This book is included in the Family Affairs - Children, Parents & Home Economics section.
Foreword to the Second Edition Boys, the author dreamed of wonderful municipal playgrounds, of organizations giving the boys opportunity to camp in the open, of zoological and botanical gardens planned and adapted to the understanding of youth. His busy life as a civil engineer, surveyor, and work in the open gave him no opportunity to develop his dreams, but at the end of a five year tour of the United States and Canada, made over fifty years ago, he drifted into New York City and was shocked beyond expression by the almost total lack of breathing spaces for our boys, in the greatest of American cities. True, it then had Central Park; but fifty years ago Central Park was out among the goats, only to be reached by a long and tiresome horse car journey. This lamentable state of affairs caused the writer so much real pain and concern that he then and there inaugurated a personal crusade for the benefit of the boys, a crusade with the avowed object of winning for them the peoples' interest in the big outdoors. The most difficult part of his task was to convince the men of the swivel chairs that boys' leisure should be spent in the open; that the blue sky is the only proper roof for a normal boy's playground; also that the open spaces are the places where God intended young people to live, work and play. No great crusade, no great movement of any kind is one man's work, nevertheless, every successful movement must have one enthusiast in the front rank, one who knows the trail and comprehensively envisions the objective objectum quad complexum. Others may and will join him, and occasionally spurt ahead of the leader, like the hare in the fable, but the enthusiast keeps right on just the same. Pray do not understand by this that the writer claims that he alone is responsible for this bloodless revolution. No, no, his propaganda work did however win for him the moral support of the editorial staff of St. Nicholas, Youth's Companion and Harpers. Later he was openly backed and encouraged by such distinguished sportsmen as President Roosevelt, his chief forester Governor Pinchot, and his Chief of Staff Major General Bell. While the stalwart men of the Camp Fire Club of America worked hand and glove with him, all similar organizations failed not in voicing their approval. Furthermore he was always helped by his loyal friends of the daily press. Many famous writers lent their influence, all working consciously or unconsciously to help the great cause of boyhood. The author only claims that, in all these fifty long years, he has never ceased to work for the boys, never wavered in his purpose, and now? well, when he marched at the head of fifty thousand Scouts in the great muddy outdoor Scout camp at Birkenhead, England, he realized that his ephemeral air castles had settled down to a firm foundation upon Mother Earth. Yes, boys we have won a great victory for boyhood! We have won it by iteration and reiteration, hi other words, by shouting outdoors, talking outdoors, picturing outdoors, singing outdoors and above all by writing about the outdoors, and constantly hammering on one subject and keeping one purpose always in view. By such means we have at last, not only interested the people of the United States in the open, but stampeded the whole world to the forests and the fields. So let us all join in singing the old Methodist hymn: "Shout, shout, we are gaining ground, Glory, Hallelujah! The Devil's kingdom we'll put down, Glory, Hallelujah!" The Devil's kingdom in this case is the ill-ventilated school rooms, offices and courts. It is well to note that the work in this book was not done in the library, but either in the open itself or from notes and sketches made in the open. When telling how to build a cooking fire, for instance, the author preferred to make his diagrams from the fires built by himself or by his wilderness friends, than to trust to information derived from some other man's books. It is much easier to make pictures of impractical fires than to build them. The paste pot and scissors occupy no place of honor in our woodcraft series. So, Boys of the Open, throw aside your new rackets, your croquet mallets, and your boiled shirts pull on your buckskin leggings, give a war whoop and be what God intended you should be; healthy wholesome boys. This great Republic belongs to you and so does this BOOK OF CAMP-LORE AND WOODCRAFT. DAN BEARD Suffern, New York, December first, 1930. Foreword HIDDEN in a drawer in the antique highboy, back of the moose head in my studio, there are specimens of Indian bead work, bits of buckskin, necklaces made of the teeth of animals, a stone calumet, my old hunting knife with its rawhide sheath and carefully folded in oiled paper is the jerked tenderloin of a grizzly bear! But that is not all; for more important still is a mysterious wooden flask containing the castor or the scent gland of a beaver, which is carefully rolled up in a bit of buckskin embroidered with mystic Indian signs. The flask was given to me as "big medicine" by Bow-arrow, the Chief of the Montinais Indians. Bow-arrow said and I believe him that when one inhales the odor of the castor from this medicine flask one's soul and body are then and forever afterwards permeated with a great and abiding love of the big outdoors. Also, when one eats of the mystic grizzly bear's flesh, one's body acquires the strength and courage of this great animal. During the initiation of the members of a Spartan band of my boys, known as the Buckskin Men, each candidate is given a thin slice of the grizzly bear meat and a whiff of the beaver castor. Of course, we know that people with unromantic and unimaginative minds will call this sentimentalism. We people of the outdoor tribes plead guilty to being sentimentalists; but we know from experience that old Bow-arrow was right, because we have ourselves eaten of the grizzly bear and smelled the castor of the beaver! While the writer cannot give each of his readers a taste of this coveted bear meat in material form, or a whiff of the beaver medicine, direct from the wooden flask made by the late Bow-arrow's own hands, still the author hopes that the magical qualities of this great medicine will enter into and form a part of the subject matter of this book, and through that medium inoculate the souls and bodies of his readers, purify them and rejuvenate them with a love of the WORLD AS GOD MADE IT. DAN BEARD June, 1920 Contents CHAPTER I. FIRE MAKING BY FRICTION How TO MAKE A FIRE-BOARD, Bow, DRILL AND THIMBLE. INDIAN LEGEND OF THE SOURCE OF FIRE. RECORD FIRE-MAKERS. ROBBINGSTICK OUTFIT. ESKIMO THIMBLE. Bow, BOW-STRING, THIMBLE, FIREBOARD, FIRE-PAN. TINDER, CHARRED RAGS, PUFF BALLS. FIRE-MAKERS OF THE BALKAN. FIRE WITHOUT A Bow, CO-LI-LI, THE FIRE SAW. FIRE PUMPING OF THE IROQUOIS. PYROPNEUMATIC APPARATUS CHAPTER II. FIRE MAKING BY PERCUSSION THE WHITE MAN'S METHOD, How TO USE FLINT AND STEEL. WHERE TO OBTAIN THE FLINT AND STEEL. CHUCKNUCKS, PUNK BOXES, SPUNKS AND MATCHES. REAL LUCIFER MATCHES. SLOW MATCH. How TO CATCH THE SPARK. SUBSTITUTES FOR FLINT AND STEEL CHAPTER III. HOW TO BUILD A FIRE How TO LAY AND LIGHT A FIRE. AN EXPERIENCE WITH TENDERFEET. MODERN FEAR OF DOING MANUAL LABOR. MATCHES. FIRE-MAKERS AND BABYLONIANS. THE PALPITATING HEART OF THE CAMP. GUMMY FAGOTS OF THE PINE. How TO MAKE A FIRE IN WET WEATHER. BACKWOODSMEN'S FIRE. THE NECESSITY OF SMALL KINDLING WOOD. GOOD FIREWOOD. ADVANTAGE OF SPLIT WOOD. FIRE-DOGS. How TO OPEN A KNIFE. How TO WHITTLE, How TO SPLIT A STICK WITH A KNIFE. BONFIRES AND COUNCIL FIRES. CAMP MEETING TORCH FIRES. EXPLODING STONES. CHARACTER IN FIRE. SLOW FIRES, SIGNAL FIRES AND SMUDGES CHAPTER IV. HOW TO LAY A GOOD COOKING FIRE A PERSONAL EXPERIENCE ON SHORT RATIONS. THE MOST PRIMITIVE OF COOKING OUTFITS. CAMP POT-HOOKS, THE GALLOW-CROOK, THE POTCLAW, THE HAKE, THE GIB, THE SPEYGELIA AND THE SASTER. TELEGRAPH WIRE COOKING IMPLEMENTS, WIRE GRID-IRON, SKELETON CAMP STOVE. COOKING FIRES, FIRE-DOGS, ROASTING FIRE-LAY, CAMPFIRE LAY, BELMORE LAY, FRYING FIRE LAY, BAKING FIRE LAY. THE AURES CRANE CHAPTER V. CAMP KITCHENS CAMP PIT-FIRES, BEAN HOLES. COWBOY FIRE-HOLE. CHINOOK COOKING FIRE-HOLE. BARBECUE- PITS. THE GOLD DIGGER'S OVEN. THE FERGUSON CAMP STOVE. THE ADOBE OVEN. THE ALTAR CAMPFIRE PLACE. CAMP KITCHEN FOR HIKERS, SCOUTS, EXPLORERS, SURVEYORS AND HUNTERS. How TO COOK MEAT, FISH AND BREAD WITHOUT POTS, PANS OR STOVES. DRESSING SMALL ANIMALS. How TO BARBECUE LARGE ANIMALS CHAPTER VI. CAMP FOOD How TO MAKE ASH CAKE, PONE, CORN DODGERS, FLAPJACKS, JOHNNYCAKE, BISCUITS AND DOUGHGOD. MAKING DUTCH OVENS. VENISON. BANQUETS IN THE OPEN. How TO COOK BEAVER TAIL, PORCUPINES AND MUSKRATS. CAMP STEWS, BRUNSWICK STEWS AND BURGOOS CHAPTER VII. PACKING HORSES How TO MAKE A PACK HORSE OF YOUR OWN. How TO MAKE AN APAREJO. How TO MAKE A CINCHA. How TO MAKE A LATIGO. How TO THROW A DIAMOND HITCH. How TO THROW A SQUAW HITCH. How TO HITCH A HORSE IN OPEN LAND WITHOUT POST, TREE OR STICK OR STONE. USE OF HOBBLES AND How TO MAKE THEM. How THE TRAVOIS is MADE AND USED. BUFFALO BILL AND GENERAL MILES. How TO THROW DOWN A SADDLE. How TO THROW A SADDLE ON A HORSE. How TO MOUNT A HORSE. How TO KNOW A WESTERN HORSE CHAPTER VIII. THE USE OF DOGS. MAN PACKING HIKING DOGS, PACK DOGS. How TO PACK A DOG. How TO THROW THE DOG HITCH. How TO MAKE DOG TRAVOIS. DOG AS A BEAST OF BURDEN IN EUROPE AND ARCTIC AMERICA. MAN PACKING. PACK RATS. DON'T FIGHT YOUR PACK. PORTAGE PACK. GREAT MEN WHO HAVE CARRIED A PACK. KINDS OF PACKS. ALPINE RUCKSACK. ORIGIN OF BROAD BREAST STRAPS. MAKE YOUR OWN OUTFITS CHAPTER IX. PREPARING FOR CAMPING TRIP PORTERS OF THE PORTAGE. OLD-TIME INDIAN FIGHTERS AND WILD ANIMALS. MODERN STAMPEDE FOR THE OPEN. How TO GET READY FOR CAMP. CUT YOUR FINGER NAILS. Go TO YOUR DENTIST. GET A HAIR CUT. A BUCKSKIN MAN'S POCKET. FLY DOPE. PROTECTION AGAINST BLACK FLIES, MOSQUITOES, MIDGETS AND NO-SEE-UMS. THE CALL OF THE WILD CHAPTER X. SADDLES How TO CHOOSE A SADDLE. EVOLUTION OF THE MEXICAN SADDLE. BIRTH OF THE BLUFF FRONTED SADDLE. THE COWBOY AGE. SAWBUCKS OR PACK SADDLES. STRAIGHT LEG AND BENT KNEE. NAMES OF PARTS OF SADDLE. CENTER FIRE AND DOUBLE CINCH CHAPTER XI. CHOOSING A CAMP SITE "WARE SINGLE TREES OR SMALL GROUPS OF TREES. SAFETY IN WOODS OR FOREST. KEEP YOUR EYES OPEN FOR GOOD CAMP SITES. CROSS STREAMS WHILE CROSSING is GOOD. KEEP TO WINDWARD OF MOSQUITO HOLES. 'WARE ANTS' NESTS. How TO TELL WHEN WIND BLOWS. EVOLUTION OF THE SHACK. How TO SWEEP. How TO MAKE CAMP BEDS. How TO DIVIDE CAMP WORK. TENT PEGS. How TO PITCH A TENT SINGLE-HANDED. How TO DITCH A TENT. USE OF SHEARS, GINS AND TRIPODS CHAPTER XII. AXE AND SAW OUR GREATEST AXEMAN. IMPORTANCE OF THE AXE. WHAT KIND OF AXE TO USE. How TO SWING AN AXE. How TO REMOVE A BROKEN AXE HANDLE. How TO TIGHTEN THE HANDLE IN THE HEAD. ACCIDENTS. THE BRAINS OF AN AXE. ETIQUETTE OF THE AXE. How TO SHARPEN AN AXE. How TO "FALL" A TREE. How TO SWAMP. How TO MAKE A BEETLE OR MALL. How TO HARDEN" GREEN WOOD. How TO MAKE A FIREWOOD HOD. How TO MAKE A CHOPPING BLOCK. THE PROPER WAY TO CHOP. How TO MAKE SAWBUCKS FOR LOGS. How TO USE A PARBUCKLE. How TO SPLIT A LOG. How TO USE A SAWPIT CHAPTER XIII. COUNCIL GROUNDS AND FIRES CHEROKEE INDIAN COUNCIL BARBECUE. CAMP MEETING COUNCIL GROUND. THE INDIAN PALISADED COUNCIL FIRE. INDIAN LEGENDS OF THE FIRE. STEALING THE FIRE FROM THE SUN- MAIDENS OF THE EAST. MYTHS OF THE MEWAN INDIANS. TOTEMS OF THE FOUR WINDS, FOUR MOUNTAINS AND FOUR POINTS OF THE COMPASS. IMPRACTICAL COUNCIL FIRES. ADVANTAGES OF THE OVAL COUNCIL GROUND. How TO MAKE AN ELLIPSE. How TO DIVIDE THE COUNCIL GROUND IN FOUR COURTS. COUNCIL CEREMONIES. GHOST WALK AND PATH OF KNOWLEDGE. WHAT THE DIFFERENT COLORS STAND FOR. PATRIOTISM, POETRY AND AMERICANISM. CAMP MEETING TORCH FIRES CHAPTER XIV. RITUAL OF THE COUNCIL FIRE PROGRAM OF A COUNCIL FIRE. INVOCATION. THE PLEDGE AND CREED OF ALL AMERICANS. APPEAL
End of Preview.
RETURN to
Main Titles Index or
Family Affairs - Children, Parents & Home Economics
Please Read The Website Disclaimer!
Copyright 1986-2012, The Survival & Self-Reliance Studies Institute (SSRsi), All
Rights Reserved
Site conceptualized, designed, created & maintained by MEG Raven
Snail Mail: SSRsi, PO Box 2572 Dillon, CO. 80435-2572