As I remember, American history presented in the lower grades contained a lot of fiction. The tales of Washington and the cherry tree, David Crockett, etc. are among those I remember. This could be another one of them. I remember the fine Crane Bond papers my grandfather used in correspondence. I don't recall a crane watermark in the bond paper (they used several watermarks.

A broken-necked crane would have meant a change to very expensive paper beds for an extremely tiny output.