Historiker

I’m working on adding a skirt to my zelt tent. At Camp Swift I had a plain zelt tent, which is 4 zeltbahns with a center pole. I know the German army slept 4 in a tent like that, but sleeping on the ground is a bit uncomfortable. Others in the unit have side skirts which allow you to raise the height of the tent which allows you to set up a cot to sleep on…plus you don’t have to get dressed and undressed on your knees.

My tiny tent at Camp Swift… I’m between two with small skirts, the tent in the back of the picture uses 8 zelts for sides for an even taller tent.

So I decided to make a skirt for my tent. I’m trying something different. I have several 6 foot square Italian zelts. They have a seam in the middle, by splitting them at the seam I can make two 3×6 sections, buttoning several of these together will make my skirt. All I have to do is finish the edge and add buttons to meet the sides of my top zelts.

The Italian version of the zelt…

Here’s the zelt split down the middle and buttoned end to end. Part of my skirt.

I’ll keep you posted as it goes together….

I had the privilege to meet two really talented photographers who were attending the Waxahatchie reenactment. These guys took some of the best photos I’ve ever seen of a reenactment! - and not because they managed to get a flattering photo of decidedly un-photogenic me - more because they captured reenactors in character - in moments that reflect back in time… they seem to make history come alive. I’m captivated by the shots they took.

The photographers whom I know only by the handles of “TXZeiss” and “Yo Spiff”.. here are the links. Thanks again!

TXZeiss’ photos are here.

Yo Spiff’s are here.

I added the zeltbahn page to the site… it’s actually more of a rant about the current state of repro zelts… I was really bugged that zelts I’d bought which were supposed to be standard size aren’t.

I’ve been working on the main site a bit more as time free from work allows. I managed to make live the Book Reviews page starting off with a great little book written by a man who grew up in Germany during the war. Though it’s not mentioned in the book, and initially I just thought the last name of the author coincidental the author is the nephew of General Reinhard Gehlen. That aside the book is good on it’s own merits, well written and interesting!

I recommend it!

Maybe I should say … looking for modern ways to power old equipment. I have one real lead-zinc cell battery that was the original 1.5 volt power source for the FF33 field telephone, but I think it ran out of charge somewhere in 1945… that’s a problem with these old things.

Original battery, vintage 1945!

I found that a standard D cell battery works but is a little under amp’ed to power the telephone plus it doesn’t have the wire terminals that are needed to connect. My solution is to solder two in series and attach a wire lead.

The main trick is that you need to leave enough slack for the batteries to lay a bit sideways in the battery compartment as they won’t fit side by side. Here they are installed in the telephone.

My unit commander had a great surprise for me this weekend. I received a Luftwaffe signals specialist patch in recognition for my work on the unit’s field communications gear. Here’s some of it… Anyway I’ve got a nice new specialist patch for my fligerbluse.

It is worn on the left sleeve just above my Kreta and Afrika cuff titles.