Canvas Manufacturer ID Needed
 

Can anyone identify the company the attached diamond shaped logo belongs to? The item in question is a canvas tent valise of Canadian origin, made in 1944, but in all likelihood this company was also probably making other canvas items for the Canadian Military during World War 2.


David

David,

Please see the attached images.

Colin

S.S. Holden - Ottawa
 

Yup, S.S. Holden made several diufferent types of canvas and clothing items for the military during the Second World War.

Attachment 133174

Attachment 133175

Attachment 133176

Attachment 133177

Attachment 133178

Location .....
 

SS Holden was somewhat associated/related in business with Woods Tents.....
Woods had a large plant on Montcalm street in Hull but could not find a street address for Holden which was in business before WW I........ post war Woods became a football/hockey equipment manufacturer......
Holden may have been located in the manufacturing area of LeBreton Flats......

Both of them were in their glory days during the war.

Wow!

Once again, I am amazed at the information pool available to all of us via the members of MLU. Identifying this company did not take long at all. This is also another excellent example of just how detailed the illustrators were with their work for the Master Parts List for the 52-Set, 80 years ago!

Colin, I will use a couple of your photos in my 52-Set Project Thread, with acknowledgement of you being the source shortly.

Ed, thanks for the informative history of the evolution of the S.S. Holden signage throughout the war. Based on the image of Colin's 1944 Tent Valise, it appears they had reached the 'Diamond' design in time for it to show up in the 1944 tent production.

Bob, interesting comments on a possible relationship between S.S. Holden and Woods. I found a few interesting clues while searching the web.

It appears the Holden operation started with three Holden brothers setting up an outdoor goods company which by the 1930's had become S.S. Holden, just one of the original three brothers. Catalogues of their goods show up for sale on the web, fairly frequently. The most notable is their Catalogue #8, from the Fall of 1938, which is probably their catalogue for the 1939 business year. The war would have diverted them from that line of work for the duration, but one would expect to find a big celebration of reaching Catalogue #10 shortly after the war. That is a significant milestone for any company. There is nothing out there I could find. Not even a Catalogue #9.

I did a little more digging and found the Obituary for Mr. S.S. Holden. According to it, Mr. Holden, his wife and their housekeeper were driving to Miami, Florida late in 1945 when they were involved in an auto accident outside of Savannah, Georgia. All three individuals were taken to hospital in Savannah, about 80 miles from the accident. Mr. Holden and the housekeeper were released with minor injuries after observation and treatment. Mrs. Holden was admitted with her injuries and died a few days later.

Mr. Holden was apparently an avid outdoorsman, and was very active in conservation work of all kinds. In July of 1946, less than a year from the passing of his wife, S.S. Holden was in Alberta, Canada working on a wildlife conservation project when he suddenly collapsed and died of a heart attack.

If, as Bob mentioned, there was some form of working relationship between the S.S. Holden Company and Woods, after S. S. Holden died, his company may have been taken over in some way by Woods.


David

David,

In my second image above, I can see a very faded marking centred above the makers mark. I can see (in three rows) TENT ___ELESS VALISE.

I pulled the tent out of the valise to refresh my memory of any markings on the tent. The below images are of the maker and applied unit markings on the tent.

Colin

Wow!

I was not even looking in that area on the valise, Colin. Seems to possibly be a one line space between WIRELESS and VALISE.

Interesting also that the entire kit is typical khaki canvas. There was a production run of tents from Manitoba Tent & Awning in 1944 in that strange orange toned canvas...for some reason.

Has the wooden pin bag and wooden mallet survived with your tent as well, Colin?

David

There are literally hundreds of the tent peg bags out at my favorite surplus yard. Some are WW2, some are marked as small duffle bags, and some are of WW1 vintage.

David,

There is a one line space between WIRELESS and VALISE.

The valise is more of khaki shade, but the tent has an orange hue (the images were taken in very different light conditions).

I don’t have poles, pegs, or the peg bag, but I do have a mallet that I obtained separately from the tent.

Colin

Colin.

Good to know. The orange tone canvas is intriguing as a military item. Not exactly a colour that blends in.

Rob.

If you can find one of the pin bags marked from Holden in 1944, can you pick one up for me? I might as well keep the dust off the set of pins I have sitting on a shelf. I have an illustration and specs I can post if you need it.


David

Orange tone canvas
 

Indeed

Attachment 133186

Good Afternoon, Hanno.

I got home from work yesterday and ended up unwinding, while thinking about this orange tent equipment that keeps popping up from time to time from Canadian manufacturers in the latter half of World War Two.

The initial questions in my head were all focused on the colour itself and why anyone in authority would have picked it for use, over the traditional Khakis or Greens, for military use. I could not come up with any useful answers, and then I started to wonder if the colour was not the end point goal, but merely a byproduct of an unrelated issue. I was starting to get into the wine now.

From 1939 to 1941, the war was European in nature, and then Japan entered the conflict. 1942 was something of a transition year. The Allies were trying to adapt to war in two distinct areas of the world and were starting to find serious shortcomings in a lot of their equipment in tropical combat conditions. These were slowly identified and prioritized. Top of the list were things like the Mosquito having its wood ply structure delaminating due to animal glues used in construction. So serious that De Havilland himself went to India to investigate. Wireless equipment was failing for everyone as well. Another important priority. A little further down the line, in all likelihood, it was probably noticed that heavy canvas goods like tents were rotting and falling apart far sooner than expected in the wet tropics.

So perhaps, to solve the rotting canvas problem, a new improved waterproofing/fungicide was developed in 1942/43 to replace what was in use, but a byproduct of this was the orange tint to the new product. Once a new product was available and new canvas in production, not all manufacturers would have received it at the same time. It would have been phased in across Canada. In addition, the individual tent manufacturers would not have abandoned existing stocks of the older canvas. The tent was the critical product so that production would have switched first. Finish the last complete khaki tent and move to the new fabric. The existing khaki fabric was likely used up on the smaller, storage type items like the Valise and Pin Bag. Then from that point, all further production would have been in the new orange tint canvas.

There seem to be a few surviving 1943 dated valises from Manitoba Tent & Awning. The one you posted, one I saw a few years ago on another European Website, and a friend of mine in BC has yet another, photo attached. Note the smaller, grommeted bag to the right in this photo. Also dated 1943, this is a product of Woods in Ottawa.

The Master Parts List for the 52-Set would have been written/assembled in 1943/1944. It shows S.S. Holden as the manufacturer for the Wireless Tent Station and describes the tent as being Khaki in colour. Based on the surviving example of a Wireless tent in Colin Alfords possession, it looks like 1944 may have been the transition year for S.S. Holden switching from khaki to orange tint canvas: an orange tint tent in a khaki valise. Too bad more of these wireless tents are not available to study. Chances are some may all be khaki and some all orange. Would also be nice to find some old time employees from these various tent makers who might remember when and why this orange tint canvas came into production.


David

Must keep in mind.......
 

Hi David

All of the wartime colours were NOT very UV resistant and faded to some weird shade.....the Orange canvass quickly turned to a beige tone eventually..... not to mention the dirt and grime while in service. Duffel bags inside cargo trucks would get dirty faster while the truck tarps over the cargo would totally discolor after one Summer.....CMP parts did provide for sand, OD Green, some form of Khaki....... even the OD green seat covers became dusty...bleached out...shade of green.

Did you know .... that the fungus that attacked clothing, radio wiring, etc. or often called jungle rot ......... the bacteria once isolated and reproduced........
is now manufactured and used by the industry to distress jeans and to soften the weave of heavy canvass work clothes.........

That is very interesting, David.

Would that be (part of) the explanation why Candian webbing was more yellow/ golden than British manufactured webbing?

https://www.canadiansoldiers.com/equ...937pattern.htm