I always liked the look of the red grips and blades that are shown associated with the voyageurs. I had a paddle for years that was painted in that manner, although much of the paint had flaked off over the years. One year it broke while I was on a trip in the Boundary Waters and that was the end of that paddle. Winter is as good of time as any for indoor projects in preparation for use when the weather gets nice. I decided that I wanted to improve the look of my paddles.
The paddle on the left is an example of the general idea of what I was going for. In working on this project, I wanted to know more about the history of this practice. It appears that historians are a little unsure as to the specifics of paddle painting during the fur trade, or its exact prevalence. It is certainly known that at least some of the mindspace attributed to this practice is due to the artwork of Frances Hopkins. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frances_Anne_Hopkins She was married to an officer in the Hudson’s Bay Company, Edward Hopkins, and traveled extensively with him in the North American interior while he was stationed in North America from 1858-1870. During this time and after her return to England in 1870, she made many paintings, drawings, and sketches that depicted the surroundings and lives of the voyagers around her. Many of her paintings show painted paddles. Therefore, there is some ambiguity as to whether this was artistic license, or reflected a trend that was popular towards the end of the fur trade, but not necessarily one that was widespread in earlier times. However, her artwork, including the picture above, gives many representations of not only painted canoe paddles, but the ornamental features adorning the canoes as well.
However, there is some other, support, context, and reasoning that certainly make it plausible that painted or decorated paddles were not uncommon among voyageurs. There are other historical documents that make mention of decorated paddles, including with patterns, designs, and colors other than red.
Historians have reviewed the bills of lading issued by the fur companies, and these most always did not include paddles among the gear provided by the company. Therefore, it is to be assumed that the voyageurs owned and supplied their own paddles. The voyageurs themselves were not made wealthy on the fur trade and therefore their paddle would have been one of their few possessions and one critical to their livelihood. It would therefore stand to reason that voyageurs would invest in, take care of, and adorn their paddles. Relatedly, voyageurs who spent the winters in the interior would likely have had time available for paddle care and adornment. Pigments, for example from clay or iron oxide, would have been available for these purposes.
Also, the blades and the grips of the paddle are potentially subject to the most wear, therefore as a valuable possession, a voyageur may have wanted to care for or treat the wood of the paddle, particularly in these areas with the application of varnish, paint, oils, or the like. A pigment as noted above could have been mixed and applied along with these protectants.
So on to my version. I started with the paddle below, which was in need of some TLC.
I used some chemical stripper to remove all of the remaining varnish off of the paddle, getting it to a clean slate. I settled on a red oil-based paint for the added water resistance. However, I first sanded the entire paddle and gave it a coat of spar urethane which has improved resistance to sunlight, water, and temperature. The oil of the urethane is also supposed to help the oil based paint to adhere to the wood. After this was allowed to dry, I put an additional coat on the shaft as it would not be receiving any red paint.
When the shaft was dry, I taped the blade and the grip off and painted them with the red oil-based paint. with two coats, allowing the paint to dry in between. When the paint was dry, I thought that I was done. However, I quickly discovered that no matter the length of time drying, some of the red paint stained my hands after holding the grip. Therefore, I gave the entire paddle a coat of spray spar urethane as a finish, with an additional coat over the grip and blade.
Now that’s a good looking paddle, ready for the water in the summer.