Bill Greenwood and his Wood-Canvas Canoes

by Mike Elliott, Kettle River Canoes
email: artisan@canoeshop.ca

Unless you live in British Columbia, you have probably never heard of Bill Greenwood or Greenwood canoes.  And if you want to start a fight amongst wood-canvas canoe enthusiasts, just ask them to name the prettiest canoes ever made.  In Maine, you would hear names like Morris, Gerrish and White.  In Ontario, Peterborough canoes are top of the list.  But in British Columbia, people speak about Greenwood canoes in hushed tones and bow down to Bill Greenwood’s exquisite water craft.

There is some information available about Bill or his canoes.  There is a website devoted to Bill, his company and his family.  Checkout greenwoodcanoecompany.com

The information presented here has been collected from people who bought their canoes directly from the builder at his shop as well as some anecdotes from Jim Kinzell, who worked with Bill as an apprentice from 1969 to 1975.  Dave Lanthier from Kamloops gave me a small biography produced in 1972 as an assignment for a physical education course at a college.  My information is incomplete.  That said, Bill Greenwood and Greenwood Canoes deserve recognition in the world of wood-canvas canoes.

 

As I understand it, Bill was born in 1912 and was an active outdoorsman who loved hiking, skiing, canoeing — just about anything that got him outside.  Then, he suffered a stroke while hiking in the mountains.  He was 24 years old.  As part of his rehabilitation, Bill decided to learn how to build canoes. He boarded a train in Vancouver, BC and made his way to Old Town, Maine.  He hung around the Old Town Canoe Company shop and absorbed everything he could about canoe building until they realized what he was doing and kicked “the spy” out.  Bill spent some time at other canoe factories including the Peterborough Canoe Company in Ontario before returning to British Columbia and setting up Greenwood Water Craft Company.  The shop location changed a number of times over the years until he established a large shop complex on Mitchell Island in Richmond, BC in the late 1960′s.

Not surprisingly, the lines and details of Greenwood Canoes borrow heavily from the “Maine Guide” canoes of Old Town and other builders in Maine.  They all sport wide, flat bottoms and have very little rocker.  The stem profile is heavily curved (often forming a complete half-circle) and the hulls all contain a lot of tumblehome.  Bill’s 16’ (4.9 meter) canoes did not have a centre thwart, but instead had both bow- and stern-quarter thwarts as was typical of Maine Guide canoes.  Many of the canoes had bottoms reinforced with half-ribs between the main ribs to create a strong comfortable floor.  And Bill absolutely refused to make a canoe without a keel.  In fact, one of my clients asked Bill to leave the keel off the canoe he was ordering.  Apparently, Bill said something like, “My canoes have keels.”  When my client told Bill that many Chestnut Canoes paddled very well without a keel, Bill said, “If you want a Chestnut canoe, then buy a Chestnut canoe.”  My client told me that story while I was preparing the restoration work order on his 17’ (5.2 meter) Chestnut Cruiser.

The workmanship in Greenwood canoes is outstanding.  He used “aircraft quality” Sitka Spruce for the double-tapered ribs.  The 4″ (10 cm) wide planking was made of air-dried, quarter sawn (edge grain) old-growth Western Red Cedar.  Following the tradition at Old Town canoes, the planking is perfectly tight with absolutely no gaps.  The stems (and slat seats) were White Oak while the rest of the canoe was trimmed in Philippine Mahogany (Luan).  All of the woodwork was flawless – graceful lines and elegant detailing.  The one drawback in many Greenwood canoes built in the early 1970’s is the fact that he used steel screws to attach the mahogany outwales.  Apparently, Bill was feuding with one of his suppliers.  He wanted 1.5” (37 mm) #8 brass wood screws in lots of 1,000 while the supplier insisted on selling lots of 10,000.  Bill ordered steel screws from another supplier in lots of 1,000.  I have had to cut that beautiful mahogany into hundreds of tiny pieces because the steel screws had corroded to the point of being fused into the wood.  I’m sure Bill thought he had won the war with his supplier, but it has made the restorer’s job much more difficult 40 years later.

The quality of the workmanship is all the more impressive when you consider the fact that Bill worked almost entirely with one hand.  The stroke affected his left side. Consequently, his left hand was crippled to the point that he had limited use of it.  His daughter, Susan, told me that Bill referred to his left hand as “Duddy” – his dub of a left hand.  My understanding is that he used jigs for almost every step of production.  That and a few very good assistants in the shop (including George Fletcher and Jim Kinzell) made it all work beautifully.

Greenwood Canoes came in lengths from 15’ (4.6 meter) to 18’ (5.5 meter).  He had two basic models – the Pleasure Model (12” – 30 cm – deep) and the large volume Prospector Model (14” – 36 cm – deep).  He built a full range of lengths in both models (as well as a 12′ car-top boat) until 1970.  One client of mine has a beautiful home in North Vancouver overlooking the entire Lower Mainland.  He had ordered a canoe from Bill in 1970 and was expecting a call any day to say that the canoe was ready.  Then, he heard a news report of a large fire on Mitchell Island in Richmond.  He looked out over the valley from his home and saw a big cloud of smoke.  The Greenwood Water Craft shop was engulfed in flames.  The next day, my client went to the site and saw Bill kicking through the ashes that used to be his shop.  He said, “I only had time to grab two canoes.  The yellow one over there — that’s yours.”

Bill rebuilt the business with a limited number of moulds and continued building canoes until he sold the business in 1975.  According to Doug Ingram of Red River Canoe and Paddle, the moulds ended up in Cranberry Portage (a small community in Northern Manitoba east of Flin Flon).  Apparently, they were never used again and are now in very poor condition.  Bill died in 1979.  His contribution to the world of wood-canvas canoes is significant here in British Columbia.  People bow their heads in reverence to these stunning works of art.

All of this (and much more) is described in my book – This Old Canoe: How To Restore Your Wood Canvas Canoe.
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