Nautical Research Journal
any point along that centerline. Stakes driven into the soil on the outside, along with a few clamps and braces, maintain the shape of the hull as it is formed. (Greenhill 1995, 38-43)
More permanent boatbuilders can produce multiple copies of the same hull shape or shell by setting up a series of molds or patterns at prescribed distances along a centerline. Long planks are then bent over the molds and their edges fastened to each other. When the shell or hull is complete, it is removed from the molds which can then be used to construct another similar hull. T is method may be familiar to some kit modelers, as it is very similar to that used to construct the hull of many larger models. Generally known as the bulkhead system, the molds, now oſt en laser cut from plywood stock, are glued to a backbone along the centerline of the hull, and extending upward from the keel to just below the main deck. Planking strips are then bent into place and glued, not only to each other but to bulkheads as well. While it may be appropriate in modeling the wooden junks of China, it certainly does not duplicate traditional European ship construction.
In “skeleton” construction, the method most oſt en associated with the European tradition, the conceived shape of the hull is constructed of numerous ridged pieces of wood forming frames ranged along the centerline of the keel, usually quite close to each other between rigidly constructed bow and stern assemblies. A rich vocabulary is employed to identify all of these individual pieces. T e words, keel, stem, sternpost, fl oor, futtock, clamp, knee, beam, apron and fashion piece, may sound familiar to some. T is generally rigid structure is then covered with planks to form a watertight enclosure. T e classic wooden ships from the great age of sail were built this way. T e most accurate models of them were constructed in a similar manner.
T e simplest craſt so constructed was the bateau. Bateau is simply the French word for boat, but there is more to it than that. Follow that word through
history to North America and you can see it evolve to mean a particular type of boat with certain characteristics. Howard Chapelle describes the American Colonial bateau as a “double-ended fl at- bottom, chine-built small boat.” (Figure 2) While he sees the relation of the dory to the bateau as “speculative” he states that the hull construction of bateau and dory are the same. (Chapelle 1951, 33- 36) John Gardner, in T e Dory Book, off ers a more detailed and older history of the bateau, perhaps with a more specifi c connection to the dory. A review of Working Boats of Britain, by Eric McKee, and Christian Nielsen’s Wooden Boat Designs will show a collection of fl entners, fl atties, trows and barges, any of which might be designated as a bateau by colonial Americans. Other names associated with North American boats having the type of hull described by Chapelle would be York boat, pirogue, Mackinaw boat, Durham boat, keelboat and James river bateau.
Philadelphia, now in the Smithsonian, is a large bateau raised from Lake Champlain in 1935. (Figure 3) It was designated a gundalow by the Continental Navy. (Chapelle 1959, 107-112) T e identifi cation of the craſt as a gundalow is a good example of how problematic some of these evolved names can be. One may guess that the name comes from the fact that it carries a single large gun in the bow. T e Oxford Companion to Ships & the Sea suggests that it is simply a spelling error on the part of Benedict Arnold. (Kemp 1976, 348) A later entry states that the name gundalow was used to designate a now extinct form of river barge. (Kemp 1976, 361)
Today the term gondola can be used to describe the double-ended, hard-chined, fl at-bottomed signature boat of Venice or a heavy fl at-bottom river boat as well as a rail car, fl at-bottomed and open at the top for bulk cargo. Ultimately, Philadelphia—hard- chined, fl at-bottomed and double-ended—is pure bateau, even at over fi ſt y feet in length with a beam of a little more than fi ſt een feet. Even larger craſt of a very similar shape are described by Greenhill in tracing the history of the medieval cog of Northern Europe. (Greenhill 1995, 225-231)
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