The needle's web: sewing in one early nineteenth-century American home
Date
1988
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Publisher
University of Delaware
Abstract
This thesis examines the life of Eleuthera du Pont through her needlework, and explores what this sewing reveals about women's work and society between 1816 and 1834. Eleuthera's letters, diaries, drawings, embroidery patterns, and finished needlework projects: collars, cuffs, handkerchiefs, caps and dresses are the primary sources of information. ☐ Eleuthera's letters detail the entire sewing process, from initially deciding to begin a project, to acquiring the materials and actually performing the needlework. Sewing was her work, and she was obliged to complete an embroidery project within a certain period of time. She exchanged patterns, materials, and finished projects with other women of her class, and occasionally pierced class barriers by sewing with working-class women and stitching premiums for workers' daughters in the local Sunday school. Eleuthera also sewed powder bags, towels, and cartridge bags for the du Pont powder mills, and did other sewing for her father and brothers. (Abstract from ProQuest citation page.)