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Canoe

Object: canoe

Use: transportation, fishing

Era: collected 1934; built c. 1850

Collector: William Barraclough

Materials: Western Redcedar wood

Size/ Dimensions: length: 4.6 metres, width: 75 centimetres at widest point of hull

Collection site: Nanaimo, No. 1 Reserve

Current Location/Museum: Nanaimo District Museum, Nanaimo, Canada

Accession Number: 1975.146.001

Display Technique: plexiglas case in main museum gallery

Condition: deterioration of wood and seals, loss of plugs

The canoe is one of the most important items made and used by the Snuneymuxw people. Crafted from carefully chosen giant Redcedar trees, the canoes were paddled with skill and pride. The canoe was the transportation link between village sites and the territory of other Nations. It took the Snuneymuxw to their seasonal sites for hunting, fishing and harvesting. Canoes were used in the sheltered waters of the island-filled Snuneymuxw territory, on the Nanaimo River and its streams, and to make the longer journeys on open water when heading for the Fraser River and distant locations.

This canoe was carved from a single log, hollowed with sharpened tools called adzes. Many carvers also relied on controlled burning, after which the charred wood was chipped out. The shells of canoes were shaped and widened by filling them with water, which was heated almost to boiling by dropping heated stones into the hull. When the moist, heated dugout was flexible enough, cedar sticks were inserted as spreaders to shape the canoe to the desired width. The bow and stern, or front and back ends of Snuneymuxw canoes, were carved to slope upwards. This allowed the paddlers to slice through the waves, and to pull up onto the beaches at landing points. The butt end, the widest point of a log, would sometimes determine the size of the bow. The bow and stern could also be added to the canoe as separate pieces. There were variations between canoes built for hunting and those made for carrying cargo.

William Barraclough acquired the canoe featured here and eventually donated it to the Nanaimo District Museum. He went to look at the canoe with a friend, in about 1934. He wrote: "We spoke to an old Indian who lived near by; he stated his father often paddled him over to the Fraser River for salmon in the canoe."