Dr. Edwin Seaborn's Birch Bark Canoe
DimensionsOverall: 60.9 × 528.3 × 84 cm (0.61 × 5.28 × 0.84 m)
Credit LineCollection of Museum London, 2024
Object number2024.001.003
Label TextThis birchbark canoe belonged to Dr. Edwin Seaborn. He built it in the 1930s with the help of Anishinaabe Elders Robert and Edward Thompson, and their sister, Mrs. Root, using birchbark sourced from Norther Ontario. When they completed the craft, Mrs. Root paddled it on the Sauble River and declared it to be okay.
Dr. Seaborn knew the Thompson family because he had a cottage along the Sauble River across from Chief’s Point (Indian Reserve) where the Thompson’s lived. Robert and Edward sang songs and told stories for the cottagers, performed stunts on canoes, and made bows and arrows for the visiting children. Seaborn had known their father and mother who sold milk to cottagers from a dugout canoe. Robert taught Seaborn and others about the Anishinaabeg ways of being.
NameCanoe
1916-1918
