A Book to Treasure … and Seeking Patty Polk’s Sampler
While browsing through my library a few days ago, I was lucky enough to run across Abbie in Stitches written by Cynthia Cotten and lovingly illustrated by Beth Peck laying on a table in the children’s section of the library. This book is intended for readers aged 4 through 8, so it was a very quick read for me — but what a delightful one!
It is the story of young Abbie, who would much prefer to read than to learn needlework, but her mother explains she needs to know how to, ” … sew household linens and clothes … ” for the family she’ll have someday. Abbie also needs to learn how to make what Abbie calls “fancy stitches” in order to show she is, ” … an accomplished young woman.” These answers don’t satisfy Abbie, who complains to her older sister — an already quite excellent stitcher — that when she is grown she’ll, ” … have books instead of needles and thread, and read as much as [she likes].” Her sister reminds her, “Books are for boys … Needlework is for girls.”
I’ll let you find out for yourself how Abbie manages to deal with her dislike of needlework, and how the people around her handle her approach. 
Cynthia Cotten states in her Afterword that Abbie in Stitches was inspired by the story of Patty Polk, whom I wrote about recently in a similar vein, and whom she first read about in a 1921 book by Ethel Stanwood Bolton and Eva Johnston Coe called American Samplers which, ” … mentioned a sampler stitched around 1800 that said, ‘Patty Polk did this and she hated every stitch she did in it. She loves to read much more.’” Cynthia, too, was, ” … intrigued by this girl’s outspokenness at a time when most samplers dealt seriously, and often depressingly, with duty and death.”
Unfortunately, at least in my opinion, Cynthia also says, “Nobody I contacted knew the whereabouts of this sampler. Today, many people doubt its existence, saying it might just be a needlework legend.” I choose to believe in certain fairy tales, and if this is one of them, then so be it.
But I have a challenge for you … Help me locate Patty Polk’s sampler. If it ever existed, then it is out there somewhere in some lucky collector’s hands. Let’s find it! Post anything you know about her sampler here!
Technorati Tags: Patty Polk, Abbie in Stitches, Cynthia Cotten, Beth Peck, Ethel Stanwood Bolton, Ethel Bolton, Eva Johnston Coe, Eva Coe, American Samplers, hated every stitch, loves to read, needlework legend, feminist, feminism
August 9th, 2007 at 3:43 am
[…] it is much easier for a woman today to express herself publicly than it was for most of the “Patty Polk-alikes” who came before us (women have come a long way, baby, and I’m glad — but not yet […]