Mid-Century Camp Coffee

Long before drip cones, French presses, and high-end freeze-dried pour-over instant coffee sachets made their way into camp kits and backpacks, coffee in the woods meant a blackened pot over an open fire. The boiled concoction commonly referred to as “cowboy coffee” was for much of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries how coffee was made outdoors. The tools were heavy – cast iron, tin, enamelware – and the heating method was involved and dirty. The invention and popularization of pressurized, portable stove systems in the first part of the twentieth century began to modernize the camp kitchen. (Coleman introduced its first gas-fueled pressure stove, the Coleman Model No. 1, in 1923.) These new and convenient cooking methods called for new cooking vessels, some of which resembled, or were indeed, those used at home. Mass production of aluminum during World War II was retooled for civilian purposes in the years following the war. The lightweight, durable material was a natural choice for the mid-century camp kitchen.

Stovetop percolators and drip coffee makers such as the ones in this collection were stamped out by companies like Aluminum Cooking Utensil Company of New Kensington, Pennsylvania (a subsidiary of Alcoa – Aluminum Company of America) and its “Wear-Ever” brand; Aluminum Goods Manufacturing Company of Manitowic, Wisconsin and its “Comet” brand; West Bend Aluminum Company of West Bend, Wisconsin; and Enterprise Aluminum Company of Massillon, Ohio. From a 2-cup personal maker to the massive 18- and 20-cup party sizes, they became iconic additions to the camping chuck box for decades.