The Survival of the Bark Canoe was published by Farrar, Straus and Giroux in 1975. Henri Vaillancourt lives in Greenville, New Hampshire, and builds birchbark canoes — not reproductions or interpretations but genuine canoes made exactly as the Native peoples of the Northeast made them for thousands of years. He gathers his own birchbark, processes his own spruce roots for stitching, carves his own cedar ribs, and seals the seams with spruce gum and bear grease.
McPhee profiles Vaillancourt with characteristic thoroughness: describing each step of the building process, the materials and their properties, the history of the bark canoe as technology, and Vaillancourt’s own character (difficult, obsessive, uncompromising in his pursuit of authenticity). The second half of the book follows Vaillancourt and McPhee on a canoe trip through the Maine woods — following routes Thoreau described — where Vaillancourt proves a difficult companion: irritable, impatient with others’ incompetence, and happiest when alone with his canoe in moving water.
The book explores McPhee’s recurrent theme: the person who has mastered a particular skill or craft to a degree that seems obsessive to outsiders but makes perfect sense from within. Vaillancourt is not building canoes as a hobby or a historical exercise: he is driven by something deeper — the compulsion to do one thing perfectly, to master a material completely, to eliminate the gap between intention and execution.
Collecting The Survival of the Bark Canoe
First edition (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, New York, 1975): Cloth with dust jacket.
Market values:
- First edition, fine/fine: $50–$125
- Very good: $20–$50
Projected values (2026–2036): Moderate appreciation.
A Dying Craft
The Survival of the Bark Canoe (1975) profiles Henri Vaillancourt, a young man in Greenville, New Hampshire, who builds birch-bark canoes using traditional methods — no fiberglass, no modern adhesives, just bark, cedar, spruce root, and pitch. McPhee accompanies Vaillancourt on a canoe trip through the Maine woods that becomes a test of both the canoes and Vaillancourt’s difficult personality. The book is a characteristically McPhee blend of craft, character, and landscape — and a meditation on the value of preserving skills that have no economic justification.
Frequently Asked Questions
Is Vaillancourt still building canoes? Yes — Henri Vaillancourt has continued building birch-bark canoes for over fifty years and is recognized as the foremost practitioner of this traditional craft. His canoes are in museum collections worldwide.