Historic Tents and Gear
 

While looking for something else entirely, I stumbled across this catalog for 1917 including all sorts of tents, camp gear, and general clothing.

If one has read things like Canada's Glittering Mountains, this is probably kind of gear in use back then.

No wonder they needed horses to haul everything in!

Here's the link:

https://archive.org/details/catalogueno6tent00granuoft

Even back in 1969 on my first camping trip with my parents, we used a heavy/bulky canvas tent.

https://www.clubtread.com/forumPix/428000/428462.jpg

Mary Schaffer's tent at Maligne Lake. 1911?

When I went camping in the early 1960s in the Four Corners area (New Mexico, Colorado, Utah, Arizona), we used a great big tent called a Navajo sheepherder's tent. Also heavy, bulky, and canvas.

Huh. Almost looks like it could have come out of that catalog, doesn't it?

When I started camping my parents were using a 4 person 'pyramid' tent they made themselves in 1959. Single-wall, breathable but leak-proof (as long as you didn't touch it) Egyptian cotten construction. Weighed 6 pounds without a floor. We used our ponchos for ground sheets.