“All boats are on display at our factory and you are cordially invited to visit us…. the water is at our back door.”

— Link Line of Watercraft, 1951

Edwin Link was born in Huntington, Indiana, in 1904. He was flying at 16, and soon after developed the Link Trainer, a fuselage with a cockpit and controls that re-created the motions and sensations of flying.

In 1937, Edwin established the Link Manufacturing Company, Ltd. (located just steps from the Museum inside the bridge visible to the south west) and built his invention – the first commercially produced flight simulator. Over half a million airmen were taught to fly using this device during the Second World War effort.

At the end of the war, Link realized that the company needed to change direction: “With the cessation of hostilities, it was natural we turned our thoughts and engineers to watercraft, as, situated as we are, on the St. Lawrence… where ‘everyone’ owns a boat, unparalleled opportunity was offered for testing and providing the best features of hundreds of craft.”

Many different kinds of boats were designed and built at the Link Manufacturing Company including the famous Linkanoe. The pieces of this sectional canoe could fit into the tail of a float plane, and then be assembled after landing so that the pilot could paddle to shore. Over 4000 of these canoes were built between 1946-1949. Other sectional boats built at the Link factory included the LinkSkiff, (the same hull as a Linkanoe except fitted with a center seat and oarlocks), a square stern LinkBoat, and the LinkTender.

A variety of other non-sectional lapstrake boats were built at the factory until 1960, when Link Manufacturing closed the business and sold the facility to local boat builder Charlie Cliffe and partners.

Boats built by Link Manufacturing in the Museum Collection:

Cedar Strip Heron
Linkanoe