Camp Log.
(WOMEN) Camp Log 1946. N.p.: N.d. (1945-48). Small folio., pp. 136); stapled handmade paper wrappers upon which are imposed birch bark, pressed flowers, and wood-reinforced edges, covered with plastic wrap held in place by duct tape; one signature detached but present; clean and presentable throughout; near fine.
Summer camp scrapbook exhibiting an impressive degree of care and artisanship in its production by an unknown young Englishwoman in the period immediately following the second world war. The Camp at Bomber's Farm, as it seems to have been known, was a weekend retreat for girls on a farm located near Westerham, Kent. Tennis, cycling, hiking, horseback riding, milking, fruit picking, flower hunting, and sunbathing are mentioned as popular activities. Each day one or two of the camp staff must go to town to shop for food.
The writer / artist is a young woman, a member of the staff, who helps both to arrange and organize the site, and to supervise the campers. Except for the inclusion of more than 50 original black-and-white photographs, the book is entirely done by hand, including watercolor floral borders and floral decorations, pencil, ink, and watercolor floral and botanical drawings, actual botanical specimens and bird feathers, a watercolor scene, pencil sketch of the Westerham Valley landscape, pencil sketch of a bride, and neat calligraphy throughout.
Text varies from journal-like entries about working to open the camp to the public, camp activities during the season, cooking outdoors, routine days and eventful nights, botanical notes, especially concerning English orchids; lengthy passage on tenting in the rain quoted from Jerome K. Jerome's "Three Men in a Boat;" original verse, etc. Though the text records only che 1945 camp season, the "pictorial supplements at the end includes photographs from the summers of 1944 through 1948.
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