Upper Canada Here's an innovation that existed years ago-- an example of devotion someone had to the visual theatre as much as the spirit of history and pride in heritage. The scene is a lecture hall not far from Niagara Falls- it is 1969 or 70; before consumerism drove the region to be Canada's and Buffalo, New York's answer to Las Vegas. It was a dark, clean and comfortable theatre where the stage was visible from sloping seating and the presentation began with music and sound, then soft small spot lights and a crescendo that began a presentation of the "Attack on Fort Erie" during the War of 1812. It was all in miniature, and the stage must have been about 50 square feet. I was awestruck. At the age of 10 this was the most amazing thing I'd ever seen or heard. The hundreds of historical figures representing attacking Americans and British defenders, with tiny cannon and a backdrop that reminds me now of a Ken Burns production- just incredible. To boot, all the attacking columns of infantry were at once moving and attacking behind tiny trees then retreating, as the movable scenes were mounted to tiny conveyor belts you couldn't of course see. On the reverse of the belt- yes, they flipped over- the figures were different, performing the scene of casualties and disorder, commanders rallying their men and other microcosms of action. The narration was recorded and the theatre-- but the stage and tiny spot lights illuminating down and exploding points of light on the ground- remained dark. The audience was transported to Fort Erie- it was like a time machine- we were there seeing it happen all over again. I was an American on the Canadian side watching my countrymen succeed and fail in a worthless war that engaged, on either side, fewer troops than a Civil War division "and half of those troops joined up because they were starving." Even Upper Canadian's had almost no idea why American's suddenly wanted their land. You see, it was a fascinating study of something strange and unusual presented to me in miniature, where, like bird above the landscape I felt the bounding of cannon from a distance and crackling of musketry at once. I had found my own kind of time machine. I looked down upon the landscape of sculptured hills and cliffs, trees and farms, walls and fences. It was an enormous exercise in strategy and tactics on a scale that brought it into your living room. For me at the age of 10, I already had three seasons of hockey and two of football and the beginnings of strategy and tactics. I was practicing strategy and how to endure on both a hot green space and cold white space, being part of the skirmish. When visiting Old Fort York in Toronto I was hooked on the attraction of re-enactments. I climbed onto the barrack beds filled with straw and talked with British Line Infantry about the ranks of men, muskets and steel. The black powder smoke and smell of sulfur in the air greeted me as I climbed around naval guns looking toward Lake Ontario, but the beaches now were a mile or more away. I was getting a first-hand grasp of the fundamentals. The flags, the bugles, the drums, the gates- the powder. I practically had to be dragged from the stone wall confines of the gift shop, where I purchased my first cardstock model of the fort. It was mine to take home and study as long as I wanted. When visiting Fort Souix St. Marie my fate of being involved with wargames was virtually sealed. And then we visited Old Fort Henry. Time & Space There are regions of Upper Canada called Algonquin and Caledon and here is the real estate for canoes and kids running around with compasses and maps. For me, best of all, I was visiting in Sprit in that time of year between Hockey and Football that all hunters wait for. The air is clean and the sky filled with newness and everywhere the smell of pine. I was seeing that trees grow in a certain way in relation to creeks that flow in certain ways in relation to hills and valleys. With our feet upon the ground I could feel the strata under me and while looking at the compass I knew this river would probably end in a marsh and when it did I got looks from other kids like "you've been here before?" By this time in my life I ventured into a model airplane store at a new mall in Toronto (Yorkville, actually) and there, sitting on the shelf next to a bunch of boring World War Two tanks was a box of miniature figures from a company called Airfix called Hussars. Napoleonic Hussars. They became mine that day and I painted them like a Disney artist. Fifteen years later one Hussar remained, still in its original paint and leaning over to one side, on a bookshelf overlooking the city of Phoenix, Arizona. After those miniatures, soon enough, I had many more Napoleonic troops- line infantry and cavalry but then, found the troops that would become my first Roman legions. I was beginning find things and fabrics to make rivers and plowed fields, then stone walls and rail fences and wagons and corn fields, "ya, this'll work.. and that.. that will work perfectly.." The cornucopia of miniatures and found items that became bridges and buildings were spewing forth like someone opened a book and all the words took shape on the desk before me, melting together and forming things to paint and sculpt, bend, drill, sand and glue together. As I changed from one army to another the paints seemed to multiply by themselves and I became an expert in adhesives and tape and how atoms stuck together, and oils and waters and I realized that "we need really good paper towel." Mom would come home and wander the house saying "I know you're home I can hear you rustling around .." "Ah-ha." I'd exclaim emerging from the crawl space, "found it.." Architecture You have to imagine a family sitting near a lightly-crackling fireplace; it's 6 pm and "Hockey Night in Canada" is about to begin. There was no such thing as "sports" channels. In fact, "cable" was a new idea amongst others; our family was one of the first in Mississauga to get a domesticated microwave oven; yes there were things that kept me from "sessions" of building and painting. Even years later after partying downtown I'd still make it home in time to paint troops a few hours before daylight. So it was that I learned an important rule of the hobby of miniature wargarnes: when to put the knife and brush down. The rule serves to refresh the eyes and fingers and clear your head of fumes. Clorine also helps, and when dad finished building the pool the summer weekends were filled with swimming in the 2 months of swimmable weather. Swimming, I think, is what keeps my nerves buoyant and to this day, allows me to paint things as small as the smallest fingernail. There were Sunday mornings when it was so quiet I could hear my mom approaching my bedroom door to wake me up, and I knew she was carrying laundry it seems... always laundry. The encumbrance of carrying something changed the gait to the degree the sound would be different. She would enter, produce a silly greeting then on the way out stop and look at my homework desk filled with Longstreet's corps or Union artillery. Then I'd hear, said slightly under her breath, "How on earth do you do this.." And sometimes I would think it's not so much how, as why. The Basics In the early days before I went to 15mm figures, I settled into the 20mm plastic range of American Civil War troops from Airfix. For a brief time I was even buying Washington's Army and British Infantry. Without having any other guidance in rule book form, aside from listening to Fort York re-enactors (who were regular Canadian army), and some maps and information on formations and weaponry, I constructed my original first draft of rules using a typewriter. These were the days before liquid paper; Correction Tape had just come out. I seem to remember the number of pages being about 12 to 15. The distance covered by a group of men in a set period of time was pretty much understood, but how we reasoned each turn to represent 15 minutes of real time I'll never know. It may have been the desire to break each hour of real battle-time into 4 turns- and it may have been that simple, especially since board game hexes and their designs from Avalon Hill and the like probably had a lot to do with our thinking. But, actually, maybe not... I don't remember having any boardgames that could have been used.. everything was brigade or similar. Perhaps it came from one of the first WWII wargame rulebooks, maybe a friend like Vince Chan or someone else who read wargame books from Donald Featherstone. No doubt most of my information was British in origin as most of the books on the subject were that I can remember. We knew things like the difference between Light and Heavy infantry, cavalry and artillery, and by simple logic derived light items moving faster in the same period of time. Of course, as time went on this math lead to movement and formation concepts like wheeling, pivoting and changing formation. From there, and thanks to some Hollywood movies, the concept of "getting into disorder" was incorporated, and -again- either we created that or got it from other gamers. Morale of course is a different story, and for that I just don't remember how we computed a units willingness to stay and fight. I can only assume it must be close to what we do today because the fundamentals are sound and seem timeless casualties compared to a 2d6 dice roll- the result either a unit feeling good or not. And even today this is the current challenge of wargames with miniatures: to simulate more precisely without being more complicated, what commanders could know and what they could see on the field of battle. When one considers those aspects a battle takes on a different and more realistic feeling; by instituting some "fog-of-war" element in the games we can see the reason why most commanders did things, and it all starts to make more sense. By holding in my hand the farm house, the bridge, the rail fence or the miniature army, my journey with the time machine is real, not projected on a screen, My sense of accomplishment at modeling is heartfelt, and I have awareness that I am devoted to a task and course of study that started when I was very young and continues unabated to this day, regardless how technology helps the learning and entertainment process. I have a history that spans the ages I am studying. I am a historic miniature wargamer. Back to MWAN #108 Table of Contents Back to MWAN List of Issues Back to MagWeb Magazine List © Copyright 2000 Hal Thinglum This article appears in MagWeb (Magazine Web) on the Internet World Wide Web. Other military history articles and gaming articles are available at http://www.magweb.com