Innu Paddles - Virtual Museum of Canada

The Virtual Museum exhibit, Tipatshimuna - Innu Stories from the Land features a variety of Innu artifacts in various museum collections. While scrolling through the collection gallery, I came across two model paddles in the collection of The Rooms  Archive, Art Gallery and Museum in St. John's, Newfoundland.

Here's the description of the first paddle:

Wooden carving of a single bladed paddle. Blade has both faces ridged, sides slanted. Arm of paddle (approximately 10.0 cm long) widens at end. Blade decorated with three sets of red parallel lines. Tip also painted red. 

Catalogue number: III-B-148

Culture: Barren Ground Innu

Institution: The Rooms, Provincial Museum Division

Place made: unknown

Maker: unknown

Collector: unknown

Date Collected: unknown

A second similar model paddle is also in their collection.

Wooden carving of a single bladed paddle. Blade has both faces ridged. Sides are slanted and the tip is rounded. Arm of paddle tapered, widening a little at the end, edge rounded. Blade decorated with two blue bands approximately 3 apart), one band bordered by red triangular pattern.

Catalogue number: III-B-149

Culture: Barren Ground Innu

Institution: The Rooms, Provincial Museum Division

Place made: unknown

Maker: unknown

Collector: unknown

Date Collected: unknown

Similarly shaped and decorated paddles have been documented before. The Material culture of the Davis Inlet and Barren Ground Naskapi outlines enthographic items collected by William Duncan Strong from the Davis Inlet and Barren Ground Naskapi (Innu) in 1927-1928. Plate 49 (pg 89) features a diagram of 4 decorated such Innu paddles.

Naskapi Paddles in the Strong Collection
Source Link

1913 Photo - Two wooden paddles, Malecite culture

Found an old photo of a pair of Maliseet paddles in the Library and Archives of Canada. Unfortunately no details of the age of the paddles, but the photo itself dates from 1913.

Two wooden paddles, Malecite culture [graphic material]

Control no. 25462

CD File no. CD95-870-020

Sapir, Edward, 1884-1939. 

Publisher / Date 1913

Summary "Wooden paddles, Malecite; 1913".

[Extrait des notes d'Edward Sapir = From Edward Sapir's notes]

Source Link

Historic Paddle Art: Illustrated London News - Fisheries Exhibit Sketch

From this Ebay Link is an engraving of entitled "SKETCHES AT THE INTERNATIONAL FISHERIES EXHIBITION" published in The Illustrated London News June 2nd, 1883.

A closeup of sketch 9, "Indians fishing, (model from Canada)" showcases the classic Mi'kmaq humped canoe with a stern paddler and the bowman preparing to spear some Salmon)

9. Indians fishing, (model from Canada) 

Figure 11 has a different canoe and is labelled as a "Milicete Indian in his fishing canoe"

A Milicete Indian in his fishing canoe

The International Fisheries Exhibition of 1883 seems to have been quite a global affair. Another author, Frederick Whymper, documented some of the Canadian representatives in his book  Fisheries of the World : an Illustrated and Descriptive Record of the International Fisheries Exhibition, 1883. The sketch below is believed to be that of famed Maliseet Guide, Gabe Acquin.

 

"Indian in Birch Canoe, Fisheries Exhibition "

 Whymper, F. Fisheries of the World : an Illustrated and Descriptive Record of the International Fisheries Exhibition.  London : Cassell : Co.: Limited, 1883.

 Page 96

SOURCE LINK

Fixing an old failure - scarfing a grip onto a sassafras northwoods - Part 1

Here's an update on an old paddle failure. Back in 2012, I was working on my first sassafras paddle made from a thick 8/4 board, the only size I could source at the time. The inspiration for the paddle was a specimen in the Hudson Museum in Maine featuring a graceful, segmented grip

Hudson Museum Paddles

(Photo Credit: Bob Holtzman)
http://indigenousboats.blogspot.com

My blank had been crudely cut out with a wonky bandsaw, but the bulk of the work was going to be removing the stock with an axe and crooked knife.

The segmented grip was being worked down with a crooked knife and rasp...

Everything was going well when I had the urge to check the flex. The thinned out lower grip snapped at the base!

I was quite disappointed at this point and didn't want the paddle remnants to go to waste, so in the end both pieces were kept in the hopes of re-purposing them somehow. The grip was stored inside since it felt quite comfortable and I wanted to keep it as a future template. After mulling around for ideas to re-use the blade, it was, in the end, just relegated to a garden ornament...a kind of  paddle tombstone for a failed project.

However, earlier this summer there was an informative post on paddle repairs over on CanoeTripping.net. CanotRouge (aka David G) uploaded a series of photos of a repair on his wife's favourite paddle. It had also snapped at the base of the grip and he set about repairing it with a scarf joint in a professional manner. It has apparently held up well so this was very encouraging in my own case.

Anyway, the paddle blade was yanked out of the garden where it has weathered into a antique grey patina but came out without any sign of rot. The grip was pulled out of indoor storage and the two setup on the garden shed to represent what could've been...

With a scrap piece of sassafras cut from more recent projects, a plan was hatched to try a scarf repair like David's.

Using a mitre saw, I cut the steepest angle I could manage. Here is a shot of the scarf joint clamped up...

The glue-up went well and it seems to be very strong. A new grip will be sketched out and reshaped soon.

DECEMBER 2016 Update: New grip has been shaped out. See post # 2 in series HERE.

Logan Museum Odawa Paddle Online

The Logan Museum of Anthropology - Beloit College has updated their online artifacts catalog to include new color photos of the circa 1900 Odawa paddle in their collection. Up until now, the only images were grainy black and white photo from an out of print exhibition catalog (see my previous post here).



Ottawa Canoe Paddle
c.1900
Maple
Length: 136.5cm
Blade width: 10cm


As I haven't yet obtained permission to post these new colour photos, I'll leave you with a link to the paddle's citation page where closeups of the surface can be viewed. The paddle is listed under Catalog # 30182 .