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I was scouring the LoC collection during a study of Federal issue trouser pocket variations and ran across this seriously awesome image of a cobbled-together A-tent.
At first glace it appeared to be a regular old A-tent but upon closer inspection I noticed that this particular tent is actually made from a number of shelter tent halves. The most detail can be seen in the over-lap area towards the top front of the tent; you can make out huge hand stitches where the shelter halves have been attached to one another. Also visible are corner reinforcements, buttons (all over the A-tent), buttonholes, and a grommet or two.
The sides of the tent seem to be two shelter tents sewn together at the top, while the tent has yet more shelter tents sewn to the bottom of the sides to act as walls (see third image).
Could this A-tent be one of the ultimate ways to end boredom in camp? Maybe a good use for condemned shelter tent halves? It doesn't seem that a manufactory would actually produce an A-tent made from rejected shelter halves so perhaps this thing is the fruit of someone's careful eye and a lot of labor.
Also notable is the wool knit shirt that the African-American servant is wearing. Original shirts of this style that I have viewed all have white silk or polished cotton plackets but I have never seen an original with a collar, which the shirt in the image appears to have. The appearance of the knit material seems to be a sheep's gray or loomstate mixed gray wool.
Brian White
Wambaugh, White, & Co.
At first glace it appeared to be a regular old A-tent but upon closer inspection I noticed that this particular tent is actually made from a number of shelter tent halves. The most detail can be seen in the over-lap area towards the top front of the tent; you can make out huge hand stitches where the shelter halves have been attached to one another. Also visible are corner reinforcements, buttons (all over the A-tent), buttonholes, and a grommet or two.
The sides of the tent seem to be two shelter tents sewn together at the top, while the tent has yet more shelter tents sewn to the bottom of the sides to act as walls (see third image).
Could this A-tent be one of the ultimate ways to end boredom in camp? Maybe a good use for condemned shelter tent halves? It doesn't seem that a manufactory would actually produce an A-tent made from rejected shelter halves so perhaps this thing is the fruit of someone's careful eye and a lot of labor.
Also notable is the wool knit shirt that the African-American servant is wearing. Original shirts of this style that I have viewed all have white silk or polished cotton plackets but I have never seen an original with a collar, which the shirt in the image appears to have. The appearance of the knit material seems to be a sheep's gray or loomstate mixed gray wool.
Brian White
Wambaugh, White, & Co.
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