Duluth’s Nóatún Community Wooden Boat Works uses Legacy Funds to carry on the multicultural tradition of wooden boat building on the shores of Lake Superior.
Transcript
This is Minnesota's Legacy, a look at the organizations and the people who have benefited from Minnesota's Clean Water, Land and Legacy Amendment.
Britt Aamodt: Boat building begins in the fall when northern Minnesota's tamaracks turn golden.
John Finkle: We dig up trees and we get the root.
Britt Aamodt: John Finkel, Director of Nóatún Community Wooden Boat Works, takes volunteers into the bog to cut and expose the tamarack root to the air
John Finkle: That has a 90-degree angle that goes up into the trunk, and that's a knee and that has a natural strength to it.
Britt Aamodt: Then in winter, when the bog is frozen, they return with a sled and drag the root back to the Nóatún workshop on the shores of Lake Superior. The knees are shaped into a boat's frame and ribs. This is both a traditional Nordic and old Indigenous boat building technique.
John Finkle: Drawing from many, many, many, many different places and cultures.
Britt Aamodt: Minnesota Legacy Fund grants help Nóatún in its mission to explore wooden boat building traditions and to draw in volunteers to build the boats.
John Finkle: One of the rewards is getting in the boats and exploring Lake Superior.
Minnesota's Legacy is produced by AMPERS with support from the Minnesota Arts and Cultural Heritage Fund. Online at AMPERS dot ORG.