Who was the first person to put a "pump" in a canoe?

[Craig Smerda]

I seem to recall seeing electric bilge pumps being installed back in about 2002... but I don't rightly know who was the first one to do it?

[This thread could get interesting]

[horizongfx]

Scary Larry, Chatooga Guy

[KNeal]

Ummm. Sure, let's talk about that.

[Craig Smerda]

The first mention of one based on a c-boats search was...

[pblanc]

I seem to recall seeing electric bilge pumps being installed back in about 2002... but I don't rightly know who was the first one to do it?

[This thread could get interesting]

Back in the early 1990s I lived about 2 hours away from the Ocoee and paddled it a fair bit. There was an open boater who I saw on the river a number of times who had a pump that exhausted through a chromed, through-hull fitting directly out the stern stem of his boat. I think he used a heavy 12V car battery to run it. I don't recall there being a lot of smaller sealed lead-acid batteries at that time. I have no idea who he was. Maybe someone here does.

[sbroam]

It might have been as early as 1995, but I remember seeing a boat come through Nantahala Falls, plowed through the bottom hole and kept going - a couple of seconds later water cam shooting out and up from two hoses behind the paddler as he kept going. As I recall, the boat had "ORGT" stencilled on it - Outdoor Rec Georgia Tech...

[Silent Bob]

The first mention of one based on a c-boats search was...

Bev's Skeeter was the first one I remember seeing. I guess that would have been around 2000, maybe a bit earlier.

[creek1r]

I purchased Skeeter from Bob Taylor (Appomattox River Co) Feb 6, 1999 untested. First one sold in Virginia. Loved it but really wet. Probably by April/99, installed Atwood V1200 pump, 2.7 a/h battery.
Installation basically same as you see in most individual and factory systems today and same as I put in BigDog OC-1. I started seeing a few pumps installed in boats around time I sold Skeeter to cheajack around 2003 or 2004.

[Pierre LaPaddelle]

Back in the early 1970s, I dabbled a bit in marathon canoe racing. Battery-pump systems were common among that crowd. I installed one, in an 18' Chestnut Leader, using a big 12V lantern battery, toggle switch, and bilge pump. It worked. I can't claim to have been the first, however. . .

Rick

[ezwater]

Decker, why don't you just carve a giant cellulose sponge to fill your L'edge. Then you can ignore the water issue until time to load the boat on your car. Just squeeze it out, and it'll dry on the drive home.

[Dennysdad]

Back around the turn of the century I saw a fellow I sometimes paddled with named skip
With one on the new Boston section of the Farmington
First one I ever saw in the north east and I use to show up all over where ever there was water

[dixie_boater]

The first canoe with an electric pump I saw was in the late 1980s on the Ocoee. The guy who had this set up called it the EZBailer and he would offer to sell the components. He had an EZBailer sticker on the side of the Whitesell Piranha he paddled. I don't remember the guys name. Years later I heard that he took a bad swim and gave up paddling.

[Glenn MacGrady]

The first canoe with an electric pump I saw was in the late 1980s on the Ocoee. The guy who had this set up called it the EZBailer and he would offer to sell the components. He had an EZBailer sticker on the side of the Whitesell Piranha he paddled. I don't remember the guys name. Years later I heard that he took a bad swim and gave up paddling.

The only pump I've ever seen was probably this same guy, but I have no idea who was first. It was 1987 on the Ocoee. I was paddling that weekend with Nolan on Section IV of the Chattooga and the Ocoee -- buying one of his Piranhas -- and he pointed the guy out on the Ocoee. Pumps never came to the northeast that I ever saw last century. Not sure about the last decade.