Camping in the Old Style

 Visit with the Acorn Patrol in a re-created campsite of the early 1900’s.  At this time in history the Pisgah National Forest was in its infancy, and city folk were discovering the joys of outdoor recreation. It was a time when camping meant sleeping under canvas and cooking over an open fire. Here in the wood smoke, surrounded by the outdoor gear of a by-gone day, the traditional skills of camp and trail will be practiced in their proper setting. 

 “Camping in the Old Style” is presented by the Traditional Outdoor Skills Program, Schiele Museum of Natural History, Gastonia, North Carolina. Visitors can see fire by flint, steel, and friction, old style campfire cookery, four different styles of period shelters, and traditional camp tools in use. Each camper has expertise in various aspects of woodcraft, history and nature study, and welcomes questions from visitors.

“Camping in the Old Style” is inspired by Horace Kephart, author of Camping and Woodcraft, originally published in 1906, and Our Southern Highlanders, first published in 1913. Kephart’s low tech-high skill approach to enjoying the outdoors holds lessons for today’s modern campers.