He Came by Canoe, by Canoe He's Remembered

Much like a wilderness adventure, a handcrafted canoe is a collection of elements that fit together just so to create something extraordinary.

As featured in Letters from Camp Magazine – Fall 2023.

White and red cedar, black walnut, white oak, butternut, bronze, brass, canvas. These are the elements that make up a recent and extraordinary gift to Camp Menogyn: a traditional wood-canvas canoe that was designed, hand-built and donated to camp last summer in memory of Todd Wagner, a former camper, trail guide and longtime advocate.

When Todd died unexpectedly in May 2021, the idea of a memorial canoe came to Todd’s close Menogyn friend, Chuck LeGros. Todd’s wife, Meredith McNab, and sons, Austin and Cullen Wagner, readily agreed with his plan.

Chuck enlisted help from a small group of Todd’s camp friends to gather ideas and gain support from others who wanted to honor Todd’s memory. They quickly raised enough money to hire Josh Tolkan, an artist in residence at the North House Folk School in Grand Marais and a member of the Minnesota Woodworkers Guild in North Minneapolis, to design and build the canoe. Next, the group turned to Minneapolis artist and Menogyn alumna Angie Brain to add the finishing touch: a logo featuring two white pines.

Todd Wagner

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As it happens, another canoe had brought Todd and Chuck together as campers nearly 50 years ago, in 1974, when Menogyn purchased a voyager canoe from Chicagoland Canoe Outfitters. To handle the pickup and delivery of the canoe from Sioux St. Marie, camp’s then-director Skip Wilke chose a group of 10 campers and two guides for what would become known as the Lake Superior trip.

From Sioux St. Marie, the group paddled together in the 34-foot canoe, traveling along Superior’s North Shore to Cloud Bay, Ontario, just north of Grand Portage. When the young men found themselves windbound — for about six of the trip’s 30 days — they carved wood, skipped stones, told stories, sang songs and ate blueberries by the fistful.

It was an epic journey, and when it ended, the group had brought home La Petite. In the decades since, the iconic canoe has carried thousands of campers across West Bearskin Lake to and from Camp Menogyn.

After Todd’s Hommes du Nord trip the following year, he worked as a trail guide and in other staff roles for several more summers. “He was exceptional at working with kids,” said Tony Lockhart, another longtime camp friend. “He was the example Skip Wilke used when he described the ideal camp counselor.

“Todd was thoughtful, interested, and he had a great laugh,” Tony continued. “He was amazing at connecting with people. He could, and did, connect with anybody.”

Menogyn was part of the fabric of Todd’s life. “He had all the connections that you could think of, from being a camper, a long-trip camper, on the Lake Superior trip, on staff and, eventually, a camper parent,” Tony said. Todd met his wife and many lifelong friends at camp, and his parents, brothers, nephews and sons were involved with Menogyn as well.

So it felt like the perfect tribute when the just-finished 17.5-foot, wood-canvas cedar canoe arrived at Menogyn a few hours before camp’s 100th anniversary kicked off on July 15, 2022.

At the landing, about 30 people participated in a dedication, which included remarks by Chuck and Meredith and a poem written and read by Leigh Williams, a close family friend and former trail guide.

For the launch, Meredith took the duffer’s spot in the new canoe, with Austin and Cullen in the bow and stern. Flanked by La Petite and other canoes filled with family members and friends, they paddled across West Bearskin to camp, where Executive Director Meghan Cosgrove accepted the canoe into Menogyn’s fleet.

The canoe, imagined, funded and built by a community of people who are connected by Menogyn and who had come together to remember their friend, was carrying campers through the BWCA a couple weeks later.

The weight of Todd’s loss is still heavy, say his friends. It has been just two years since he passed away, and every person who spoke of him was still deeply affected by his absence. But, despite the sadness, when friends described Todd, their eyes lit up, they laughed, and their voices carried happiness at his memory. As Tony Lockhart shared, “Todd was the kind of person who made everyone feel better for being with him.”

Chuck said that as adults, he and Todd had discovered a shared memory from their days on trail. They recalled the magic of paddling on calm, quiet nights, of stretching out in the middle of a canoe and putting their heads back to look up at the stars. They remembered feeling young and ready to take on the world as they watched the night sky in the middle of the wilderness.

“It just seemed fitting to build a canoe for Todd,” Chuck said. “The canoe was meant to perpetuate the sense of adventure that we all had with him. It represents his spirit and honors his memory.”

Todd’s Canoe

Rain fell. Stars wheeled.
Sun and wind and snow filled the air.
White cedar, red cedar, black walnut,
Butternut and oak
Grew skyward, straight and branching;
Building, year by year, the tight grains

Of ribs and planking,
gunwales, stems and thwarts.
They’re drawn together here,
Planed, shaped and fastened,
Into the taut lines and curves
Of this fine craft.
It will travel the waters
Of the great Canadian Shield,
Moving, swift and smooth, to the steady pull
Of paddles. It will track branching rivers,
Stir reflections of granite, fir and birch,
And strain in heavy winds.
It’ll ride aloft on shoulders over portages,
And rest, upturned, beside campfires at night,
While loons call from the next lake.
It will carry talk
And stories out across the water.
Year by year, rain will fall. Stars will wheel.
Sun and wind and snow will fill the air.

- Leigh Williams, July 15, 2022

At Todd’s family’s request, we’re including this link for those who wish to make a gift to Menogyn’s endowment fund in Todd’s memory.

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