Haversack
One Too Many
- Messages
- 1,193
- Location
- Clipperton Island
When I had to choose a moniker for this site I ended up using the name of the satchel I use every day. Over the years I have played in a variety of historic recreation milieus and have developed an appreciation for the broad variety of sartorial solutions which people in the past have found for specific problems. For example, knee breeches and socks make a great deal of sense if one spends a lot of time outdoors in the field. Your lower legs are the part that tends to get wet and muddy.
Anyway, my daily commute involves about 1.5 miles of walking, a 3 mile trolley ride and a 40 mile train trip each way. I have to bring a lunch as there are no places to eat within a 1/2 mile of work. I usually have the morning paper and book, and often have some paperwork as well. A briefcase is overkill and is also inconvenient climbing the stairs on the hill I walk over. Back when I used a bicycle to commute, the knapsack was fine. For walking however, it too was overkill and left a large sweat mark on my back. My solution, which I have been using now for five years is a linen reproduction of an 18th C. Haversack as per below.
http://jas-townsend.com/product_inf...d=182&osCsid=79f418453f6e972e747c1701636d0924
They are light weight, do not impinge on what I am wearing, and do not read as a purse. They also do the job and can even carry groceries if I need to stop at the market on the way home. Although they do wear out after a couple of years, they are easy to replace and scrap linen is always useful for making repairs. It is pretty much an earlier eras equivilent to the Israeli paratrooper bag. I've often toyed with the idea of painting the badge of one of a variety of regiments on the cover.
Haversack
Anyway, my daily commute involves about 1.5 miles of walking, a 3 mile trolley ride and a 40 mile train trip each way. I have to bring a lunch as there are no places to eat within a 1/2 mile of work. I usually have the morning paper and book, and often have some paperwork as well. A briefcase is overkill and is also inconvenient climbing the stairs on the hill I walk over. Back when I used a bicycle to commute, the knapsack was fine. For walking however, it too was overkill and left a large sweat mark on my back. My solution, which I have been using now for five years is a linen reproduction of an 18th C. Haversack as per below.
http://jas-townsend.com/product_inf...d=182&osCsid=79f418453f6e972e747c1701636d0924
They are light weight, do not impinge on what I am wearing, and do not read as a purse. They also do the job and can even carry groceries if I need to stop at the market on the way home. Although they do wear out after a couple of years, they are easy to replace and scrap linen is always useful for making repairs. It is pretty much an earlier eras equivilent to the Israeli paratrooper bag. I've often toyed with the idea of painting the badge of one of a variety of regiments on the cover.
Haversack
I carried the lunchbox in the days before mobile phones, MP3 players, and debit cards so it always contained, at least, the 1980s equivalents of those now essential items: a 35mm film canister with change for a phone box, Sony Walkman with headphones plus a few spare tapes, and my cheque book. Also squeezed in were whatever book I was reading at the time and a Swiss Army knife wrapped in a hanky to stop it rattling around.
