Re: MtMan-List: packs

["Frank Fusco" <frankf@centuryinter.net>]

I wasn't there, so cannot say what they did for packs. Like most writers
on this subject have pointed out, there was a variety of solutions to
carrying necessities without horses. I believe I know what I would do if I
had to contrive something to transport a large pack of goods under my own
foot power and using only nature provided materials. I would construct a
travois-like device that I could pull. There would be some drag but I
believe the gain in comfort from not having to carry the entire weight
would more than offset that.
Frank
http://www.galstar.com/~osiris/letter.htm
http://www.thecore.com/~sparkler/brent.html
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> From: Lee Driver <tdriver@laplaza.org>
> To: hist_text@xmission.com
> Subject: MtMan-List: packs
> Date: Monday, March 31, 1997 11:41 AM
> 
> About being period correct about packs, I would say:
> 
> Probably the one historical incidence that most lends itself to this 
> question is John Colter's long trek  in 1807, to look for the Crow 
> Indians at Manuel Lisa's request.
> 
> "Carrying a thirty-pound pack containing powder, lead, traps, jerkey, 
> and a buffalo robe he left the fort alone, armed with his Hawken 
> rifle and skinning knife." This quote comes from _Views of Louisiana_ 
> by Breckenridge in which he says he is quoting The Missouri Gazette,
> presumably around 1810.
> 
> If we're to believe the reports, Colter walked 750 miles or so. I
> guess we could assume he carried that same pack the whole way, but I
> seriously doubt it. Anyone who's ever packed any distance at all
> with a good load in something on the order of a handmade pack rig,
> would be able to tell you that that pack is constantly undergoing
> adjustments, improvements, redesign, and that the final version
> probably worked pretty well for Colter, and not necessarily for just
> anyone. We can know for certain that it was made out of period
> correct elements. I think we can assume too, that he didn't go very
> far, if any distance at all, before he knew he needed to have both
> hands free, which narrows it into some kind of back pack. From
> there, using whatever would have been available to hand, from skins
> to bones to antlers to sinew to branches to shaped wood... use your
> imagination. I'll guarantee you that's what Colter did, or any other
> of those mountain men who ever found themselves in need of having to
> carry their own gear. He'd been all the way to the Pacific and back
> with L&C, so he probably already had a few good inclinations with 
> regards to packing before he started on this trip for Lisa. After a 
> while, walking in rough terrain, carrying 30 or 50 pounds, you'd come 
> up with a design that would work for you that was period correct, 
> that would be it's own documentation. The ability to come up with
> solutions, then, can't be all that different from now, under similiar
> constraints.I guess we'd have to assume too, that some would come up
> with better solutions than others, which also would be period
> correct. (I do recall that the great Jed Smith and his small 
> party, on their spy mission up to Flathead House in the winter of 
> 1824, couldn't figure out how to make snowshoes, though. One would 
> think that someone who could cooly instruct another on how to sew his 
> own ear back on could come up with snowshoes, but, I guess not.)  Of 
> course, just stealing or trading for a horse or two, would curtail 
> the backpack research experiment some, or certainly change the 
> problem to one of horsepacking.. But, once one comes up with a pack 
> that works, all there is left to do is scan a picture of it onto the 
> web for all us unhorsed ones to take a look at. 
> 
> Lee Driver