Pop-up campers only popped up recently in the grand scheme of things. While there had been folding camping wagons before then, the modern pop-up camper dates to 1954 with the appearance of the first camper with a crank-up roof: the Hille Ranger. Yet only 200 or so were made, and many people point to Starcraft campers, with an innovative hard-top/crank mechanism designed by Lloyd Bontrager in 1963, as the ones to unlock the popularity of today's pop-up campers. For example, you can find used popup campers on eBay for under $500. In fact, the relative low cost of pop-up campers sets the template for many of their other pros and cons.