Christopher Chapman's 'Quetico' featuring Bill Mason

[Sweetfancymoses]

I'm reading James Raffan's biography of Bill Mason: 'Fire in the bones' which contained a reference to Christopher Chapman's 1956 Quetico featuring a very young Bill Mason. I was able to find the 20 minute film on youtube.

 

[TameVolger]

Thanks for sharing the video. The dramatic music literally worked as a time travel haha

 

[tketcham]

Christopher Chapman's 1956 Quetico featuring a very young Bill Mason.

Good find. Enjoyed watching this while drinking my morning cup of coffee. You can see where Bill Mason got some of his filming ideas for "Path Of The Paddle".

 

[Ralph]

Thanks for this.

 

[Glenn MacGrady]

Late to this. It was interesting for historical reasons, as probably a first, but not really that interesting as to content given that we now have hundreds of films of that region.

Here are details of the film, which was published in 1958 but, according to the film maker in the second link, was made in 1956:

Quetico | Canadian Educational, Sponsored & Industrial Film Archive

www.screenculture.org

Quetico : a Christopher Chapman film | WorldCat.org

"The film Quetico is historic for a number of reasons. Quetico Park has not changed a great deal since the film was made in 1956. I wanted to capture the spirit of canoeing and wilderness throught ht

www.worldcat.org

I probably wouldn't have recognized Bill Mason by face in this film. Born in 1929, he would have been 26 or 27 when the film was made. He looks more like a teenager to me.

I was curious as to what his canoe was made of. It sort of looked like painted wood on the outside but had a smooth inside with no ribs. Highly rockered. Probably one of the ubiquitous Prospector types.

 

[Odyssey]

 

[Boreal Birch]

Was nice to see Bill Mason in his youth. I enjoyed reading his books. Glad to see he was using the internal pack flaps on his Woods Packs in the proper way, tied to each other tightly under the main flap, light & tight. I did think that his axe could have had better placement for portaging, but whatever works. My mentor’s were trappers they always carried their axe in one hand while packing across portages to lop off encroaching branches. So, I did it too, I kept my axe with the sheath on however.
I like the concept of Mason’s campfire tent, never got one because way too fiddlie to set up. Cold weather camping with a wall tent is not as much work to set up, the way I set mine up with shear poles. exterior ridge and side poles. Set up this way (I call it Seven Pole Canadian Rig) eliminates guy ropes all around. Robin’s internal pole set up is likewise guy rope free, his poles much more portable. Mine, in most cases, is cut on site.
Open tent with a campfire in front during shoulder seasons for me is a Whelen Lean-to. Works during bug season with a mosquito bar over the bedroll.

 

[tketcham]

I was curious as to what his canoe was made of. It sort of looked like painted wood on the outside but had a smooth inside with no ribs. Highly rockered. Probably one of the ubiquitous Prospector types.

I captured a frame of the movie showing the interior of the canoe and it appears to have some form of ribbed construction but the ribs look a bit skewed. I'm not a canoe builder so won't hazard a guess.