I live in one of the areas of Montana that the Lewis and Clark Expedition, also known as the Corps of Discovery, traversed during the early 1800s (1803-1806). Beaverhead Rock, the formation that Sacagawea recognized as being close to the summer grounds of her nation, is one of the local landmarks.
Eighty percent of the Lewis and Clark expedition was accomplished by water. The explorers used various types of boats, barges, canoes and pirogues to accomplish the round trip journey, and I think the most fascinating of these are the dugout canoes that they carved during their travels.
The canoes were carved out of a single tree, using green cottonwood or Ponderosa pine because those woods are easy to shape when wet. The outside of the tree was kept wet, while small coal fires were set on the log to burn the wood away. As the wood burned, metal implements, such as axes and adzes were used to carve away the burned portions of the log, until it was hollowed out.
The completed dugout canoes averaged 30 feet long and 3 feet wide and weighed about a ton. They could carry a minimum of 800 pounds of cargo along with 7 men. The explorers also built larger canoes, 50-55 feet long, for travel on the Columbia river. These canoes could carry 2-3 tons of cargo along with 4-6 men. The larger canoes took 12 days to complete; some of the smaller canoes were built in 5 days.
The explorers carved 6 canoes from cottonwood trees at Fort Mandan
in what is now North Dakota before heading west. One of the canoes was abandoned near the Big Hole River in Montana and the rest put into storage when the expedition shifted from waterways to horseback in order to travel over the Rocky Mountains into Idaho.
Once they crossed the Rockies, the men made five new dugout canoes from Ponderosa pine. All of these canoes were wrecked or sold before they made it past Columbia Falls. On the return journey, the explorers retrieved the canoes they had stored in Montana and used them to travel to the Great Falls of the Missouri. During the journey they carved a total of 15 canoes. William Clark carved two canoes near Billings Montana that were so unstable that they had to be lashed together. I bet that after days of burning and scraping, they were pretty determined to use them in anyway possible.
Cool history.
I thought so, Denise. I enjoyed seeing the carved replicas at the park.
Either my 5th and 11th grade memories (Social Studies and American History) are deficient or we didn’t cover this aspect of Lewis and Clark’s expedition (carving their own dug out canoes enroute). Thanks for sharing!
What I remember most about Lewis and Clark is that they made moccasins all the time because they wore out so quickly. I discovered the dugouts via a display at my local park.
Thanks for sharing. We studied about Lewis and Clark but I don’t think we studied about the canoes.
I don’t think we did either. But I thought it was fascinating that they’d build them, abandon them, wreck them, build new ones.
Fascinating information. I have seen canoes similar in some Native American museums.
How cool!
Very interesting. Thank you for sharing.
You’re welcome, Susan.
Thank you!
You’re welcome, Bridgette!
A week spent burning out the interior of a canoe probably saved many weeks of walking through the wilderness!
I’m sure it was so much easier in most regards, Elissa. Especially with all their supplies.
Hi, this is so very interesting, Thank you for sharing this info. Have a great rest of the week.
Thank you, Alicia! I hope you have a great week, too.
I keep thinking of how much time they spent building the canoes and how heavy they would have been when they had to carry them around a rough spot in the rivers. We see paintings of them in their canoes but I never gave thought to how they got the canoes. Thanks for the history lesson.
I read a little about that. Those canoes were so heavy that they were difficult to portage for any distance, but at one place, they put built a “truck” with wheels and axels to go under the canoes in order to transport them and the cargo over land. Great observation, Alice!
Canoe building was very important in their travels. Lots of work but saved them lots of time in the long run. I can understand wanting to use them after putting all that time into them. Thanks for all the information.
You’re very welcome, Sarah.
We had a group of 5 kids, tween to early teens, make a canoe this year at our community center with guidance of course. They did a lot of the work. Not sure how it was decided but it was auctioned off for charity. It was a beautifully done piece of art that floated. They did take it out into a local pond to make sure it floated. They had a blast that day.
We have seen several dug out canoes in museums and at reenactments. Recently we went to a living history museum where they were working on burning one out. It took practice and talent to be able to know how much to take out so it would be as light as possible but still strong enough to carry the load and be stable. It is so convenient to be able to make a way to travel in such a short time and in a relatively easy way.