C A M O U P E D I A

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Below Drawing by Charles Livington Bull with the following caption: Perhaps the best known of all the camouflage tricks is the dead horse made of papier maché, or even of steel, so arranged that the sniper or lookout can hide in it and keep watch of the enemy.

Monday, August 3, 2026

the unknown role of Iowa artists in modern camouflage

Coming soon: At 2:00 pm on Sunday, August 9, I will be giving a one-hour illustrated talk on camouflage in connection with art, nature, and its military uses in World War I. The talk will take place at the German American Heritage Center & Museum at 712 West 2nd Street in Davenport, Iowa. Insights and surprises abound. Looking forward to it! For more information, see gahc.org.

FALSE COLORS: Art, Design and Modern Camouflage

Saturday, August 1, 2026

ship camoufleurs George Musaphia / B.R. Campbell

George Musaphia illustrations

I know almost nothing about an American illustrator named George Musaphia. The little that I do know I found in a brief news article in the Spokane Chronicle (October 7, 1918), which reads as follows—

RECORD CLAIMED BY CAMOFLEURS Two Seattle "camofleurs"—the men who paint the zig-zag stripes on ships returned recently from Portland OR, where they spent six days supervising the camouflaging of six vessels being built for the Emergency Fleet Corporation. The total of six ships in six days is believed a camouflaging record.

The two are George Misaphia [sic], formerly a New York portrait painter, and B.R. Campbell, who, in peace times, is a Boston theatrical scenery decorator.

That's it. I've searched for both artists, Musaphia (not Misaphia, unless I'm mistaken) and Campbell, the latter of whom is possibly a New England artist named Brooks R. Campbell (1898-1977), who worked as a sign painter in Manhattan. It seems likely that the other man was George (or Georges) Musaphia (1894-1979), but I could be wrong.

One thing about Musaphia that seems certain is that he was affiliated with the theatre, and that he worked in Boston (in advance of World War I) as an illustrator for theatre reviews. Maybe that's how he met Campbell, who is described as a "Boston theatrical scenery decorator."

The six Musaphia illustrations that I have found so far were all published in 1913. I've scanned and reproduced them here. They are stylistically consistent, but the attribution is also clear because he signed his name in an unusual way, part symbol and part letters. They were published in the Boston American on the following dates (from top to bottom) September 7, October 12 and 19, and November 2, 9 and 30. He probably was a portrait painter because his theatre illustrations are, without fail, essentially portraits of the actors as they appear in costume.

Tuesday, July 28, 2026

Seymour Reit / cartoonist, animator, writer, camoufleur

Since early childhood, I have known about Casper the Friendly Ghost, a cartoon character who first appeared in comic books in the late 1940s. But it may have been forty years later that I learned about Seymour Reit (1918-2001), the American animator and children's book author who may (or may not, since there has long been some dispute) have been the person who came up with Casper's character.

As an adult, although Reit was short (he was five foot four), he was larger than life in terms of all his accomplishments. He began his career as an animator for the famous Fleischer Brothers, and in his final decades he was a prolific contributor to MAD Magazine. But that is the tip of the iceberg: as a writer or cartoonist, he was also affiliated with Will Eisner, Archie, Little Lulu, Gulliver's Travels, Popeye, Betty Boop, and Captain Kangaroo.

But he also had two wartime links: First, he was born in New York on Armistice Day on November 11, 1918, the day that marked the ending of World War One, with the result that his parents named him Seymour Victory Reit. And then, when the US entered World War Two, he enlisted in the Army Air Force as a lieutenant, and served as a camoufleur.

I suspect that I first heard about Reit in 1978, when I ran across a copy of a book that he had written, titled Masquerade: the amazing camouflage deceptions of World War II (New York: Hawthorn Books). At the time, I had been researching and writing about art and camouflage for about a decade, and his book was enormously helpful in learning about the varieties of deception in World War Two. It is still of considerable value, even though quite a few other volumes on the same subject have more recently been produced.

Seymour Reit

NOTE: For more on cartooning, animation, shapeshifting, metamorphosis and camouflage, see this online video talk.

Tuesday, July 21, 2026

was utter nonsense / camouflage as painting things up

Bus for wounded soldiers at WWI fundraising rally [colorized]
Peter Rodyenko, “Camouflage: Modern aerial photography outmodes paint, results in introduction of new techniques” in Life magazine (January 13, 1941), p. 39—

To most people, the art of camouflage means "painting things up." They are, of course, very wrong. In general, they get this impression from seeing pictures of guns and tanks "camouflaged" with crisscross and zigzag designs. In their newspapers they read of snipers who wear strange-colored costumes to "confuse" the enemy. They hear and believe stories about industrial buildings which have been so decorated with dazzle paint that they are invisible from the air. What they do not realize is that most of such stuff is utter nonsense.

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Monday, July 20, 2026

painting camouflage on trucks—then washing it off

WWI camouflaged ammunition truck (colorized)
Eugene Wokal, quoted in Ronald Naversen, The Scenographer as Camoufleur. Dissertation. Carbondale IL: Southern Illinois University, 1989, p. 47—

I became friends with Major Peter Rodyenko [who taught camouflage at Pratt Institute]…I traveled down there [to Fort Belvoir] to look around and decided I wanted to work on camouflage. We trained by painting trucks and washed off the paint at night so we could do it again tomorrow.

See also

Rodyenko, Peter (1936) “On Camouflage Training” in The Reserve Officer Vol 13 No 9 (September), pp. 5-7.
___(1941) “Camouflage: Modern aerial photography outmodes paint, results in introduction of new techniques” in Life magazine (January 13), pp. 39-42.

RELATED LINKS

Saturday, March 28, 2026

no more spit and polish / WWI trench mud in your eye

Above Rawley Morgan, "Our Involuntary Disguises" in The London Bystander, March 20, 1918, p, 613.

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CAMOUFLAGE TOPIC OF PRESIDIO TALK: Commonest Instance Cited as Clove Eaten by Men Who Go Out Between Acts; MUD HANDIEST IN TRENCH; Captain Gillette Illustrates Fine Points for Student Officers Showing How Shading Is of Great Importance in The Sunday Oregonian (Portland), November 11, 1917, p. 3—

OFFICERS TRAINING CAMP, Presidio of San Francisco, Nov. 10: "Camouflage—a spice known as the clove, largely consumed by men who leave the theater between acts to go and use the telephone."

This is one domestic description of the word camouflage, but it isn't quite the camouflage that is taught for war purposes. The chief ingredients of the camouflage of war, with all due respect to the words of well-known war correspondents like Will Irwin and others, is not paint and artistic ability, but just plain, ordinary mud.

At least such is the declaration of Captain Douglas H. Gillette, Engineer Corps, who recently gave a lecture to the Presidio "officers-to-be" on the subject of camouflage.

Paint is a scarce commodity at the front, and the same is true of burlap and canvas, and when these ingredients are absent the soldier boys find it very easy to do a good camouflaging job by smearing the mud—same mud that is used on football fields in Oregon—over the spokes and caissons of artillery material and otherwise disguising military secrets from the enemy aircraft and other observers.

"It is important, remarked Captain Gillette, "to conceal the heads of the men firing from the trenches."

Trenches Are Obliterated
"There are two ways to conceal heads, and the one chiefly recommended is to obliterate the line of the trenches as much as possible. Daubing the head in mud or dust sounds better to a great many of the student officers, however, for once a man has lost his head his efficiency is greatly curtailed, whereas it is ofttimes possible to recuperate after the loss of a mere trench.

"All camouflage is based on the idea of fooling the enemy by making it appear that what is, is not, and what is not, is. It may apply to a single man or gun or to an entire position. The art is new, but It has been used so extensively that the supply of raffia, from which screens. were made, is exhausted, and they have to use shredded palmetto leaves and Florida moss.

Outlines Broken Up
"If it is sought to hide a battery, the best plan is to break up its outline so it cannot be recognized by enemy airplanes. If a scout is looking for a gun and sees something that looks like a cow he is not likely to boast that he has attained the object of his search. It is a fact that objects are recognized by their shape more than by anything else.

"Things should always be painted dark on top and light below; that is to make shadows look natural. For the same reason painted canvas is sloped at an angle of at least 30 degrees over raised objects. A painted pattern should never be stopped at an edge; it should extend around the corner. Dull colors are best, usually.

"One school of camouflage artists holds that the best way to reduce the visibility of material is by making it look like straw—if it happens to be in a locality where there is straw—or by disguising it as bushes. If there are three or four guns at regular intervals bushes should extend from one to the other; four piles of bushes 30 to 40 feet from each other might enable an airplane scout to penetrate the disguise.

Mud Used Profusely
"Spokes and rims of gun carriages should be spotted with mud. The spots should be irregular and large, as small spots are likely to attract attention. Positions or material may be concealed
by painted canvas or burlap, raffia or wire net, or canvas over wire net. With a bucket of paint and a brush the simplest form of camouflage, painting, may be achieved.

"The armies have taken full advantage of the qualities of wire net. Sometimes miles and miles of road leading to the rear are covered with the net, through which enemy airplanes can see nothing. At times the net extends along the sides of the road.

"When an airplane appears it is a matter of duty and policy for everyone to hide or remain perfectly still. Cartridge cases must never be placed in large piles in these days of scientific war, for the sunlight reflected from their surfaces gives the enemy a guide."

Four Thousand Germans Killed
Captain Gillette points out tho value of concealing even the frontline trenches by a story of a battalion that concealed its position, and, by waiting until the Germans had advanced to within 50 yards of its trench, killed 4000 of the enemy before retreat was possible. The exact line of the parapet should be confusing to the enemy. If it is not, the position may be sighted during the day and heavy damage may be inflicted at night.

Even the entanglements in No Man's Land feel the force of the camouflage idea. Captain Gillette can't understand why they use galvanized wire, which is highly visible and more ex- pensive than that which has not been galvanized. Because wood is more visible than iron, posts that support the wire are of iron.

RELATED LINKS

Wednesday, January 21, 2026

the man who signs a dictated letter but hasn't read it

Above World War II American ship camouflage, as applied to the USS Gladiator (1944), a minesweeper. US Navy photograph, public domain, AI colorized.

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Sophie Irene Loeb, WHAT IS CAMOUFLAGE? in The Washington Post, January 31, 1918, p. 7—

…The husband who pretends to be furious because his wife was so slow in letting him in the house that she forgets to scold him for being out late. When a man tells a woman he understands her perfectly. When a strange saleslady calls you "dearie," while waiting on you. The eating place that decreases the portion and increases the price on the plea of patriotism. When wifey buys her husband a lovely sofa cushion for his birthday. When a stranger tells you how much he is respected in his own home town. When a dressed up doll keeps talking about how she "doesn't care a thing about money." The new spring crepe shirtwaists. The youthful old lady who hasn't a gray hair in her head. The lounge lizard who prates about what a grand family he came from. The small boy who brings home a playmate to help square things. The individual who congratulates you on what a fine man your grandfather was and wants to borrow $5. The middle-aged chap who goes to the circus to amuse the neighbor's little boy. The city uplifter who goes to the farmer's wife to tell her how to can fruit. The landlord who tells his shivering tenants how long and hard he has tried to get coal. The climber who invites newspaper reporters to her "exclusive" pink teas. The woman who writes applications to serve near the trenches while she is having her breakfast in bed. The salesman who invites you to dinner because he is "so lonely" and charges it to his firm, from whom you are to buy. The "pillar" in the church who loudly prays for sinners, having yesterday quietly foreclosed the mortgage on the home of the widow and her children. When hubby tells his wife he has a very important meeting at the lodge or must sit up with a sick friend. The fellow in the party who is very busy telling a story when the waiter presents the bill. The man who is always "in a conference" when you telephone. He who signs a letter "dictated," but not read. Many a knitting bag carried in public. The politician who tells newly enfranchised women that his party secured the vote for them. Public officers sitting in skyscrapers and telling how they are reducing the cost of living. The storekeeper who tells you that the thing you asked for is not being "used this year."…

Sunday, January 18, 2026

wartime camouflage efforts of an El Paso car dealer

Above WWI photograph of US General Patton (cropped) standing in front of a tank in France, 1918. Public domain, Wikipedia.

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UNIQUE SCENE IN CAMOUFLAGE: Cleverly Painted Auto Cannot Be Distinguished from Surroundings in El Paso Herald, June 8, 1918—

In the display window of the Buquor Motor Company is a camouflage scene rarely equaled "over here." In the background is a canvas on which is painted a battle scene—bursting shells and air lurid with explosives. Before this is a Maxwell car, although its best friend would hardly recognize the car because of the camouflage. It is spotted and spattered with green and fire colored splotches. Foliage, in addition to that on the canvas, is supplied by palms and leafing plants.

Standing close to the arrangement, there appears but little remarkable about it, but from the sidewalk the camouflage is quite apparent. From the middle of the street the automobile can hardly be distinguished from the plants and the glare of shots. The work, performed by J. L. Buquor, is so admirably executed that the machine blends with both the glare of shots and with the foliage in such a way as to quite conceal the auto from across the street. The work was done with water colors.

In thus showing how camouflage prevents autos from being detected in time of battle, a spot light has been provided which is used at night time, giving an even better effect than a day view. Naturally things "over there" are constantly in the mind of Johnnie Buquor, his brother, Ad[olph] Buquor, being now ready to depart for France from New Jersey at any time.

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WOMAN COLLAPSES WHEN MACHINE GUN UNEXPECTEDLY EXPLODES IN HER FACE—REALISTIC OLD TANK in El Paso Herald, June 15, 1918, p. 15—

Because he operated a machine gun carelessly Johnnie Buquor is in line to become the defendant in a damage suit. In the display window of the Buquor Motor Company is a big war tank—marked F-4—of the type used by General Byng to roll the biggest victory of the war over the Germans. It is a massive thing with mud-splotched wheels, steel-plated and heavily riveted, surmounted with machine guns whose ominous muzzles frown toward passersby.

Thursday evening a dozen or more pedestrians had stopped on the sidewalk before the window to view the war monster. One woman pressed close to the glass to get a better view of a machine gun pointed towards her. Suddenly the gun belched out fire and smoke, right in her face, the woman screamed and collapsed on the sidewalk.

Now for a little inside information: The big tank that looks like a steel-riveted fort on wheels from the sidewalk, is found when viewed from the other side to be made of old packing boxes, Maxwell mud pans, tubes and old crates. Johnnie Buquor has one of the guns so constructed that lamp-black is puffed out of the muzzle by compressed air, and that's how the woman got shot. Invariably when there is a crowd before the window and the machine gun is touched off, somebody jumps to get out of the way. The discharge is so realistic that people before it don't feel safe.

Saturday, January 17, 2026

who has been stealing my cigars—it surely is a puzzle

ARNOT ART GALLERY, Star-Gazette (Elmira, New York), 17 Dec 1918, p. 4—

The Arnot Art Gallery will be open this evening from 7 to 9 o'clock and every afternoon during the remainder of this week from 2 to 5 o'clock. Two hundred and sixty-six visitors called at the gallery Sunday to see the color concealment or camouflage pictures. They are very interesting and some of them will puzzle you a little to find the hidden bird. The principles of camouflage are embodied in these pictures.…

Can you find the cigar thief in the Victorian-era puzzle picture above?

Age Camouflagin' / Kin Hubbard talks disguising age

Anon / good place for a painting / Chicago 1889

Abe Martin [Kin Hubbard], SHORT FURROWS, in The Indianapolis News, September 28, 1918, p. 4—

Rev. Wiley Tanger addressed "Th' Serious Thinkers" in Tell Binkley's insurance office, last night, takin' fer his subject, "Age Camouflagin." After garglin' a dipper o' water, he said: "One o' th first things a feller notices after he reaches fifty is how swiftly Saturday night rolls around. He no sooner takes a bath till he begins t' lay out his underwear fer another one. He no sooner shaves th' snow from his chin till it's white agin. Th' weeks an' months an' years dart by like a Chaplin film. He no sooner gits used t' a straw hat with a polka dot band till it's time t' look around fer a rakish green hat. Th' day's gone ferever when he could git by with a youthful face an' sparklin' eyes an' th' time t' camouflage has arrived. Th' never endin' battle agin relentless ole age is on. Th' barber, th' masseur, th' tailor, th' presser an' cleaner, th' shoe maker, th' osteopath an' th' toupee maker must all be drafted int' his service an' he starts forth t' conquer an unseen foe. But why should a feller try t' hide th' fact that he's fifty? Surely ther's room enough on this earth fer people o' fifty! Who's he tryin' t' fool? What's he tryin' t' put over? He has started over th' top an' a talcumed face an' tan spats won't hold him back! A polka dot hat band an' gray hair won't mix!! A peeled gray head an' a green hat only excite comment—speculation!! I don't mean t' say that a feller should begin t' unravel an wither at fifty. If ther's anything I hate t' see worse'n a peeled gray badger in a pinch-back suit, it's a reconciled feller o' sixty sittin' around fumblin' a set o' white whiskers when he ought t' be plowin'. A feller ought t' be tickled t' death t' reach fifty! He ought t' be proud of it!! What I'm drivin' at is that a feller ought t' stay in his class. A toupeed feller kin never look like anything but a restorer ad! Bright colors only emphasize ole age. If you're spared till fifty, take advantage o' ever' moment from then on, but do it leisurely an' gracefully. Don't try t' look like you've been born agin!

"You kin be youthful in spirit without shavin' all th' time an' smellin' like Floridy water!! Talk about th' golden days o' youth!!! What's th' matter with th' diamond studded years beyond fifty? At fifty we should quietly apply th' brakes an' leisurely descend th' slope with seasoned muscles, ripe judgment, shorn of illusions, rich in experience, filled with sweet, memories, grateful fer havin' successfully weathered th' adventurous years o' youth, with a keen appreciation o' ever precious hour an with th' knowledge that ther's no new sensations. Let's stop camouflagin' an' leave th' pinch-back clothes an' zebra shirts t' youth. Let's bathe ever' Saturday as usual, but let's not worry about our chins bein' white. We've had our fling at lady killin' so let's sober down an' resolve not t' drain our reserve tanks chasin' after a procession that's only headed fer where we already are."