Anyone else here get tired of all the rat race going on? What if we lived in the late 1800's? Reality would be harsh, but to think of living by my own wits and fortitude is very alluring. All that was needed to survive was drive, knowledge, and some skill with a firearm on the frontier. Way more than that, really. Jeremiah Johnson comes to mind. Grizzly Adams(early hippie) and Mad Jack The Trappper with old number 7. Lonesome Dove and Broken Trail. A person could be a little industrious and do OK with-out making everyone else rich off of his/her sweat. I guess I'd like the American Dream with-out a lifetime of hurdles in front of you. Not that it should be easy, but it shouldn't be darn near impossible!!!

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Go big or stay home

I don't disagree with some of your points, but I think I like living in a time where there is no smallpox, polio, cholera, or any number of other deadly diseases that are essentially non-existent in a developed country. I'm kind of partial to showers and flush toilets, too... but I was raised in the city. Me and horses have an agreement. I don't try to ride them, they don't try to kill me. If I was in the 1800's I'd be a shopkeeper. Or the piano player in the saloon.

You can live like that now, you know. From the looks of the pictures he posts, you just have to live near Iggy.

I reenact, do Living History-Revolution, Civil War, War of 1898, next year War of 1812, then there are the people who do Rendezvous, etc. the CAS shooters. e.g. I think you'll find that all of us agree that the Past is a nice place to visit, but we wouldn't want to live there. I read a book by a criminologist, he started off by listing a number of horrid murders committed in New York City, he then said, you think it's such a terrible place? These all occurred in 1898.
In my science fiction club we prety much agree that we are living in a Future Imperfect, and that 2011 does not look at all like what we imagined it would be like in 1961.
If you were a shooter living in 1894 you'd be wondering when you'd finally see some of that new fangled smokeless powder.

It sounds romantic to me too. However I bet only a couple mountain men out of a hundred lived much past 45 years old! Think how carefull you would have to be out in the wilderness by yourself. Probley just breaking a ankle could be a death sentence. Still I get a charge at looking at many mountain men and civil war reenactors that more often than not are 300 lbs like me. The oldest pictures I have seen usualy show small wirery tough men.
When they went west many times it was forever as it might take 4 months to get to the mountains. Unless you were going to become a squaw man, you were out of luck with female companionship. I used to buy every book I could get on the mountain men and have a respectable library. I got the feeling 30 to 35 years was old!
Now if I could have had a good ATV, with gas and parts available every 100 miles I just might live through a season!
I started out with the national park service in yosemite in 1960. I spent 6 months in a tent or sleeping in the open about a month of that. Some of that time was hikeing about 8 miles back in, worked spraying bug infested trees and we came out 2 weeks later. Also was on several huge fires for about two weeks each. Rest of the time was as a blister rust checker where generaly we spent the day working by ourselves several miles off any road or trail. 1961 it was grand tetons.
Sounds unbeliveable, but when not working it could get a little boreing if you didnt have anything but leg power and were in deep woods.
Hell, a winter is a long time now even haveing vehicles. I kind of dread the next six months as I cant afford to get away and motel it much and there wont be much ATVing.
I would love stepping back in time, but I would also love to step back and forth to the present as I desire, not be locked into that past era.

This is what I would like to do if somehow God granted it. I know nothing about cameras etc but would learn. I would like to step back in time with good cameras, recording equipment and interview the old mountain men, indians with a interpiter etc. Even the founding fathers and all other types. Get it on film, and see and hear how it really was.

As the other posters have stated, while there are some attractive things about the late 1800's, I do not think I would want to go back to those times.

Like others several times I have spent a month to a little over 2 months in the wilderness , sometimes in 3rd World countries.

With some modern stuff, and modern preperation.

Untill you have spent a lot of time with out electricity, air conditioning, central heat, referigeration for food [ice for the Scotch...] etc...

Also, I now live in the country, and durring the winter 85% to 90% of my heat, for my house comes from my wood stove.

Plus in the late 1800's there were No 1911's or No S&W Mod 29's...

WHO would want to live without THEM????

Yea...I should have been a cowboy.

Well....,durn it. Looks like I've snapped back to reality. Hot showers are pretty important come to think of it. Guess we should put an ad in the WTB section for a reliable time machine.

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Go big or stay home

Sir, whenever I get feeling romantic about stepping back in time, I think of one word:

Dentistry.

Hope this helps, and Semper Fi.

Ron H.

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Wishin' don't make it so.

I do play the cowboy several times a year and I love it.

My biggest moment was horceriding in the Califorinanmountains for 3 hour in compagnion with Phil Spangenberger a couple years ago.

I like the old west and have some books on the subject. But it was also a very hard time to survive. I do know one thing. I wouldend survive it. I survived cancer in this time I don't do that for sure in the old days. I do have diabetic. Hmmm what are my cances in the good old day's?

I am with Feralmerril. When possible grab a camera flash back and record it all. But I come back to this modern time to live.

In this time I dont get grabbed by al those hasty people. I dont have an Iphone where I am addicted at. I just do my job right so nobody can get a fingernail behind me. I just trye to live right so I don't bodder anyone.

It works fine for me. In the mean time I can play the cowboy with some friends and have a good time.

A guy could move to Alaska or rural Canada - or even parts of the South - and live as a trapper today if he wanted to. There are also people all over the place that have opted out and live by their wits and wiles. We generally call them homeless people, bums, hobos, etc. If you want to live the homeless life, I'm told that San Diego is nice. Though I suppose you could also move to Iowa and start raising organic carrots or some such. Lots of options really.

Next time you are at Barnes and Noble look for a copy of Backwoodsman magazine. It'll help teach you how to get your hobo knife ready, etc.

I'm not too far from backwoods people, trailer park 2 blocks away.

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S&WHF 366

Yea....sometimes I think I'd be better off having been born back in the 1800's.........but I enjoy modern indoor plumbing.

When your in the woods you are gonna miss the Charmin.

This, and antibiotics. I *may* have survived then as long as I have now. But both my children would not have (apendix), nor my wife (cancer survivor).

Actually, I was thinking Model 29s and Combat Magnums, but you've got a point on the 1911!

Jeff Cooper once said he and a bunch of his buddies had quite the campfire evening sitting around imagining what it would have been like to go back to medieval times with a .45 Commander. Think about that one.

I hate to say it but I think I will just stay where I am. I'm sure I would have been long since dead at my present age if I had been born as little as 50-years earlier (antibiotics). Also better throw in an honorable mention for optometry/ophthalmology.

I got away from the rat race by moving to small town Kansas. I have my horses and my shooting range in the back yard, so I can play cowboy any time I want. But, I can also go into town and get most anything I need.

I remember rural areas that didn't have power until after WW2. They used kerosene lamps for light and drawed water with a bucket out of the well or had a spring. They cut wood with an axe and a crosscut saw and you only heated one room because you couldn't keep enough wood cut to heat the whole house. People had to work hard from sunup to sundown to just survive. I am sure it was harder in the 1800s than what I remember from the 40s and 50s so it may be fun to fantasize about life in the old days but in reality it was a rough life. I now live in a rural area where I can shoot and play cowboys and indians or cut a tree and play lumberjack but it is nice to live in a house with central air and heat and have a car and a 4 lane road when I want to go to someplace.Larry

Personally, for me I feel the 50's to the 60's were the best years and I was fortunate to have lived in those years. We did not have some of the diseases we have now. Starting a business was easy with less government red tape, income tax was not a real concern, guns were bought at drug and hardware stores without filling out forms or getting approval from a government agency. Crime was less, drugs and gangs were not a problem and people lived a fairly long life as it was common for one to have relatives living at 85 yrs of age. Doctors made house calls and we had cars that looked like cars and was made of real metal. Gasoline was less than forty cents a gallon. People held jobs for companies with retirement plans and insurance benefits.

I do not mind other people being rich. Most of them worked hard to get that way. The rich employs others. I do not mind banks charging high fees since I can change banks.

The problem as I see it.

If I lived in the 1880s I'd be dead now.

Sprefix, try to get the book "Yellowstone Kelly". It`s my favorite of that era. It`s his memoirs. He joined the army just as the civil war ended at 15 years old and was sent west right after. He died in 1928 and lived the life. The movie "Yellowstone Kelly" with clint walker touchs only a very small piece of his life.
Luther Kelly - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

http://www.franksrealm.com/Indians/M...stonekelly.htm

In the 1800s Cowboy is something folks did when they couldn't find easier work. Cowboys were mostly teenagers who were killed by the weather. Not so romantic, however I still feed three horses every day.

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Living a dream - S&WCA #2364

My horses wish they were fed three times a day. The price of hay has gotten so bad, they may go down to three times a week.

Those born in the last quarter of the 1800s had a slim chance of making it past their 5th birthdays.
No pre-natal care, born at home with little trained help, no antibiotics, and Mom stood a good chance of not surviving too.
Where are you wanting to live? In the towns maybe better chances of getting by. Out in the wild, watch out for the other predators, with two or four legs.
Now my personal fantasy. I remember seeing on TV a tale of a Guard tank crew coming to the rescue at the Little Big Horn.

I think some people have romanticised ideas of the past simply because that's when their favourite guns came out, or the way that the guns were made; there was plenty of junk around

So true. Just visit an older rural cemetery. They are full of children and young mothers who died during or shortly after childbirth.
John

We all like to fantasize of going back in time with modern weapons. But the indians would probley like that idea too!
We dream of the freedom of "Roaming". Remember this. Even the indians didnt roam without bounds. The tribes had their own areas that respected each others bounderys. If not, they wared. The mountain men and trappers etc went in strong groups well armed for the times.
Would it be much different today if a group of say 7 or 9 guys formed themselves together and traveled together not respecting property rights? They soon would be fighting swat teams and the national guard plus being sniped at by the property owners!
When I was a boy in the 40s my folks had a pretty old couple that were close friends to them that would come over to visit. I think the old man was a BIL to a aunt of my dad`s or something. Anyway this old boy had been in the army under blackjack pershing and had chased poncho villa around. I belive it was before that, that he told of being with a group of friends and they roamed the colorado rockys just hunting and he claimed they didnt see a road in a year!

Amazon.com: The Good Old Days--They Were Terrible! (9780394709413): Otto Bettmann: Books




I bought this book for my dad about when it first came out, around 1975 - he was born in 1907 (the year Oklahoma became a state) and died in '78. I don't know if he ever read it or not, but I went through it cover-to-cover a number of times. I always think of when people talk about how great it would have been to live in the old days, or how terrible things are now.

FYI, the cover is a little hard to make out in this picture. The main pic is of fine folks visiting the beach at Coney Island where animal corpses and other offal float in the water, as a garbage barge steams by. The little oval picture on the left is of a smoke-belching, fire-causing steam engine (which were prone to exploding when commonly overpressured) the picture on the right is a dangerous, gigantic tramp, stalking neighborhoods and inciting terror. "Tramp tramp tramp - here comes the tramp!"

Doughnuts...coffee stands....grocery stores...Shari's pie...the list is endless. I've done rondy's, ren faires, reenactment, and it's fun to play but I don't want to live in those times!

I recall a sign I saw in a Farrell's Ice Cream Parlour years ago. It said:
"THESE are the Good Old Days."

I don't think I'd want to live in those times, especially where I live now. I live in an area that was a hotbed of Comanche raids, murders, and horse thefts. A frontier settler was very likely to be killed and dismembered by the Indians. The children were often stolen and reared as slaves. No, not a good place to be - but it would have been nice to stock up on all these $17.00 Colt Peacemakers!

[QUOTE=cass;136175215]I don't think I'd want to live in those times, especially where I live now. I live in an area that was a hotbed of Comanche raids, murders, and horse thefts. A frontier settler was very likely to be killed and dismembered by the Indians. The children were often stolen and reared as slaves. No, not a good place to be - but it would have been nice to stock up on all these $17.00 Colt Peacemakers![/QUOTE

I remember my great uncle telling about making 20 cents a day driving a 4 horse team hauling lumber in the late 1890s. That would take a long time to get $17. Larry

OK, reading all of this I get an conclusion.

If we have had all the mentality of the good old days in the present days we have had all a good day now.

I think the final test would be to know if the people were happier in that era or in this. Unfortunatly how would we know? We do know that there has been huge strides in medicine, I think we can agree with AC.
I think the body adapted to heat more than we tend to recall if you lived in those days. I well remember liveing without AC or indoor plumbing. I think that years ago people simply visited far more with each other than now. Maybe these chat sites somehow replace some of that. I recall that we knew our neighbors far better, reconised many more people when you went to town and more friends and relatives were always pulling up in the driveway. It seemed friends and relatives helped each other out of friendship more and there wasnt a price tag on it.
I started out in a very rual area but ended up doing my career in crowded southern california. Retired here to utah and it was like stepping back in time 50 years as far as waiting in lines etc go`s.
Go to DMV or whatever and it`s like, where ya been? We been wainting for you! Instead of make a appointment, take a number and wait a couple hours!
Maybe a lot or all of this depends on where you live even today, and probley it did a 150 years ago too. You could have stayed in boston as a ganymede or enlist with lewis and clark.

The good old days were not good, just old.

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Thirty characters. Exactly...

Wells Boys,

I've lived out-of-doors, slept on the ground, forked a horse everyday and cooked on an open fire for months
at a stretch...I wouldn't take a million dollars for those experiences.
But, wouldn't I give ya a nickle for some more of it neither!

I ain't quite turned into a town dog jest yet, wife likes town livin'...I don't like bein' crowded up, jest to say the least.

Do like being able to walk out on the veranda and pop a few caps off'n the porch with the grandsons.


Can't do that in town, cause someone keeps calling the law on me, everytime...


Su Amigo,
Dave

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"IN GOD WE TRUST"

100+ years from now someone will say they should have been born in the early 21st century... to return to the ruggged individualism and freedom to chose what book to read and what to learn, instead of the Knowledge Chip implanted at birth. Others will point out how horrible it was to live with cancer, diabetes and all the other diseases of those past times.

Meanwhile... the great great great grandchildren of the Gorilla will be issuing Reminders to Wyatt's descendants that politics is a banned topic... (some things never change )

Dave sed,
I've lived out-of-doors, slept on the ground, forked a horse everyday and cooked on an open fire for months
at a stretch...I wouldn't take a million dollars for those experiences.
But, wouldn't I give ya a nickle for some more of it neither!

I have done the same thing as he did and I couldn't express my sentiments any better than he did.

Some of us are older to different degrees. I was born in 41. From my view I liked the 40s, 50s and early 60s. It seems to me things really started to go to hell in the mid 60s and it`s been getting worse ever since. If thats so, what started it? Seems to me it was durring viet nam, all the long haired protesters and the catering to them. I didnt get in on it, but the "free sex", pot use, reverse discrimnation laws, disrespect of LEO and military and all other authority, freak show dress, forced tollerance towards gays, womans pro choice, disrespect of all old heros as in the founding fathers, john wayne, old westerns replaced with jerry springer and ellen degenerate, everything our men fought against and died for meaning socialism or downright communism tolerated and accepted, unbrideled spending and welfare, loose morals incouraged old good morals laughed at, immigration laws unenforced, parents stopped by new laws from discipling their kids, green peace getting their way over all reason, I better quit now.
What started all this?

Amen to that, imagine a barber-dentist..even the thought scares the you know what out of me....In a hundred years somebody will be saying that about the 2000's (if anybody is left)...Semper Fi.

"THE GOOD OLD DAYS"
Which was more dangerous:
1. a Lawman
2. a Saloon Girl that had a room over the bar. (remember the wild cowboys that celebrated by firing their six-shooters in the ceiling of the bar?)

I had a old friend that told me durring world war two he was overseas somewhere without electricity and had a dentist that had a guy pedal a bicycle wheel that was hooked up with belts to power his drill!

My grandkids are always asking for stories of when I grew up. They tell me they would love to live like that.

I say its not too late, I'll pay them a dollar a day to buck slabs. Let them take baths in the yard in a #3 wash tub.

I understand that an 1875 $20.00 gold piece would buy a Peacemaker and give enough change to buy a box of shells in those days. Nothing has changed. That same $20.00 gold piece still will today.

The number of children who didn't reach the age of 6 would have driven me into the deepest depression.

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and what his trumpet saith

Wow, feralmerril, that's the longest sentence I've ever seen on this forum!! I also agree completely.

I live in the country. I never go to town unless I have to. Usually only one time a week or once every two weeks.
I get my water from a well @600 feet deep. I do have electricity, but in the winter 85% of my heat comes from the wood stove. Once it gets cold I use only the wood stove 24 hours a day.

I have Burros, and Llamas, as well as some ducks. Most every day for the last couple of years I have @23 Canadian geese that land on my pond.

I was born and grew up in the city, after I retiorted we moved to the country.

I had a great time on my Job, but being retired and moving to the country was the best thing I have ever done.

One thing we reenactors agree on is back then the average man or woman had far more in the way of skills to cope with both the little and big problems and the family was much more self sufficent and self reliant. As I type this I am ay my town's public library here in Central NJ. Power went out in my apartment complex at 9:40PM last night, when I left my apartment at 10AM this morning it still wasn't back, the local shopping center was without power. Lot of branches down due to their not being able to carry the weight of both leaves and snow, to us it' s a PITB and more work, to our forebear's it's firewood. Likewise the Little Brown Shack Out Back may have been miserable on a cold winter night, but at least it never back up, overflowed, clogged up, etc.
A famous naturalist and conservation officer name Aldo Leopold wrote a book entitled "Sand County Almanac" in which he notes that when you live on a farm you learn that heat does not come from the furnace and breakfast does not come from the grocery.

well they didnt have any 29s back then, but i guess i could have got by with a pair of saas and a 73 winchester

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WILL WORK FOR AMMO!