Article published May 14, 2005
CLASSROOM IN A CANOE
Students expecting to learn a boatload
By LARRY P. VELLEQUETTE
BLADE STAFF WRITER
Laura Hallam has been working since January on a class project that's sure to make a splash in three states over the next two months: a 483.5-mile canoe trip retracing the route - albeit in reverse - that French explorers took in the early 1700s from present-day Pittsburgh to Detroit.
The 21-year-old civil engineering student from Monroe said she doesn't know why some people have told her it's crazy to spend the next seven weeks on open water in a student-made canoe.
"My mom is a little nervous; she tries not to think about it," Miss Hallam said. "As soon as I wake up after that first day of canoeing and I'm so sore, I'll probably know why people are saying this is so crazy."
A group of students and their professor at Lawrence Technological University in suburban Detroit plan to set off on this historic canoe trip this morning in two small plastic canoes on the headwaters of the River Rouge in Southfield, Mich. A total of 12 students will participate in the trip; Miss Hallam will join the group when it leaves Monroe next Saturday.
The intrepid explorers plan to make final landfall in Pittsburgh's Point State Park on July 9 to participate in a celebration of the 250th anniversary of Braddock's defeat at the Battle of the Monongahela, said Philip Vogt, their professor and fellow traveler.
Except for the very first portion of the trip, the group will travel in a single handmade, cedar strip/fiber-glass canoe that is 24 feet long and 4 1/2 feet wide that cost approximately $5,000 to make.The approximately 350-pound craft is big enough to hold six people and as much as 720 pounds of gear. It is approximately the size of the canoes used by French fur traders that first made their way from present-day Pittsburgh to what is now Detroit in the early 1700s.
"We're not pushing it. We're going to take [the trip] at a prudent speed," Mr. Vogt said.
The group will rest every fifth day of the journey, and doesn't plan to travel more than nine miles a day on the water. The students and Mr. Vogt will camp outside every night except for their five nights in the Cleveland area, he said.
The logistics of the trip were almost as difficult to put together as the massive canoe itself, Mr. Vogt said. A land crew will accompany the canoe along the way, ferrying supplies and equipment as needed and shuttling crew members in and out.
Mr. Vogt said he didn't mind that his present-day travelers wouldn't be enduring the hardships encountered by those first European explorers on the Great Lakes.
"If [having a land crew] seems like cheating, you have to remember that the French could drink the water that they encountered," the history professor said.
The travelers will "hug the shoreline" of northern Ohio as they travel west to east across Lake Erie on their trip, Mr. Vogt said, making frequent stops along the way. Among the local stopovers planned are May 21 at the River Raisin Battlefield Center in Monroe and May 25 at the University of Toledo's Lake Erie Research Center on Bayshore Road in Oregon.
When they finally reach Erie, Pa., on June 24, they will be greeted by the Compagnie Franche de la Marine de la Riviere au Boeuf, a group of historic re-enactors from the French-Indian War. The travelers will take that weekend to make a 14-mile overland portage with their canoe to Waterford, Pa., where they will embark in French Creek, Mr. Vogt said.
From there, Mr. Vogt said the group will traverse French Creek until it empties into the Allegheny River, and then follow that river until it meets the Ohio and the Monongahela rivers in Pittsburgh.
Students will learn about teamwork, leadership, planning, communication, history, engineering, social issues, the environment, Lake Erie, and more in a way that Mr. Vogt said is just not possible in a traditional classroom. Students can earn up to nine credits in science, humanities, and engineering.
The history professor said the idea for the trip was his, and came from his upbringing in southern Indiana along the Ohio River and from his love of the Detroit area's early history.
"Being here in Detroit and in the Great Lakes region, it's economically distressed and it's been for some time," he said. "We worry about jobs going overseas, but one thing that they can't move overseas is our history."
Contact Larry P. Vellequette at:
lvellequette@theblade.com
or 419-724-6091
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