THE OLD TOWN CANOE COMPANY: OUR FIRST ONE HUNDRED YEARS, by Susan T. Audette with David E. Baker, Tilbury House Publishers, Gardiner, 1998, 176 pages, $50 hardcover, $30 softcover.

This gorgeous history of a venerable Maine business contains more thrills and spills, twists and turns than a day at the annual Kenduskeag Stream Canoe Race.

The Old Town Canoe Co. today is the world’s leading manufacturer of canoes and kayaks, but the paddling hasn’t always been smooth. Labor unrest, stock market calamities and the dreaded “F” word — Fiberglas — are just a few of the obstacles that have dogged the Gray family as they guided their business from the early production of birchbark canoes to wood and canvas, up to the modern use of the synthetic miracle product, Royalex.

The authors’ enthusiasm for canoes and kayaks is infectious. Susan Audette of North Windham, Conn., has raced sleek new vessels in competition, while favoring the traditional wood-and-canvas canoes that helped put Old Town on the map. Co-author David Baker has been canoeing since childhood, and he collects and restores canoes. Both are members of the Wooden Canoe Heritage Association.

While their descriptions of boat design at times seem aimed at the experienced canoeist — a glossary of terms would have helped the novice reader — readers will savor their yarns of Yankee ingenuity and satisfied customers, along with an admiration of Penobscot tribal members who provided the inspiration for the first canoes.

American Indian designs at the beginning of the 15 chapters add style and grace to the book. So does a plethora of vintage black-and-white photos, along with sharp color catalog pictures. Perhaps because the company agreed to have a woman write its history, women are pictured throughout the book paddling with their husbands and families; there’s even a 1960s-era view of a dozen bathing beauties ankle-deep in water, carrying an Old Town canoe.

Along with other Maine companies such as L.L. Bean, the authors stress that Old Town has survived because of its owners’ integrity. Those have included Alexander Gray and his sons, Wilbur, George and Herbert, who started the business in 1898 in the rear of their hardware store; and Sam C. Johnson, owner of Johnson Diversified, which bought Old Town Canoe Co. in December 1974. As with every crucial decision Alexander and his sons made, and later those of Sam, Deane and Braley Gray, one senses they were wary of tampering with tradition, but after studying the pros and cons of progress, they usually made the right decisions.

“If God wanted fiberglass boats, he would have made fiberglass trees!” read a sign on Deane Gray’s desk in the early 1960s. Eventually he had no choice but to build his boats with the product, especially since the White Canoe Co., which Old Town later acquired, was employing the new technique through the abilities of designer “Bub” King. The Gray family also gagged on aluminum, but used that also when the market demanded it.

Shrewd business sense and the hiring of geniuses such as Pearl Cunningham and his son, Jim, along with Alfred Wickett and later, designer Lew Gilman, helped assure Old Town’s longevity. So did market testing of such standards as the Tripper, a favorite canoe for canoeists of all abilities, and the Atlantis 2560, the pride of Old Town’s motorboat production.

Audette and Baker have kept their chapters brief while not skimping on juicy tidbits, some suprisingly candid for a history of an existing company. Moving the book beyond mere promotion for Old Town, they report freely on the story of a smooth-talking young employee whom Old Town fired when his boats fell apart, and the Grays’ contempt for labor unions. In 1943 the employees voted overwhelmingly to have the AFL represent them.

In March 1954 the workers voted to strike. The strike lasted for 63 days “with little local support.” A no-win situation ended with both groups agreeing to the old contract and a modified union shop. Sam Gray gave them a wage increase equal to others that prevailed in town.

Along with the book’s history and the challenges of keeping a business viable are numerous testimonials from satisfied Old Town customers. One, written by an 88-year-old Cooperstown, N.Y., woman, remarks that she and her mother used to take their 18-foot “OTCA” (shorthand for an Old Town canoe) out after dark to go skinny dipping.

“To get back in the canoe,” she wrote, “I could slip right over the side just like a wet seal.”

Like the hiss of white water in April, that tale, and other joys like good writing and a well-built canoe, will never change.