Publications and Presentations

Wool: Unraveling an American Story of Artisans and Innovation

Keeping Americans warm for four centuries, wool has been an essential commodity from colonial times to the present. Local author Peggy Hart tells wool’s colorful and epic tale and how it has impacted millions of lives from inventors, immigrants, mill owners, millworkers, slaves, and Native Americans, to farmers and advertisers.

Moving from handcraft to industrialization and back, Wool is a story of technological and social change, marketing forces, and our choices as consumers, a must-read for anyone who has knitted (or worn!) socks, woven a piece of cloth, or curled up with a warm wool blanket. More than 100 Illustrations from historical to contemporary

$20 + $5 shipping.

Articles

Cassimere: Hiding in Plain Sight, published in digitalcommons.unl.edu/tsaconf/1174/

Mill Sample Wool Quilts, Complex Weavers Journal, Number 128, February 2022

Presentations

The following are presentations that are available either in person or by zoom. Past presentations include weaving guilds, historical societies, The Complex Weavers Seminar, The New England Weavers Seminar, the Weaving History conference, the Textile History forum, and the Textile Society of America Symposium.

Presentations available, all approximately one hour

Wool Book talk

Keeping Americans warm for four centuries, wool has been an essential commodity from colonial times to the present. Its colorful and epic tale has impacted millions of lives including artisans, inventors, immigrants, merchants, mill owners, millworkers, farmers, slaves, and Native Americans. Handcraft production gave way to industrialization, but is now back in nthe hands of knitters, weavers, felters, and other handcrafters. Wool is a story of technological and social change, marketing frces, and above all, consumer choices.

Wool in America, 1780-1840 

This period represents the intermediate stage between hand production of textiles and mechanization. Large scale importation of merino sheep during this time greatly improved the quality and quantity of wool available. Wool carding machines began the process of mechanizing textile production; subsequently the development of cotton spinning made possible the putting out system of production and also new fabrics based on using machine spun cotton for warp. Soon after, cotton looms were modified to weave fabrics with wool weft such as satinet. In 1837, William Crompton invented the loom on which 100% wool fabric could be woven. 

While Americans were quick to embrace the new inexpensive cotton fabric, wool continued to be a staple in wardrobes for everyone from citizens to slaves. 

The New England Woolen Industry and the Crompton and Knowles Loom Works

New England was the birthplace of textile manufacturing because of its abundant resources in both water power and skilled immigrant mill workers. Whole cities were built around cotton mills in Lowell, Lawrence, and Manchester. Woolen mill technology developed later, and woolen mills became the backbone of life in hundreds of smaller towns. Unlike the cotton mills, woolen mills spun and wove fiber grown here, using machinery made here. Dozens of specialized businesses supported the industry, from reed makers to dyers and finishers.

The Crompton and Knowles Loom Works of Worcester, MA had the corner on loombuilding, outfitting mills from Connecticut to Canada.. Up until the last loom was manufactured in the 1950’s, the W-3 was constantly being improved by independently patented innovations. Why and how did these marvelous machines get sold for scrap metal and the mills close all over New England?

Satinet 

 The spinning and weaving of cotton cloth gets all the attention in the history of the Industrial Revolution. But running parallel to cotton mills were small woolen mills, especially in Massachusetts. These early mills produced satinet, a cloth with a cotton warp and a woolen weft. This was cheaper and easier to produce than all wool cloth at the time, and often used local wool. Massachusetts towns with satinet mills included Amesbury, West Tisbury, Shelburne, Rowe, Greenfield, Cummington, and Northampton a Williamstown, Pittsfield, and North Adams. Most of the mills operated before 1850 and were closed by 1860.

Cassimere: Hiding in Plain Sight

In the nineteenth century, cassimere was one of the most produced woolen fabrics in American mills. Cassimere appears in nineteenth century texts, as in George Cole’s Complete Dictionary of Dry Goods, first published in 1890. Cole describes cassimere as “the general term applied to that class of all-wool cloths used for men’s clothing, woven either plain or twilled, coarse or fine of ‘woolen’ yarn”. Cassimere is much in evidence in census reports of wool manufacture from 1837 to the early 1900s. But If you look for cassimere in the indexes of later fabric reference books, you will probably not find it, or if you do, as in the 1967 Dan River Mills Dictionary, it is defined as worsted suiting. Does this mean that it existed in the nineteenth century but is now gone?  No, but it is hiding in plain sight today, mostly as a humble woolen twill.

Fashion moved on and cassimere was eventually replaced by worsted and eventually synthetic fabrics. However decades of inventiveness and the resulting trove of cassimere design ideas are still used by contemporary designers.

Wool Quilts and Forgotten Fabrics

If a quilt is defined as a sewn blanket pieced from scraps of fabric, wool is not the fabric most often associated with quilts. For many quilt makers, cotton is the fabric of choice. However, over centuries in many countries, wool has been used to make quilts. This stems from its availability in interesting circumstances, as in an early American quilt that used an entire cloak as a foundation, British soldiers’ quilts made from uniform fabric, and Depression era American quilts made both from recycled clothes and commercial mill swatch samples.

Many quilts are anonymous, without provenance, but offer clues about time and place in the type of fabric used, especially the quilts made from mill samples. Wool quilts in America in particular showcase the variety of textures, weights, and patterns of wool fabrics that are now forgotten: broadcloth, flannel, cassimere, challis, and menswear woolen and worsted fabrics

West African Strip Cloth

Narrow fabric looms are used in many West African countries to weave strips, which are then sewn together lengthwise to make large rectangles. These are worn as wrappers by both men and women, or used as blankets. Alternating warp stripes, weft face sections, and elaborate weft brocade in the strips results in spectacular graphic block patterning when sewn together. 

Idiscuss the history of West African strip cloth, and show images of both the weaving process and finished pieces. She will also bring examples from her collection of Ewe and Ashanti kente (Ghana), and Dogon and Fulani pieces(Mali).

Designing a Blanket

I have designed large rectangles (blankets) since 1981, when I set up my first power loom. Since then, I have woven literally thousands of blankets. 

In this workshop, weavers will consider materials and patterns and plan a blanket. They will prepare to weave a sample swatch to test the chosen yarn with the pattern. Wool yarns can both celebrate and confound even the best pattern. We will talk about finishing techniques and options. 

I will show slides from my studio and bring blankets to share as well as sample swatches that didn’t make the cut!