Immersion Training Ideas

[jake.koch]

Hypothetically Speaking

If you were going to help plan or attend an event or series of events focused on 24 hour full Living History 1st Person Immersion Training (different time period for each event) what are some different things you would like to see take place. Said training would be focused on folks that work in the interpretive field that may or may not already do living history, however depending on the size of each training would also be looking for quality folks from this crazy wonderful hobby to portray certain roles, flesh out the feeling of "being there," serve as material culture "role models," and in some cases portray whole military units that would interact with the trainees. The intent would be to have it be just as fun for the living historians as it would for those there for the training. The length of time for each program would probably be five days and four nights (Wednesday through Sunday).
These would most likely be civilian with some military component. What type of different activities would you like to see take place? What first person activities do you think would be most beneficial to interpreters who either use living history as part of their job or are wanting to learn what its all about. For example, if it was Civil War I would suggest mail call, lots of drilling, picket duty, foraging, and things of that nature. I know there is a great deal of experience among many of the folks on here which is why I wanted to ask. For what its worth the 1st such training will be very small scale in the time-frame of the late 1840s in New Mexico (I will not go into detail as it is not Civil War). The sequel will hopefully be larger scale and will likely take place at a western fort and focus on the story of the "galvanized yankees" or the frontier army just after the Civil War.
I apologize for being vague, however not all plans are finalized so I don't want this misconstrued as an announcement of any kind. We also have a few sticks in the fire and don't want to say which sites. I am involved with a nationwide organization for those in the interpretive field. We will be the ones running the events or partnering with similar organizations to do so. For those of you that are involved with multiple time periods our hope is to make this an annual training event, with a living history certification of some sort. We hope to move it around the country each year and do just about any time period from the Revolution up through the 1940s, likely more commonly focusing on the most common time periods of say 1775-1865 that you see in museums.
Thanks in advance for your help! We have a great deal of the logistics for the first one planned out, however we are beginning to map out the actual immersion experience and I wanted to make sure there wasn't anything so obvious that we missed it completely. I have always appreciated the wealth of knowledge on this forum and wanted to reach out. For those events that are in the Civil War time-frame I will definitely be making some sort of announcement to make folks aware of any opportunities.

MODs I know this post is a little unique so feel free to remove if you feel it is out of context of the site or move it to a different location if this one is not appropriate. Thanks!

[NMVolunteer]

Re: Immersion Training Ideas

I saw "New Mexico" and got excited. If your participants are healthy, it would be interesting to see fatigue duty. Perhaps some basic blacksmithing and repair work for the specialists with the cavalry and artillery. Paperwork and inventory for the quartermasters and ordnance corps.

[jake.koch]

Re: Immersion Training Ideas

Thanks Michael. The first event at least is going to be focused heavily on civilians, however with the frontier element thrown in there will be military aspects such as night guards as the area we will be at was between the Comanche and Apache (not ideal for anyone!) and had its stock raided frequently. There will be a company sized formation representing a portion of Gilpin's Frontier Battalion which passed through the new settlement. Gilpin's command was interesting to say the least, a mix of Germans from St. Louis and other men from Missouri. Gilpin himself and a few of the non Germans in his command had fought with Doniphan during the Mexican-American War, that said discipline was rather lax, especially in the German units stationed at Ft. Mann in Kansas where men were shooting at each other, a lieutenant got one of the "men" in his company pregnant, and on and on. (If there is anyone on here interested in doing 1840s and portraying one of Gilpin's men shoot me an email and I will reach out to you when we make the announcement, we already have some folks from the quality side lined up to help so it should be a unique experience).

I am mainly interested in ideas for civilians. There is indeed a blacksmith shop at the site and I am interested in any ideas for period correct activities for the civilians there. The impressions will be traders, hunters, settlers, skilled craftsmen, and unskilled laborers. There will be day to day things like equipment maintenance, cooking obviously, Spanish language interpreters (for communication between the laborers and the Anglos).We have some ideas based on firsthand accounts, but again I wanted to reach out to everyone here in an attempt to think outside the box and perhaps snag some ideas that we may not think of.

[Johnny Lloyd]

Re: Immersion Training Ideas

I moved this to the "How To" section of the forum. This is good info for those that want to know more on the mechanics of event hosting.

[jake.koch]

Re: Immersion Training Ideas

Johnny,

Thanks, I was between posting it here or the sinks. I appreciate it!

[NMVolunteer]

Re: Immersion Training Ideas

Have you contacted Bent's Old Fort? They do a week-long immersion training session for civilian skills like blacksmithing and other such skills.

[jake.koch]

Re: Immersion Training Ideas

Michael,

Sending you a pm. Many of the folks that are involved with our program do quite a bit at Bents, some are there right now helping to facilitate that very training you spoke of. They do some great things at that site, I know from having done an event there in the past, however our hope is to take this a step further with full 24 hour immersion, less training at skills then actually doing them as part of the "being there in 18**" mindset, with a good bit of preparation ahead of time by all involved. Again, the training portion of this event is for professionals in the interpretive field so depending on which role they take on they should already have those skills. We want to weave that in with the experience of the folks from the hobby to get the best possible experience for everyone.

[jnn62]

Re: Immersion Training Ideas

Jake, my name is Joel and I reside in northern New Mexico, I would be interested in portraying a Missouri Volunteer and my son Zach speaks German, who will be 17 in August. Keep me posted as to the details and location. Not sure where this would take place and the dates you might be considering. Let me know. Joel

[rbruno]

Re: Immersion Training Ideas

If I would make one suggestion for civilians, I would recommend something to do with farm animals and horses. I am not saying like a cattle drive or anything like that, nor am I saying that everyone rode horses "back in the day". But compared to today, horses and small farms with chickens, pigs, etc where certainly more common than today. As far as something to do, I have horses and chickens and I am always fixing/repairing fence, working on the barn, working on the coop. There are always repairs and maintenance to do. Could one of the activities be for your civilians to help maintain out buildings and any kind of enclosure for a small farm setting? I have been to a couple mainly civilian events and there are no horses around. To me, horses add a more authentic feel to an event even if it is a wagon and horse or mule. I think these things would be found in any town or settlement and would add something for people to do during the day.

[James Brenner]

Re: Immersion Training Ideas

I realize the following examples are a little outside your timeframe and may not be appropriate for the resources you have available but they may give you some ideas for further research ...

During the War of 1812, General Winchester commanded the left wing of Harrison's army. In the fall of 1812, cattle and hogs accompanied the army and the men butchered them for food. Winchester's order book directed his soldiers (not the camp followers) to use the tallow and lard to make soap and candles. Also, in 1813, for several days prior to the invasion of Canada, Harrison's soldiers baked hardtack in the Fort Meigs' ovens as well as in the smaller reflector ovens. (The NPS report on the bake house at Fort Vancouver is very interesting and probably reflects period practices: https://www.nps.gov/fova/learn/histo...house-hsr1.htm.)

Will you have male and female camp followers? If so, they may also provide some interesting scenarios. In the W1812, camp followers were nurses, laundresses, tailors, sewed artillery cartridge bags, and rolled cartridges ... in addition to cooking and other activities.

I hope this helps a bit.

[Elaine Kessinger]

Re: Immersion Training Ideas

Consider that for true immersion to take place, many experiences and skills need to be already learned.
So, in example, you can't hold an immersion activity and learn the skills at the same time unless it's a skill your portrayal would be logically learning.
One can do an immersive New Recruits Learn Drill because it logically can be new to everyone. One cannot do immersive Cattle Drive because few people have the skills already.
If your goal is to have an immersion event, then start ahead with workshops and skills practice so participants can get up to speed. As soon as you add new learning your portrayals would already know to an immersion event, it's ceased to become an immersion event.

[jake.koch]

Re: Immersion Training Ideas

Joel,

I sent you a pm!

[jake.koch]

Re: Immersion Training Ideas

Elaine, Rob, James and all,

I appreciate all of your responses. The reason why we wanted to set these programs up in this fashion is that a great many folks in the interpretive field may wear period clothing for something like a house tour but not have much experience with day to day life, or may talk about daily life at a house museum but have never had a chance to “live” that in a historic environment. By surrounding them with a number of folks from the hobby that are experienced, knowledgeable, and passionate to flesh everything out, provide visual examples of how to go about living history correctly, and in an “in character” manner show them what they need to know.
For this first event we will see what we get in the way of applications, which will determine what role that person gets. Fortunately part of the historical account for what we are portraying includes recent immigrants from the east. There is an awful lot they can be taught “in character” by those with more frontier experience where it historically makes sense for them to not know as much.

Rob, I agree with you on animals one hundred percent, the sights, sounds, and smells brought on by having various types of stock around was so common up until the turn of the century in most places and brings a great deal towards events. This site is adjacent to the Santa Fe Trail so caravans would have been a common site there. Whether we are allowed to have as many different types of stock as we would like will be dictated by the site we are at, however that will be something I advocate a little more for in our proposal.

James, this training will be for males and females in gender specific roles. There is a period adobe oven on site, it is also my hope to have something to butcher on site and tan the hide as all of those things would have occurred at that location.

Elaine, you made some great points which I agree with completely. Looking back I don’t think I was as clear as I intended to be in my original post. For those that come into this with little to no experience there will be a great deal of reading and preparation in advance to get them where they need to be for the event. In their case they will be working towards earning a certification so it will certainly be scholarly and academic.