when you look at what people called pirogues over the years, it is really up in the air.

 

[seedtick]

got the inside painted today

anybody got any ideas on what the board in front with a hole in it is for? Too small to any but the smallest of behinds. Not likely there just for a rope

 

[a Bald Cypress]

P

Mast hole with a step under the seat area

 

[Kayak Jack]

I'm with Baldy. I'd guess it's for a mast.

The lines of that hull are graceful. Nice.

 

[shawnkfl]

looks like somebody had a sail on it at one point. is there a block with a hole in it below that seat? you think it may be squirrely paddling, i'll bet she's a real handful with a sail! either that, or it was for a pole that a lantern hung on.

 

[seedtick]

no mast step or any evidence of one under the seat

the gentleman whose family it's been in told us that it originally had a small sail and that it was sailed across Lake Ponchartrain.. yeah buddy .. but then realize that they weren't try to win a race, just to beat paddling speed

Friend Keith and i did a takeoff on it and if we ever get time, we'll attempt to reproduce it in 1/4" X 3/4" strips and fiberglass. Probably pass on the sailing part

 

[Oyster]

I put my money of two things. Its quite possible that it had a small crabclaw sail which requires only a hole as long as its snug. Its also possible that in your area the hole stored a pushpole, yes no? A lot of times the crabclaw that we used were used mostly downwind. Its also possible that with the shape being a bit of a vee in the bottom from what I can see, that no step was also needed either. Maybe also the step has been removed because of rot somewhere along the way and just left the hole in the thwart.

 

[JEM]

Shame she had to be painted. Can't tell from the pictures but it looks like white caulk on some parts and that would look funny with the rest natural wood.