Tag Archives: reenacting

Historically Speaking has Relaunched!

Though there are still a few kinks to be worked out, today I am officially relaunching my reenacting blog, Historically Speaking.

After travel, reenacting has always been my most popular subject here at DriftingFocus, and I am glad that it will finally have a home of its own. I have something of a backlog of material that I’ve been waiting for the relaunch to post, so keep an eye on the blog over the next few weeks and if you’re interested in keeping up with my historical exploits, please change your links and subscriptions to: Read More

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Categories: Meta Reenacting
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Impressions in Progress: Revolutionary War Campfollower

[dcs_img width="300" height="450" thumb="true" framed="black" desc="My cobbled-together campfollower impression."
lightbox="true" title="My cobbled-together campfollower impression." pos="right" mleft="15"]

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Back in September I had the good fortune to be invited along to a rather large 18th century event held at Fort Ticonderoga in upstate New York. Since it had been 10 years (and 35lbs) since I last wore my 18th century gear, much of it no longer fit, had fallen apart or, due to recent research, had been found to be inaccurate. After taking an inventory of what was still appropriate and wearable, I was left with very little: stockings and two petticoats.

Thankfully, the reenacting community is very friendly and are great about loaning gear to those in need. I borrowed shoes from my friend Anna, and my friend Taylor (who runs the lovely history-related blogs Hats from History and Dames a la Mode) leant me a cap, bonnet, shift, and bedgown. Sadly I had to go stay-less for the event, though that’s a bit easier to disguise in a bedgown than in a proper gown. I think I looked pretty damn good though, all things considered.

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Categories: Projects Reenacting
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I wish I could be a reenactor but…I can’t find any reenactors!

This seems to be a common complaint among folks trying to get into the reenacting hobby. Reenactors can be a bit insular, but it’s nothing a little Google-fu and creative thinking can’t fix. Here are a few bits of advice on finding reenactors to talk to.

[dcs_img width="500" height="311" thumb="true" framed="black" author="photographer: Will Ritcher" lightbox="true" pos="right" mleft="15"]

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1. As I’ve mentioned before, you may not be able to find exactly what you want in your immediate area, so be general in your searches. Instead of searching for, say, “WWII reenacting units in York, Nebraska” you need to be searching for “WWII reenactments in the midwest”. Reenactors travel for events, and in areas where they’re not common, they often travel great distances, so keep that in mind when searching. Just like they (hopefully) taught you in school, if your searches are still not turning up anything useful, broaden your search terms.

2. Look for reenactments as well as reenacting units, and don’t be picky. Attending a reenactment and chatting with reenactors is a great way to get into the hobby, and we’re often much more open in person than over email. Also, don’t just look for reenactments that are of the period you’re interested in. Many reenactors portray multiple time periods, so it’s entirely possible to meet a Vietnam War reenactor at a Revolutionary War reenactment, or a WWII reenactor at a Civil War event. Also, remember that many reenactments are private and un-publicized outside the hobby, so if it looks like your preferred period isn’t portrayed in your area, don’t give up – you may just not be seeing everything that’s actually going on.

[dcs_img width="500" height="357" thumb="true" framed="black" author="photographer: Will Ritcher" lightbox="true" pos="left" mright="15"]

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3. Be creative in thinking of ways to find reenactors. Check flickr for photographs of reenactors and contact the photographer see if they are reenactors themselves (many are). Check the reenactment/reenactor/reenacting tags on Tumblr. Look for reenactor blogs (there. are. many.) and contact the authors. Reenactors are out there, we just may not be in the most obvious of places.

4. Know the words to search for. Here’s a selection of some of the keywords that will help you in your searching endeavors: reenactment, living history, reenacting unit, tactical reenactment, historical site, timeline event, military display, costumed interpreters, As I mentioned before, try to search for events, not just reenacting groups. You can meet all sorts of reenactors at public living history events, and many times you will find that the websites for those events will list the groups that will be in attendance. Once you find that, you can use those names to search for the websites of those groups.

5. Be aware that many reenacting units don’t have a web presence. Many groups prefer to keep things easy by using a simple Yahoo mailing list for unit organization and communication, and so it can be hard to find the members online. Keep in mind that many reenactors aren’t exactly social media-savvy and most prefer offline, face-to-face contact. If you can’t find reenactors in your area online, it doesn’t mean they don’t exist, so keep trying.

I hope that these bits of advice will help you to find reenactors, who will then also help you get into the hobby. If you’re reading this and would like me to help you, feel free to contact me and I will do what I can.

[dcs_small][Note: This post features photography from my friend and fellow reenactor Will Ritcher. Will has been working on his photography recently and has been putting out some really great stuff lately, so I felt it deserved some featuring!][/dcs_small]
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Categories: Ask A Reenactor Reenacting The Hobby
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I wish I could be a reenactor but…it’s too expensive!

Ah, money. It’s the bane of pretty much everyone’s existence, so it should come as no surprise that money and the expense of reenacting is the #1 stated cause for potential recruits feeling unable to become reenactors.

Reenacting is, unfortunately, an expensive hobby. Gear and clothing is costly, events often require more than a few gallons of gas to drive to, and proper firearms can bankrupt even those with deep pockets. It varies widely from period to period, but based on some informal polling of friends, I’d say that the average cost for the basics of an impression (i.e. no firearm, no shelter) will run you somewhere between $400-$800, but it can easily be double that.

That said, there are some things you can do to reduce the amount you have to spend to “pay to play”, some things you can do to save money toward getting your start in the hobby, and a few insider tips that may reduce your costs at the beginning.

1. Most groups have loaner gear. It may not fit right, it may not look good, it may not be the best quality, but it will do for your first couple events. If you’re particularly large or small, this may be more of a problem, but if you’re of average build, many units will have enough spare equipment and clothing between its various members to “kit you out” for an event. The one exception is shoes. If you have found a unit that you want to join and they have enough other gear to loan you, spend your money on getting a good pair of shoes. Get good ones and you will save money later by not having to replace them as soon.

2. Choose a cheap impression. Many earlier period impressions (18th century and earlier) are cheaper because you can sew your own clothes. Patterns are readily available for what you will need, and other unit members will likely step up to help you out. Fabric still costs money, but you will save on labour by sewing your own clothes. For those folks looking to do later periods such as WWII, look around at various suppliers to see what impressions tend to be cheaper. Package deals (like this one) are also a good way to save cash for those interested in later eras.

3. Save up money in small increments. I started reenacting when I was twelve years old. At the time, I got $40 a month in allowance. I saved up my allowance for the better part of a year and sent in an order to a sutler for some basic items. My advice is to use a similar approach. Figure out how much money you can spare per month and set up a SmartyPig account to auto-deduct that amount into a special savings account that’s just for reenacting. If you are convinced you can’t spare anything, try this experiment: set up the account to deduct $1 a day (or $7 a week). That works out to $365 a year, just from a dollar a day. I use this method whenever I have convinced myself that I can’t afford something. It works quite well, and you don’t feel the pinch from day to day.

I hope that some of this advice is helpful to those of you who feel that monetary concerns are holding you back from joining the hobby. If you have further concerns or have other advice, please feel free to leave a comment!

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Categories: Advice Reenacting The Hobby
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I wish I could be a reenactor but…I don’t have the time!

When I polled a group of hopeful reenacting recruits, one of the most common hindrances that holds folks back from joining the hobby is a lack of time.

Well, I’d like to start off by saying that…it doesn’t take as much time as you might think.

Just like any other hobby, the amount of time you put into reenacting is completely up to you. Some reenactors are constantly acquiring and creating new impressions, others stick to just one or two. Some reenactors attend an event almost every weekend, while others attend only two or three events per year. As with many hobbies, if you don’t have a lot of time, start small and work your way up.

If you don’t have a lot of time on your hands, here are a few bits of advice for easing your entry into the reenacting world:

1. Start with an impression that you can buy. 20th century impressions are particularly good for this, but you can buy a whole impression for Civil War, Revolutionary War, or many other periods as well. This is not the route I recommend for everyone, but if you don’t have a lot of time, it can really take a load off your shoulders. In many cases, buying your gear is only slightly more expensive than making it yourself, and for 20th century periods such as WWII, it’s your only option anyway.

2. Find a group that doesn’t have event attendance requirements. Some groups require you to attend a certain number of events per year to be considered a member; others do not. Try to find a group that is more forgiving in this respect, and talk with unit leaders about your predicament. They should be understanding. If they’re not, then it’s not the right group for you anyway. My first six years in the hobby were spent attending no more than two events per year.

3. Find a group that does a lot of events that aren’t far away. Events that are less than 2 hours away are often viewed as “close”, so if driving time is an issue for you, ask potential units about what events they attend and how far away they are.

4. Participate only as much as you are able to. Some events run from Friday night until Sunday afternoon, while others are one-day affairs. Stick to events that are shorter in length. If you can’t find short events, then attend only part of longer events. The Vietnam War events that Marc and I do are Friday night through Sunday morning, but we often arrive around 7am on Saturday and are gone by 6pm the same day. We miss out on some stuff, but it’s better to participate a little bit than not at all.

If you’re currently hoping to start reenacting but have held back because of a lack of time, I hope that those bits of advice will help you to take the plunge into what can be a very fun and rewarding hobby.

As always, please leave a comment if you have other commentary or further questions.

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Becoming a Reenactor: Potential Barriers to Entry & How to Overcome Them

I run a reenacting-related Tumblr blog by the name of Daily Reenactor. It currently has 3,150 subscribers – a pretty healthy following for Tumblr. Daily Reenactor tends to be much more of a catch-all blog, with some videos, random photos I take or find, and tidbits about the lives of reenactors.

One of my personal goals is to help potential recruits find their way into the hobby. I started reenacting back in the mid-nineties, before the ubiquitous nature of the internet greased the wheels of social interaction. It was really, really hard to find reenactors and to find accurate information, and even harder to get a start in the hobby. It’s now fifteen years later and I’ve noticed something: it’s not all that much easier, if you don’t know where to start.

Unlike this blog, most of the readers of Daily Reenactor are not already reenactors, which has created something of an opportunity for me. I have been informally polling my readers as to whether they wish they could be a part of the reenacting hobby, and if so, what has thus far kept them from doing so. Here are a few of the responses I got:

Can’t find a reenacting unit near me. Biggest reason is that I’m going to school, work and have kids. They all hate reenacting.

Money is probably almost always going to be the problem. Definitely is for me, though location is not great either.

I’m a student without a job, a car, or a drivers license. Gear is expensive. I live in an area that seems pretty low on reenactors or events. The closest reenactments are at least an hour and a half away, and neither my parents nor my friends have the time or inclination to drive 4 hours, round-trip, and sit around (probably bored) whilst I run around in uniform. Also, a friend of mine from high school reenacts with a local group, and when I sent him a facebook message inquiring about the group, he said that the leader flat-out doesn’t want any women in it.

There’s no reenacting in my area (or close to). if so, it’s only twice or once a year.

For the most part, for me, it’s the money issue. I do not have time to learn to sew, so…there you go? Everything else I can find!

Time, once you are old enough to make the money to do the things you wanted to try you are working too much to have any free time.

Aside from SCA, ren faires, and one small medieval group…I can’t find squat. That’s my current block.

As you can see, I got a wide variety of answers, but there were definitely some common themes. My plan is to have a post series here on Historically Speaking which addresses each of the common barriers to joining the hobby, and what you can do to mitigate them. If you’re interested in becoming a historical reenactor, this is definitely a series you’ll want to follow along with!

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Friday Photo: Marc and the MAT-49

Today’s photo is of Marc, playing around with a “dummy gun” mockup of a French MAT-49 machine pistol. That particular firearm was commonly used by the French troops in Algeria which he is portraying in this shot, but due to the full-auto nature of the gun, it is extremely rare in the USA. Thus, for living history events, we use a fake reproduction made of wood and rubber.

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Categories: Friday Photos Photography Reenacting
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