Boat-Maker Resurrects 18Th Century Aleut-Russian Kayak -- George Dyson Has Spent 20 Years Making, Describing Wilderness Craft

BELLINGHAM - George Dyson is building by hand a new ``baidarka''; that's the Russian word for kayak.

He pulls a resin-coated, nylon thread from a spool attached to the ceiling in his new workshop.

He pulls the thread through holes in an aluminum keel he made, then wraps the thread around a curved aluminum pole five times for each hole. He explains he'll use about a half-mile of thread to lash the aluminum frame together.

``For some reason about 20 years ago, I became obsessed with bringing the Aleut-Russian baidarka back to life,'' Dyson says.

``I've done little else since and, as to the big question - Why? - your guess is as good as mine.''

Dyson's obsession sent him from the East Coast to Canada when he was 17 to build kayaks and paddle along the Inside Passage of the British Columbia coast, a 900-mile stretch he called home.

The story of Dyson's obsession begins with Russian adventurers and fur traders who began exploring the Aleutian Islands in the 18th century.

The Aleuts paddled crafts the Russians called baidarkas in the rough, icy waters between the islands as they hunted seals and walrus.

The original design of the Aleut kayaks - with wooden frames and animal skins - made them lighter, stronger and faster than dugout canoes.

Despite the craft's advantages, the Aleuts' boat-building skill remained lost for more than a century.

For the past 20 years, Dyson has been trying to recapture that skill with his aluminum frame, nylon-covered boats.

Dyson built his first kayak when he was 12 in Princeton, N.J., where his father, noted astrophysicist Freeman Dyson, worked at the Institute for Advanced Studies.

At 17, the younger Dyson dropped out of high school and left home for British Columbia. Since then, he has built 20 more baidarkas, he said.

Dyson built most of them while living in the Belcarra Park rain forest near a beautiful, white sandy beach, he said.

He lived in the park in Port Moody, B.C., for 19 years, some of them in a tree house 95 feet above the forest floor.

Dyson gained notoriety when Kenneth Brower's book, ``The Starship and The Canoe'' appeared in 1978. The dual-biography compares Freeman Dyson's desire to build a spaceship he could explore in to his son's desire to build kayaks.

The book portrayed George Dyson as young, wild and adventurous - a man who could escape the world in his kayak.

``You change when you get older,'' Dyson says. ``In some ways, I have resented that label. In those days, I never had work to do. Now, I have a lot of work to do.''

At 37, Dyson wants to settle down with his family.

``I don't ever want to move again,'' he says. ``I'm a real creature of routine.''

Dyson moved to Bellingham with his wife, Ann E. Yow, a free-lance photojournalist, and their 9-month-old daughter, Lauren, in November after finding a spacious workshop and a new home.

His work includes designing, building and selling boats; directing the Baidarka Historical Society; and writing and getting published scholarly works about the baidarka.

The workshop is the center of his kayak-building business and the Baidarka Historical Society.

Dyson builds about two kayaks a year, selling them for $6,000 to $10,000.

He is now building two for ``L.A. entertainment people,'' as he calls them. One kayak is for musician Ry Cooder. Another is for ``the bad guy who tried to feed James Bond to the sharks in the last James Bond film,'' Dyson said.

``I've always resisted commercialism in any way, shape or form,'' Dyson says. ``But now, by force, I'm being put into the business.''

He founded the Baidarka Historical Society in 1984, to, in the words of the society newsletter, ``further knowledge of the Aleut baidarka and its role in Russian-American history, and to encourage, by way of its renaissance, the continued evolution of the skin boat.''

Dyson is looking forward to a joint venture with Japanese businessmen who want to sell in Japan baidarka kits based on his design. No deal has been reached yet.

``I've never had plans,'' Dyson said. ``I'm real pleased. I never thought I would build kayaks. It's really worked out.''