The Leopold Canoe Fundraiser
The Leopold Canoe is Sold!!
The Leopold Landscape Alliance Tribute Canoe has been purchased by Greg Kielback. Greg called to check on availability, drove down from Rockford, IL, wrote a check and picked it up all in one day! He is very enthused about owning this one-of-a-kind wood strip canoe built by Jim Leichty & Bob LaFollette of Madison County, IA as a fund raiser for LLA.
Greg works for the Byron Forest Preserve District as an ecologist, interestingly, an area where Leopold made land management recommendations in the 1930's. He has written several articles about his work and Leopold. He and his wife, Heidi, have been Researchers-Writers-Artists-in-Residence at the Starker-Leopold House.
The canoe almost went to Florida, Arizona or other parts of the country, but we are so glad to have it stay in our region so we can see it again from time to time. So neat to have all these points connected.
Many thanks to Jim & Bob for donating their fine craftmanship to Leopold Landscape Alliance! And to Greg for his donations to LLA.
The canoe craftsmen flanking LLA members at the Reception unveiling the canoe. Left to right: Bob LaFollette, Dave Riley, Jim Spring, Steve Brower, Jerry Rigdon, Jim Liechty.
This beautiful hand-made canoe was made by Jim Liechty and Bob LaFollette of Covered Bridge Country Canoe Works in Madison County. Jim is a native Burlingtonian who tramped in many of the areas where Aldo had his adventures as a young boy. So Jim wanted to give back to LLA to help with our projects of buying the Leopold Childhood Homes and encouraging landscape scale restoration. Many thanks to Jim and Bob for their wonderful donation to LLA.
The 14' wood strip canoe is made primarily of poplar strips but also includes some red oak from one of the Leopold Birth Trees planted by the Starker Grandparents about 1890. The deck plates, seats, and portage yoke are made from this red oak as well as a few dark strips in the hull. It's a real beauty with an engraved Leopold logo and it only weighs about 60 pounds.
The Alliance sold this beautiful tribute canoe to support the purchase of the Leopold houses and our landscape scale conservation partnership.
Construction photos show the in-process hull. The inside of the canoe is finished with Leopold wood in the seats, portage yoke, and bow & stern deck plates with Leopold and Canoe Works Logos.
www.coveredbridgecountrycanoeworks.com
Bow plate of Leopold Red Oak with LLA logo Yoke & seats made from Leopold wood
Canoe builder, Bob Lafollette, explains construction Young LLA member gets her first canoeing lesson
The Canoe's new home until the ice goes out.
Iowa Water Trails Assoc. Publicizes Canoe Fundraiser
The Leopold Tribute Canoe received a nice bit of publicity when the Iowa Water Trails Assoc. posted a great article on their website about the canoe. You can read it at www.iowawatertrails.org./ Click on the news page, Archives and then scroll down in March. The title is "Paddling with Aldo." Iowa Water Trails also has a free monthly newsletter that you can subscribe to on their site.
Stern plate with Canoe Works logo