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  • From: Bunjov AT aol.com
  • To: homestead AT lists.ibiblio.org
  • Subject: Re: [Homestead] Small camping trailer was: Draft Animals
  • Date: Sun, 5 Oct 2008 08:04:42 EDT

Don - I knew you would be a fountain of knowledge.
Back in the fifties was when my girlfriends and I used to ride out late at
night and pull up the surveyors' stakes to keep 'them' from building on 'our'

riding territory. It was mostly John Carradine's land - Bat Cave was up there
- and Top Hat was at stud. It was kind of regionally famous.
In our midnight raids, we fell in with some Basque sheepherders, and -
although there was an insurmountable language barrier - we were in awe of
their
'rigs' - and the food!
Thank you for all the information -
Sandy
Mid-Mojave


In a message dated 10/5/2008 4:48:45 A.M. Pacific Standard Time,
don.bowen AT earthlink.net writes:

The idea of a truck based camper comes from the earliest days of the
automobile. Several people built various homes on the backs of early cars
and trucks from the Ford Model TT to a large FWD. By the thirties there
were several factories producing campers from the simplest to very fancy
rigs. The well known Airstream started with a design in the very early
thirties.

Magazines like Popular Mechanics published many articles on building your
own travel trailer or Teardrop. Most were light for use behind the autos of
the day and used materials and methods suitable for the home shops of the
time with few power tools. The eventual owner of Airstream, Walley Bayum
published at least one how to article on building a travel trailer.

By the fifties with the power of the automobile increasing and the leveling
of the American incomes many families could afford to purchase Recreational
Vehicles and take weekend and two week vacations.

I live in a travel trailer, currently parked in the beautiful Missouri
Ozarks on Genes Heartwood Homestead. This afternoon I leave to go visit my
son in North Carolina for a month. Then in November me and my RV will be
back here for a brief visit then on to Southern California.

> I have gone to the trouble now of finding out whether or not a draft horse
> could pull a small RV - sans engine, in these days of looking forward to
> no oil - and I am told that yes, it could be done.

Long before the automobile we had all sorts of horse drawn living
arrangements. Medieval paintings show wagons fitted out as quarters for
tournaments. By the late 1700s the huge incomes from colonies allowed
England to start on a massive road improvement giving rise to the Gypsy
Ledger Wagons and fancy Vardos. These were very heavy and were used to how
off the owner's best team of horse.

In this country the vast western distances gave rise to the Sheep Camp. The
Sheep Camp was often little more that an old farm wagon fitted with a canvas
top, a bed, and a stove. They were usually very light to be pulled by a
single horse. By the fifties most had disappeared and the Basque
Sheepherders moved into pickup campers. The Mojave Desert used to be home
to many flocks of sheep tended by Basque Sheepherders.

The huge western grain fields gave rise to the cook shack. A simple wagon
fitted with a cook stove, water barrel, pots and pans, dishes, etc. The
sides flopped down for serving tables and to allow air flow. The cook shack
traveled with the harvest crews. My wife's grandmother was a cook on a
Washington Palouse Country harvest crew.

> Am I crazy?

No.

I would suggest you not use an automobile based camper as they are heavy.
Build something like a Sheep Camp or a Teardrop Trailer. I have a whole
file of plans from the thirties to fifties on building camping trailers and
pickup mounted campers.

Don Bowen KI6DIU
http://www.braingarage.com/Dons/Travels/journal/Journal.html

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