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Mods: I am posting this obit here for its relevance to cavalry historians and reenactors. Few outside our subject matter would appreciate its impact. However, feel free to move it if you deem necessary. Thank you! Ken R Knopp
I regret the announcement of the passing this morning of historian and author R. Stephen Dorsey. While an author of many books on American military sword & saber belts, swords, reproduction catalogs etc., he is perhaps best known among military horsemen, collectors, historians and cavalry/artillery reenactors for his massive and unsurpassed work entitled THE AMERICAN MILITARY SADDLE 1776-1945 co-authored in 1999 with his long time friend Kenneth L. McPheeters. This large, four-hundred page, hardbound study, exacting in a multitude of research data, detail and photos is considered the single most comprehensive treatment available today of the saddlery that was used by America's armies from its earliest origins to World War II- including saddles, saddle trees, bridle bits, saddle blankets, Schabraques, saddle bags, valises, stirrups, girths and surcingles, pommel pockets and more.
While always opinionated, often irascible and occasionally wrong (like all of us that research and write in this subject matter culture) , Mr Dorsey will be remembered as a leader in compiling, publishing and contributing so much to our body of knowledge at a time when our understanding, access to research and artifacts and its relevance was in its infancy. I am doubtful, very many people today fully appreciate or can even comprehend all that he accomplished for us that we now just simply take for granted. He blessed us with his efforts and we should honor and remember him for it.
Ken R Knopp
I regret the announcement of the passing this morning of historian and author R. Stephen Dorsey. While an author of many books on American military sword & saber belts, swords, reproduction catalogs etc., he is perhaps best known among military horsemen, collectors, historians and cavalry/artillery reenactors for his massive and unsurpassed work entitled THE AMERICAN MILITARY SADDLE 1776-1945 co-authored in 1999 with his long time friend Kenneth L. McPheeters. This large, four-hundred page, hardbound study, exacting in a multitude of research data, detail and photos is considered the single most comprehensive treatment available today of the saddlery that was used by America's armies from its earliest origins to World War II- including saddles, saddle trees, bridle bits, saddle blankets, Schabraques, saddle bags, valises, stirrups, girths and surcingles, pommel pockets and more.
While always opinionated, often irascible and occasionally wrong (like all of us that research and write in this subject matter culture) , Mr Dorsey will be remembered as a leader in compiling, publishing and contributing so much to our body of knowledge at a time when our understanding, access to research and artifacts and its relevance was in its infancy. I am doubtful, very many people today fully appreciate or can even comprehend all that he accomplished for us that we now just simply take for granted. He blessed us with his efforts and we should honor and remember him for it.
Ken R Knopp