At Ausable Chasm, visitors descended through a cleft in Table Rock to board large bateaux for passage through the Grand Flume and beyond, guided safely by stalwart boatmen. The displayed boat is 30 feet long, seats 30 people, and was built for Ausable Chasm in the 1970s by carpenter Dave Torrance of AuSable Forks, New York, using a traditional design to replace the Chasm’s earlier 24-foot boats. Before the 1970s, most Chasm boats were built in Maine in the Maine lumberman boat-building tradition, while some early boats came from Saranac Lake, New York, and boat size and capacity increased over time from 10-12 passengers in the 1870s-80s, to 20-24 in the 1890s-1960s, to 28-30 in the 1970s-1996. The bateau, a sturdy flat-bottomed, shallow-draft boat with high pointed ends, was introduced in North America by 17th-century French explorers and fur traders and in the 1800s served the timber industries of the Adirondacks, Maine, and elsewhere, including spring log drives in which crews in logging bateaux moved logs down rivers from forest to sawmill and broke up jams; in the Adirondacks this logging bateau was called a jam boat. One Ausable River log drive ran from the end of Ausable Chasm to Lake Champlain, 3 miles away. The bateau’s stability under heavy loads, effectiveness on rivers, and similarity to Adirondack jam boats made it well suited for Ausable Chasm’s Boat Ride. Adult male boatmen piloted the boats, whose several-ton full passenger load and length required two boatmen per ride, with the bow boatman paddling and talking about the Chasm while the stern boatman paddled and steered. Their work demanded excellent paddling skill in tricky currents, physical strength, teamwork, hospitality, the ability to entertain, familiarity with local natural history and environment, and skill in repairing wooden boats that were often scraped or bumped and damaged by heavy use. In fall, winter, and spring, boatmen repaired, resealed, and repainted the boats, monitored river level, cleared rocks from the Rapids, and maintained the motorized cable boat haul system used from the late 1920s to 1996. The Boat Ride began in May after spring high water subsided and ran through October, sometimes into November, and for many boatmen it was a seasonal job that supplemented other work, including public school teaching; despite the hard physical labor, it was rewarding and fun, with strong camaraderie and low turnover over many years.