Six-Dollar Dome

One of the unusual and innovative structures erected by more than 100,000 campers for the 49th annual Old-Time Bluegrass Fiddlers Convention was the Umbrella, a clear plastic dome, over 20 feet in diameter and 10 feet high. Mike Turcot talks about how they built the six-dollar dome.

July/August 1973
By the Mother Earth News editors 
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Here's a breakdown of materials and costs for our $6.00 lodge:

Wood struts: free. We got ours from same people who had more than they needed.

Plastic: $5.00 from hardware store. We used one roll of clear, 9' x 100 builder's poly. You could cut the major cost of the dome by scrounging enough material for the skin, but we didn't think it was worth the effort so we just used money. Other coverings should also work if you don't like plastic.

Hammer; free =borrow, steal or use rocks or hatchet).

Staple gun: free (borrow from a friend).

Nails: 19¢

Beer (optional): 81¢

All these materials will fit into a car trunk . . . and if you doubt that you can build an Umbrella Dome, let me add that we put ours up between 3 a.m. and 6 a.m. after driving for 14 hours.

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At least one wit has suggested that Mike Turcot's Indian name should be either " He-whose-lodge-falls-down" or "Thumbpounder" instead of the rather grand "Crazy Horse". Mike, however, claims that such jocularity is entirely uncalled for. At any rate, here's how he and his friends built a six-dollar dome.

Crazy Horse (Mike Turcot)

If you made it to Union Grove, North Carolina last Easter for the 49th annual OldTime Bluegrass Fiddlers Convention, you probably recall some of the unusual and innovative structures erected by the more than 100,000 campers who showed up to get high on the music. Among the unorthodox shelters, you may have noticed a clear plastic dome, over 20 feet in diameter and 10 feet high, known as the Umbrella. That poly bubble—the brainchild of the Umbrella Conspiracy: He-who-talks, Wounded Buffalo, Pete and myself—cost only $6.00 and took the four of us just three hours to construct.

The idea for the Umbrella came to us because we needed a cheap structure that could be erected simply, from readily available materials, by ordinary people with no special skills. Techniques such as conventional geodesics were automatically ruled out . . . first because none of us had a head for the necessary math, and also since we all felt that the precise regularity of a geometrically constructed shape—while perfectly acceptable to the computer that developed it—was rather boring and lifeless as housing for real human beings. In short, we wanted a funky shelter that would respond to the whims of its makers and would come out different each time no matter how many were built. We think our Umbrella Dome met those requirements.

The Umbrella's basic framework consisted of three arches made of wood struts that were overlapped and nailed together at their ends. Those supports were erected as shown in the diagram and lashed together at the top. No comples cutting or fastening is required just lay out the boards in the desired curve, with their ends resting one on another, and bang in a couple of nails at each joint. You don't even need a hammer (we forgot ours and made do with rocks and a hatchet)

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