How do you motivate others or improve the hobby?

[Pennvolunteer]

Re: Does being a modern Joe make you better at your impression?

Brett,
Brian has me pegged. I am the Director of Training at the Artillery School, Ft. Sill. Appreciate the comments in the thread, but would like to echo that I'm just glad they let me fall in with them. It is actually nice just to be in the ranks and a common soldier for a hobby.
Always love to talk. Another hard one for me to not slip up on is about face, it is very easy to just do it the modern way! As to how to get over those instinct things that have been "drilled" in to you, all I can tell you is that I have to actually think, and practice, practice, practice. The good news is, I don't fall in to many formations in my real job anymore, so I have less opportunity to get confused when I've been concentrating on the hobby!

[BrettKIllinois]

Re: Does being a modern Joe make you better at your impression?

Frank,
Thanks for the contribution and for your work educating the King of Battle.

[Dale Beasley]

Re: Does being a modern Joe make you better at your impression?

Hey Frank,

Fire for effect...

[Pennvolunteer]

Re: Does being a modern Joe make you better at your impression?

Dale,
Shot, over... but it looks like my mission time stinks, I need to monitor the net closer.

[MillerTime]

Campaigne Reenacting

I was just curious. When did campaigne/authentic reenacting start to take effect. What I mean is when did this start? I know reenacting back in the 60's and 70's wasn't all correct. So who where the first real campaigners. I know many strived for authenticity but who started the first hardcore company? Just thought It might be a fun discussion.

[Garrett Silliman]

Re: Campaigne Reenacting

Ah Avery,

Excellent question - and one whose answers I think you'll find right here

http://wesclark.com/jw/kimmel.html

Happy Reading.

[Pennvolunteer]

Re: Campaigne Reenacting

This is great information. I do our Museum gun crew here at Fort Sill with a fellow who began re-enacting as a young man as a Centennial Re-enactor. I have heard some "hair raising" stories about how bad many of those impressions were. We joked about how Audie Murphy in "Red Badge of Courage" needed technical advisors with 1870-1880 headgear with crossed rifles brass, Spanish-American War canteens and haversacks, and best of all, Trap-doors where they pulled the cleaning rod out to ram rounds. I have to say the worst thing I've seen from the 60's is the film at the Visitor Center at Shiloh. There is nothing authentic in it, and there are even guys with M1's in there. Needless to say, things have improved tremendously.

[Garrett Silliman]

Re: Campaigne Reenacting

True; however, I had the opportunity to speak at length with Mr. Kimmel last year about his experiences - very interesting stuff. Ross and comrades were members of an organization that really tried to "do it right". There are a couple of films put out by the VA centenial commission that are better, by today's standards, than some of the shlock that made its way into video during the 125th or 130th.

[billwatson]

Re: Campaigne Reenacting

Avery,

I think I know what you mean, and I think Garrett has given you the answer, but you might be better off describing what it is you're asking about in plain language rather than using words like "campaign," which come with their own baggage. The biggest problems: labels like "campaigner" and "authentic" and "hardcore" tend to be self-applied and/or appropriated for or against those with a particular philosophical agenda.

I think you want to know "when did people try to reconstruct as much of the soldier's experience as possible, as accurately as they could, in order to try to experience it themselves?" That would easily include Ross Kimmel and the fellows like him from that time, who tried to do what they could with the information and material available to them. We have so much more available to us now, in so many ways. And yet the more we have and the more we know, the more we see stretching ahead of us yet to master. And now the Museum of the Confederacy has received tens of thousands of documents relating to government purchases of arms and equipment, so much it will take years just to sort it and catalog it; who knows what we'll learn? So we're all in the same boat as Ross Kimmel; we are trying to do what we can with the information available, but we know we're probably going to find out, in the next few years, that some of what we're doing now in good faith is wrong. And we'll learn other things that will probably surprise us.

[CJDaley]

Re: Campaigne Reenacting

Thanks for posting that article Mr. Silliman. It would be in all our interests to re-read that article every few years. Ross is a great guy and like you, just talking to Ross is really great.

To my knowledge John Griffiths of the 1st PA Reserves has probably been in the hobby the longest. He also ran with Ross' crew back in the 60s-70s, but he was at the Centennial of John Brown's Raid and he slept on the ground there without a blanket or ground cloth. That was 48 years ago in 1959. I just saw John the other day and he still carries a musket and still sleeping on the ground.

[rogue]

Re: Campaigne Reenacting

Not to hijack, but go under SINKS and look at the photos I posted under WHO ARE THESE FELLOWS.
I believe they are 1970's Mudsills, and a close examination of the photos do at least show the beginnings of a thrust towards Campaigne.
Steve Sullivan
ex-33rd WI, but never a Mudsill, drat!

[Richmond Depot]

Re: Campaigne Reenacting

When I started back in '79 my group the Richmond Grays was primarily made up by guys who started out with the old 1st Md. Among the ranks were Dave Jurgella, John Griffiths,Mike Vice, Lynn Bull and several others. Being involved in what we were doing back then, at age 12, for me was a huge rush....even though things have changed for the better regarding uniforms,equipment and events, I have never been able to equal that rush. I guess, it was the people that I was exposed to who were so freely willing to help me learn.

If I can find them, I will try and dig out some old pics and post them.

[Charles Heath]

Re: Campaigne Reenacting

Scott,

While looking for the photos, see if you can dig up and post a roster of Co. G, 12th Virginia, from about that time. It reads like a Who's Who of the hobby, and a good number of those names are easy to recognize even today.

[Joe Walker]

Re: Campaigne Reenacting

The 12th Va, 2nd Maryland, and the 20th Tenn on the CS side- Marching and camping with guys like Less Jensen, Dave Jurg., Charles Childs, Dennis Ream, Anthony Hoghes, Gordon Jones, Bob Parkerand many more that took the time to listen to me asking so many questions was a real treat back in the 125th days. The "jean machine" was realing starting to get going in 86. Men in the Confederate Guard, Cleburnes, and the Mudsills in the West were before that, breaking the mould and leading the way. That "in the park" event at Gburg in 88 seams to the genesis of a lot of it.

Joe Walker

old 20th Tenn member

[Richmond Depot]

Re: Campaigne Reenacting

I can pull that right off of the top my head....or my hair

Dick Cheatham
Lynn Bull
Willie Balderson
Tom Hay
Mark Greenough
Scott Hanes
Lindsay Gray
Mike Vice
Dave Jurgella
Jim Loba
Phil Cavenaugh
Bob Toncray
Randy Wiley
Ed Sanders
Charlie Richardson
Wes Stone
Peter Kingsley
Robin Reed

Co. G 12th Va. Richmond Grays CA:1979-1986. The group came together from volunteers and paid staff who met at Ft. Harrison while portraying Co. D, 98th New York.

I started in the mainstream with the old Mahone's Brigade out of Tidewater in about '79 or so and by '80-'81 had found these guys whoe were local to me. Our Federal alter ego was Co. F 20th Maine.

Best,