Henry Rushton, of Canton, New York, was a preeminent boatbuilder in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Living and working between the St. Lawrence River and the Adirondack wilderness, and his skill in designing, building, and marketing small boats allowed him a long career. Rushton may be best remembered today for his lightweight cedar canoes. His Wee Lassie is still a popular hull design built in all manner of methods. Maybe less well known these days are his pulling boats. According to Atwood Manley in Rushton and His Times in American Canoeing, rowing craft accounted for the bulk of his trade. In the original boat, the planks were clench-nailed to the frames through the laps. Here they are riveted. A single copper clench nail secures the laps between frames. These planks have glued scarfs; the drawings show plank sections joined by scarf joints set in varnish and held with clenched 1/2" copper tacks.
Photographs by the author
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Your boat looks to be a shortened version of Rushton’s Saranac Laker, which strongly resembled an Adirondack guideboat, but incorporated an important improvement – it was, foot for foot, more stable and had a more refined motion in the roll plane. Rushton was more educated than most of the guides/boatbuilders of the Adirondack region, and his rowboats were generally more refined in shape than theirs, but he was a tiny, frail looking man and the guides were usually big, strapping, charismatic men who could sell their brand easier than he could. His Saranac Laker had almost identical general dimensions and a profile that was very similar to a typical guideboat, but instead of the guideboat’s inexplicable pronounced S-shaped sections with high, slack bilges it had a flatter bottom than most guideboats. Believing that stability is not optional in a cruising boat, and having rowed an actual Rushton Saranac Laker in the 1970s, I’ve always felt that it was an overall better boat. The Laker would have been an even more comfortable boat for the oarsman had it been an inch or two deeper in the center, but then it would have lost the ultra-swoopy Guideboat look that was so fashionable at the time.
Andre,
I’ve never had the pleasure of sitting in a Rushton-built boat but wholeheartedly endorse the 109 design as a stable and “zippy” craft. And yes, it would be a tad more comfortable if it were a little deeper. Maybe the average size of 19th-century boaters influenced this dimension?
Looking through the 1903 Catalog you see that Rushton’s double-ended models were offered in multiple lengths, while retaining the same width and depth. The Saranac Lake boat was available solely at 16′. Interestingly, you could get it traditionally framed with the natural sawn crooks or, for $10 less, steam-bent ribs.
I imagine Rushton, first and foremost, was an astute businessman, adopting his designs and offerings to what the marketplace was looking for. His crew of craftsmen put out a lot of boats with a fine pedigree. It’s great that quite a few of the originals are still getting sailed, rowed, and paddled, and not just displayed or stored in museums!
I wonder if there are any of his square stern boats still about.
Tom
Great looking boat!!!! Rushton would be proud of your effort.
Thank you, John!
Tom
I think we built five of these when we were investigating how you built serial boats when I was at Mystic. We relied heavily on Rushton’s Book of Knowledge, a notebook that he kept that is at the Adirondack museum. Besides materials, it had hours, as I recall. Rushton apparently split his frames from dowels. His hardware, as did the hardware of most of these upstate boats, came from a foundry/ machine shop in Utica. These boats handled a lot like the similar-sized small Rangeleys, of which we did a couple of runs of ten.
Ben,
If you hung around the New York Central train station in Utica in Rushton’s day you would, no doubt, have seen a lot of his craft heading south to New York City customers and back north for the summer as sports took their boats on baggage cars up the Adirondack Division for places like Fulton Chain and Saranac Lake.
In the mid 1980’s I remember studying the Rushton craft on public display at Mystic as I was working on a sailing canoe. This June I got to see the A.L. Rotch (model for the 109) during the Wooden Boat Show’s open house. Thanks for the work you folks did back when so we can build this good looking boat today!
Do you have any problems with the dry-stored lapstrake hull leaking when you first put in in the water?
Stephen,
I used Sudbury Marine Sealant at the stems and gains while planking and after framing, prior to a primer coat on the hull, I scratched a shallow caulking channel along each plank lap with a broken hack saw blade and spread a thin bead of sealant with my finger into the groove.
In October I drove to Maryland for the Mid-Atlantic Small Craft Festival with the boat on a roof rack and had a dry hull. I’ve had the same success with other lapstrake boats I’ve built with narrow 1/4″ cedar planking and closely spaced fastenings.
I’ve found the sealant needs a week or more of warm temperatures to cure before putting on paint or varnish.
Hi Tom,
I would love to own a Rushton 109 or similar Rushton rowing boat. Any leads you can suggest? I love the boat and am ready to buy.
Thank you,
Mike M.
I know of a Rushton Saranac Laker for sale at Tumblehome Boat Shop in Warrensburg, New York. Not sure of the price. I have seen the boat and it is all original. If you’re still looking, give them a call and ask for Reuben or Cynde.
Cheers, John
As an about-to-be first-time boat builder, I was fascinated and inspired by your article, so much so that I purchased the Rushton #109 plans, re-read Walter Simmons Lapstrake Boatbuilding, and have gathered less than half of the raw materials needed for this project – one I planned to undertake 40 years ago. I may also follow your modifications: the plank keel, fewer frames, and cane seats.
I was hoping to sign up for a workshop at Mystic, but the pandemic has changed those plans, so I’m looking for suggestions and resources. You’ve provided quite a few. Thanks.