Walter Mason Camp (1867–1925) was an American editor, author, railroad expert and historical researcher.
Biography
Walter Mason Camp was born in Camptown, Pennsylvania, on April 21, 1867. He attended public school in Wyalusing, Pennsylvania before attending the Pennsylvania State College until 1891 and then the University of Wisconsin from 1895 to 1896. He was a student of civil engineering and his post-graduate studies focused on electricity and steam. From 1897 until his death, he was the editor of The Railway and Engineering Review (later renamed Railway Review), a railroad construction and engineering journal published in Chicago. He was a member of many different organizations relating to engineering and history.
Camp also spent time interviewing and documenting the experiences of Native Americans and United States soldiers in the American Indian Wars. Intending to draft a book on the topic, he collected source material in the form of interview notes, personal correspondence, field notes and maps. the University of Colorado at Boulder Library, Little Bighorn Battlefield National Monument at Crow Agency, Montana, at the Indiana University Bloomington Library, and the Denver Public Library in Denver, Colorado.
About his passion for oral history and his intentions for his research, Camp said: <blockquote>After having listened to the story of the Little Bighorn Expedition from the lips of some of the men who participated therein, the current literature [in 1909] on the subject seemed to present such a tangle of fiction, fancy, fact and feeling that I formed an ambition to establish the truth. It occurred to me that the essential facts must rest in the minds of many men then living, and that these facts, if collected, would constitute fairly accurate history. This has been my plan—to gather my data from eyewitnesses. </blockquote>
Written works
In addition to his work as the editor of the Railway Review, Camp was the author of published works such as the authoritative 1903 two-volume text Notes on Track (also known as Roadbed and Track), He became familiar with Native American languages and customs (especially the Sioux), Hammer's work with Camp's research included transcribing many of the handwritten notes into typescript.
- Walter M. Camp's Little Bighorn Rosters annotated by Richard G. Hardorff
- Camp, Custer, and the Little Bighorn: A Collection of Walter Mason Camp's Research Papers compiled, edited, and annotated by Richard G. Hardorff