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My Favorite Boat
The metal boat frame to your right is a replica of a collapsible boat built here for Lewis and Clark. Menwether Lewis came to the armory in 1803 to prepare for an epic cross-continent journey and oversee the construction and testing of the boat. Lewis successfully tested it in the nearby Potomac River. Unfortunately the boat failed them in the wild. Lewis wrote "She leaked in such manner that she would not answer ... [I] relinquished all further hope of my favorite boat.." He ordered his men to dig a cache and bury the frame along a Missouri River bank. The original boat frame has never been found.
Meriwether Lewis (left) designed the collapsible boat himself and oversaw construction of its frame at Harpers Ferry armory in 1803.
During testing here the metal frame was covered with animal hides and sealed with pine-pitch to make it water tight. |