A lavishly illustrated history of girlhood embroidery in the state of Delaware, from 1750 to 1850, including beautifully rendered photographs of 190 samplers. This magnificent volume includes well-researched biographical information on the young embroiderers and their families as well as information on prominent needlework teachers and themes.

Delaware Discoveries: Girlhood Embroidery, 1750-1850

Crafts, Hobbies & Home

Allen, Gloria Seaman

Steinhoff, Cynthia Shank

Antiques & Collectibles

Chesapeake Book Company

One of the nation’s premier textile scholars discusses more than 500 samplers and embroideries, most never before published. Reflecting Maryland’s rich mix of ethnic and religious cultures, they provide glimpses into the lives of young women from Colonial times to the eve of the Civil War. 
Some samplers contain registers of family history; others are memorial or mourning samplers. Poems, moral precepts and biblical verses abound. Especially engaging are the samplers with "busy yards," populated by animals, birds and people. Exquisite silk pictorial embroideries were created under the tutelage of the Sisters of Charity at Saint Joseph’s Academy in Emmitsburg. Unique to Maryland are the embroideries worked by the children of free African-Americans taught by the Oblate Sisters, the world’s first order of black nuns. Quaker samplers are distinguished by broad compartmentalized borders filled with pairs of gorgeous flowers, butterflies and birds. Embroidered maps, all worked between 1797 and the early 1800s, form their own recognizable group.
Students of women’s history will be fascinated by the role of needlework in early female education. Modern day embroiderers will find inspiration in the designs. Collectors and antiques dealers have long awaited such a book.

A Maryland Sampling: Girlhood Embroidery 1738–1860

History

Americas

The Maryland Center for History and Culture

Gloria Seaman Allen applies her formidable research and narrative skills to the fledgling District of Columbia, bringing to light heretofore unknown details and full-color images for nearly 130 samplers and pictorial embroideries stitched in the first years of the nation's capital. Columbia's Daughters examines the political, economic, and social dynamics of Alexandria, Georgetown and Washington City, the three urban centers that merged to create the District of Columbia as the nation entered the nineteenth century. Here are the lives and little-known schools of needlework teachers and students who witnessed the emergence of a new federal identity in a turbulent time―and left embroidered records of what they saw.

Columbia's Daughters: Girlhood Embroidery from the District of Columbia

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Books by Allen, Gloria Seaman