Gettysburg 88

[iron bender]

The difference at the time wasn't museum quality uniforms or the gnat's eyelash level of detail that characterizes the movement later on. Really the only thing separating a "hardcore" from everybody else back then was that we used the equipment the way it was designed to be used. We ate hardtack and fatback out of our haversacks. We drank the water in our canteens. We carried our stuff in our knapsacks or in bedrolls. I was using a bedroll at the time. Using the gear gives it an authenticity that can't be simulated.
I was operating with the principle at the time that it is better to do without than use the wrong item. I didn't have period-correct underwear. They were hard to find and expensive. Yeah, you can see where this is going. So a week at Gettysburg in the summer: heat, dust, sweat, wool. I was chafing. Big time. Walking like I'd joined the cavalry. Some people say they walked a layer off their brogans at Gettysburg. I think I walked a layer off my thighs. Perhaps my operating principle was a little extreme...

Exactly what 7thWisonsin says. Dale Jarnagin 100% in this photo. Looked the part and what was available. Awesome shooting leathers, still have mine. But we lived in the field when we played guns, slept on the ground, and dealt with the situation. Vicksburg (bugs are why socks over britches, if you've never experienced Vicksburg in summer...)
....as an edit, look how short our sack coats are in this pic. This was back in the day when you wrote a $55 check to Jarnagin and just waited, no internet, no updates, just sit and wait. We're all older teens in this pic, zero money. Still wearing the stuff we got in the mid-late 80's. I didn't get a 'correct' sack coat until 98, from John Keaghy. When I had a pinch of money to spend. Now I've got a closet full of 'correct' stuff but I'm 50, as are my old buds. Praise to God we still get together once a year at Pleasant Hill.

 

[DoctorKingSchultz]

The difference at the time wasn't museum quality uniforms or the gnat's eyelash level of detail that characterizes the movement later on. Really the only thing separating a "hardcore" from everybody else back then was that we used the equipment the way it was designed to be used. We ate hardtack and fatback out of our haversacks. We drank the water in our canteens. We carried our stuff in our knapsacks or in bedrolls. I was using a bedroll at the time. Using the gear gives it an authenticity that can't be simulated.
I was operating with the principle at the time that it is better to do without than use the wrong item. I didn't have period-correct underwear. They were hard to find and expensive. Yeah, you can see where this is going. So a week at Gettysburg in the summer: heat, dust, sweat, wool. I was chafing. Big time. Walking like I'd joined the cavalry. Some people say they walked a layer off their brogans at Gettysburg. I think I walked a layer off my thighs. Perhaps my operating principle was a little extreme...

It sounds like at heart, you were definitely well on the way to becoming campaigners then, in my book! A lifestyle as much as a look!

 

[7thWisconsin]

It sounds like at heart, you were definitely well on the way to becoming campaigners then, in my book! A lifestyle as much as a look!

That's why I use the word "campaigning" to mean the reenacting lifestyle of living under field conditions rather than the philosophy of continued refining and altering one's impression based upon the best current research. The latter is "progressive." I think one can have a progressive campaign impression or a progressive garrison impression. I'm on a one-man campaign to influence the hobby.

 

[captaindrew]

Exactly what 7thWisonsin says. Dale Jarnagin 100% in this photo. Looked the part and what was available. Awesome shooting leathers, still have mine. But we lived in the field when we played guns, slept on the ground, and dealt with the situation. Vicksburg (bugs are why socks over britches, if you've never experienced Vicksburg in summer...)
....as an edit, look how short our sack coats are in this pic. This was back in the day when you wrote a $55 check to Jarnagin and just waited, no internet, no updates, just sit and wait. We're all older teens in this pic, zero money. Still wearing the stuff we got in the mid-late 80's. I didn't get a 'correct' sack coat until 98, from John Keaghy. When I had a pinch of money to spend. Now I've got a closet full of 'correct' stuff but I'm 50, as are my old buds. Praise to God we still get together once a year at Pleasant Hill.

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We had a company sutler in those days. Basically just a guy with the Jarnigan catalog. You told him what you needed and he helped with suggestions so you'd get the right thing. Also made our company have a somewhat uniform appearance. Well you'd give him a wish list and $$ and he'd put the order in for you and if I remember right it usually showed up in a reasonable timeframe.It was actually pretty decent stuff and I still had my whole original kit up till a few years ago. One of the young guys in my old Florida group lost everything to a house fire a few years back and I gave him the whole kit to get him back in the field and he's still using a lot of it.

 

[7thWisconsin]

We had a company sutler in those days. Basically just a guy with the Jarnigan catalog. You told him what you needed and he helped with suggestions so you'd get the right thing. Also made our company have a somewhat uniform appearance. Well you'd give him a wish list and $$ and he'd put the order in for you and if I remember right it usually showed up in a reasonable timeframe.It was actually pretty decent stuff and I still had my whole original kit up till a few years ago. One of the young guys in my old Florida group lost everything to a house fire a few years back and I gave him the whole kit to get him back in the field and he's still using a lot of it.

One of the plus sides of the strong unit ties at the time was that your unit could help direct you toward a good impression in tangible ways like that. When I started there were only 2 summers operating in California. One went out of business due to personal reasons not long after I started. The other was Andy Foulk's mom and dad, so we called them "Fall Creek West." I think I still have a few things I got from them.

 

[captaindrew]

One of the plus sides of the strong unit ties at the time was that your unit could help direct you toward a good impression in tangible ways like that. When I started there were only 2 summers operating in California. One went out of business due to personal reasons not long after I started. The other was Andy Foulk's mom and dad, so we called them "Fall Creek West." I think I still have a few things I got from them.

It can go both ways of course and I ran into this in Florida. The CO, very nice guy so I'll put this as nicely as I can, was extremely frugal. I get it, he didn't want people getting sticker shock, but he would direct new recruits to getting outright junk. Drove me nuts, there's ways and places where you can save, but some of these poor folks would show up in what looked like 1960s Hollywood costumes. The Jarnigan stuff at least in it's day, especially the leathers, were pretty good and would give you a pretty good start.

 

[7thWisconsin]

I still have a pair of Jarnagin shoes with many miles left on them.