{"id":64295,"date":"2022-11-01T08:00:00","date_gmt":"2022-11-01T12:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.themainemag.com\/?p=64295"},"modified":"2022-11-01T12:14:00","modified_gmt":"2022-11-01T16:14:00","slug":"a-master-and-his-apprentice-keep-the-art-of-snowshoe-making-alive","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.themainemag.com\/a-master-and-his-apprentice-keep-the-art-of-snowshoe-making-alive\/","title":{"rendered":"A Master and His Apprentice Keep the Art of Snowshoe Making Alive"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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A Master and His Apprentice Keep the Art of Snowshoe Making Alive<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Follow along to the snowiest corner of Aroostook County for a lesson in walking on clouds.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

by Sandy Lang
Photography by Peter Frank Edwards<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Issue: November \/\/ December 2022<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n

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The snow gets deep up here in Fort Kent. On a visit in early March to northern Maine\u2019s Aroostook County, while the Can-Am mushers are still in town after the annual international sled dog race, local residents shovel snow from rooftops before the next flurries hit. A few miles from downtown and from the frozen St. John River, heaps of snow cover the yard outside of the rambling workshop and shed. This is where Brian Theriault keeps the snowshoe-making materials and tools that he and his family have collected since he was a kid in the 1960s.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Another snowstorm is forecast for the weekend. But this afternoon, Theriault is spending a couple of hours with 13-year-old Bret Babin, whose family lives nearby. Babin notes it\u2019s his fifth visit so far to the workshop, where he learns from the master snowshoe maker about the history of snowshoes\u2014and how to craft them of freshly cut wood and rawhide using traditional methods. It\u2019s an apprenticeship made possible through an award from the Maine Arts Commission.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On this day, the two have brought several pairs of snowshoes to a nearby snowbank to examine them in the bright winter sunshine. Looking at them propped in the snow, Theriault talks about their lasting usefulness. \u201cRemember when they found a 6,000-year-old snowshoe in a melting glacier in the Alps?\u201d he asks, recalling a story reported from Italy several years ago.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Brian Theriault showing the rawhide detail on one of the snowshoes; he learned how to make snowshoes with his father, Edmond Theriault, when he was 12 or 13, and now he shares his knowledge with others.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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Bret Babin testing the snowshoes in Fort Kent outside of the Theriault Snowshoes workshop. Each pair is made by hand from the wood of local ash trees and strung with rawhide.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

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In Maine it was common for families to make and use snowshoes well into the last century, and the Theriaults adapted their designs from snowshoes made in the St. John Valley by First Nations people and early French Acadian settlers\u2014both cultures that the family descended from. Theriault notes it was snowmobiles that led to a decline in snowshoeing as the favored way of getting around when a blanket of snow covers roadways and trails. (But he still champions snowshoes as the better option: no gas is needed, and you can get to places snowmobiles can\u2019t.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Babin, who says he\u2019d like to be a game warden one day, attaches a pair of snowshoes to his boots with leather straps and ventures across the untrammeled snow of the sideyard, each footfall breaking a trail. He goes slowly at first and works up to a trot, making a few loops and big figure-eights. Then, his face flushed from the exercise and chilly air, he calls over his shoulder, \u201cIt feels like I\u2019m floating.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

That\u2019s good. Theriault, who\u2019s been watching, explains that a well-designed snowshoe should have \u201cexcellent flotation\u201d on snow and shouldn\u2019t become weighted down with clumps of snow on the webbing. \u201cYou want the snow to go right through,\u201d he says. That way, \u201csnowshoeing is like walking on a cloud. It\u2019s a great feeling.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Teenager Babin is part of an internship program at the workshop where Theriault teaches the traditional craft of snowshoe making; Theriault says homemade snowshoes were historically common in the region, especially for hunters and trappers.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

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Theriault, 65, is the third of 11 children and learned the craft more than 50 years ago working alongside his father, Edmond Theriault, who celebrated his 99th birthday this year and now lives in Scarborough. \u201cMy father and I still talk about snowshoes all the time,\u201d says the younger Theriault. Wanting to help preserve the know-how of snowshoe making, the father and son have self-published several highly detailed books and videos about the process, including an illustrated, 278-page volume titled Brown Ash Snowshoes: A North American Tradition<\/em> that they sell online.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Green, Not Steam<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

First, find a tree to harvest. That\u2019s the start of snowshoe craft-ing, according to Theriault. He surmises that only about one in a hundred brown ash or white ash trees has the right characteristics: strength, a straight trunk, and the flexibility to be bent into the wooden frames of the shoes. \u201cA good-bending tree is hard to find,\u201d he says, \u201cand it needs to be green wood. We don\u2019t use steam, because if you use green wood, you can bend it.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This is done by bending strips of the freshly milled wood around a mold and using clamps to hold the bent wood in place. Theriault shows us around the workshop and tools the business has used through the years. There are vices and hammers, drills and metal spikes, and a worktable made from a modified sewing table. Lately he\u2019s been teaching Babin to stretch the rawhide\u2014Theriault prefers rawhide from cattle rather than deer, moose, or beaver. It\u2019s a thicker rawhide that, once stretched, he says is more durable for lacing and knotting around the snowshoe frames and for weaving webbing that\u2019s open enough for snow to fall through.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Focusing in on wood grain in the Fort Kent workshop of Theriault\u2019s Snowshoes.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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Pulling a drawknife across a strip of ash wood that will be used in a snowshoe frame.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

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Among the snowshoes arranged in the deep snow, Theriault points out the two common shapes of traditional snowshoe frames. The cross-country style (also known as the pickerel or Alaskan) is rounded in the front and finishes in a pointed tail at the back; it\u2019s good for breaking trails in deep snow. The popular \u201cmodified bear paw\u201d is not as long and is rounded at both ends.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Theriault is passionate about sharing his knowledge. He leads workshops, creates exhibits, and gives demonstrations. And he teaches apprentices like Babin\u2014typically one youth or adult each year. \u201cI want to let people know how to make snowshoes,\u201d he says. \u201cI\u2019m looking to help keep this alive.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Snowshoes & Snowbirds<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Potato fields stretch out to the horizon, buried in white. After the Theriault visit, photographer Peter Frank Edwards and I drive out along Route 1, which follows the St. John River; the Canadian province of Quebec is on the opposite shore. This is one of the snowiest corners of Maine this season, and I\u2019m ready to find a trail to try. There are ample choices. In downtown Madawaska, several men have just parked, pulling their snowmobiles in trailers. \u201cIt\u2019s been raining in Freeport, so we made the five-hour drive here,\u201d one man says. \u201cWe\u2019ve found the snow.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I\u2019ve brought a pair of snowshoes that are the modern variety, made of lightweight aluminum and vinyl. After a cozy overnight at the Inn of Acadia in Madawaska\u2014the building was originally built in the 1950s as a convent\u2014photographer Peter Frank and I go for a snowshoe hike on the Four Seasons Trail Association\u2019s property, about a half-mile up one of the town\u2019s hillside roads. He rents a pair of well-worn snowshoes in the lodge for five dollars, and we hit the trails. It\u2019s an extensive network with groomed trails for skiing and narrower woodland trails for snowshoeing. We see several skiers glide past, and a few others on the snowshoe trail.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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A wonderland of white on a snowshoe outing in Madawaska at Four Seasons Trail; Fort Kent and Madawska are about 20 miles apart in Aroostook County, each with public snowshoe trails.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

In my modern, machine-made footgear, I don\u2019t feel the sensation of floating on the snow. In fact, we both sink, deeply, whenever we step off the trail that\u2019s been broken by other snowshoe hikers. But it\u2019s a remarkable excursion\u2014especially in a winter that\u2019s been lacking in snow on the coast. Deer and rabbit tracks weave through the snowshoe trail most of the way, and we cross glades and dip into woods and follow the three-mile Middle Loop trail to higher elevations, passing under birch and spruce trees.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When I begin to hear bird chatter, it sounds almost as if spring itself is awakening. We\u2019ve reached the Bird Feeder section of the Four Seasons Trail system. Several feeders are set up here at an intersection of ski and snowshoe trails. There\u2019s a flurry of wings and beaks and birdsong\u2014and several squirrels foraging the seed hulls scattered in the snow below. I see chickadees, nuthatches, and evening grosbeaks the color of a banana peel. I watch awhile, realizing what a gift it is to snowshoe recreational trails on a singular, snow-deep morning.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWhat a beautiful day,\u201d I say to a man trekking up the hill when we eventually make our way back down toward the Four Seasons lodge. He\u2019s wearing snowshoes, too. \u201cYes,\u201d he says, smiling as he steps. \u201cIt\u2019s perfect.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Birds and squirrels gather at a winter feeding station in the woods.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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Babin smiles after a trek atop the drifted snow in Fort Kent.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

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Aroostook Snowshoeing<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Ready for the trails? Once the winter snows arrive, miles of snowshoe trails are open in Fort Kent and Madawaska. Rental snowshoes are often available at lodge ski shops, or you can bring your own.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

If you\u2019re inspired to learn how to make a pair of snowshoes yourself, check out the instructional materials created by Theriault Snowshoes, established by father-son snowshoe craftsmen in Fort Kent.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Find a Trail<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Four Seasons Trail Association<\/strong><\/a>
7th Ave. at Spring St., Madawaska
Modern lodge with snowshoe rentals and more than seven miles of snowshoe trails. Check the live webcam for conditions. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Lonesome Pine Trails<\/strong><\/a>
2 Forest Ave., Fort Kent
Lonesome Pine Lodge, slopes, and groomed trails within walking distance of downtown. Snowshoe rentals available. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Fort Kent Outdoor Center<\/strong><\/a>
33 Paradis Circle, Fort Kent
Miles of interconnected trails; snowshoe rentals in the ski shop at the 10th Mountain Lodge; group snowshoe hikes on winter weekends. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Stay<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Inn of Acadia<\/strong><\/a>
384 St. Thomas St., Madawaska
Twenty-one-room downtown hotel close to restaurants and the Four Seasons Trail system. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Whispering Falls Campground<\/strong>
<\/a>620 Aroostook Rd., Fort Kent
Cabin rental with direct access to three miles of snowshoe trails on the Fish River. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

General Info<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Visit Aroostook<\/strong><\/a>
Information about trails, events, and winter fun along with year-round visitor info. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Theriault Snowshoes<\/strong><\/a>
Instructional books and DVDs about the craft of making traditional snowshoes. <\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\t\t

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