"Columbus Sighting America", woven picture, Arlington Mills, Lawrence, MA; 1893
date: label: date made
content: 1893
name: label: maker
content: Arlington Mills
notes: label: Description
content: Jacquard-woven picture with image of Columbus sighting America. Sewn onto a mounting mat. "COLUMBUS SIGHTING AMERICA / DESIGNED AND WOVEN AT THE / ARLINGTON MILLS / LAWRENCE MASSACHUSETTS U.S.A."
label: Description
content: At the World’s Columbian Exposition in Chicago, Illinois, in 1893, Arlington Mills of Lawrence, Massachusetts, offered for sale woven images of Columbus Sighting America that were designed and produced by the mill. They provided extensive information about the weaving process: number of Jacquard cards required for the design (21,024), warps (3,850), picks per inch (240), loom speed (100 picks per minute), the length of time needed to make two side-by-side images (1 ¼ hour). The image was based on a work by German historical painter Herman Freihold Pluddeman in 1836.
label: Description
content: Pictures like these functioned as commemoratives and also as exemplars of excellence celebrating the American textile industry. Jacquard woven bookmarks and pictures were both an expression of technical virtuosity for textile manufacturers and a popular novelty item for consumers.
label: Description
content: The Arlington Mills began operations in 1865 in Lawrence and Methuen, Mass. By 1925 this mill complex was one of the largest in the country. In the 1890s Arlington patented a wool scouring process using the chemical naptha that revolutionized the cleaning of raw wool and the manufacturing of the wool fiber called “Tops” in the US. Arlington Mills produced woolen cloth for the US Army and Navy during both the First and Second World Wars: its production was totally taken up by these services. The company began to close its various mills in 1952, a victim of post-WWII difficulties in procuring wool and the expansion of synthetic fiber manufacturing in the American textile industry.
label: Description
content: ATHM Collection - # 1996.96; Gift of Sabina Ekstrand
label: Location
content: Currently not on view
place: label: place made
content: United States: Massachusetts, Lawrence
topic: label: related event
content: World's Columbian Exposition
setName: label: See more items in
content: Home and Community Life: Textiles
creditLine: label: Credit Line
content: American Textile History Museum Collection
dataSource: label: Data Source
content: National Museum of American History
identifier: label: ID Number
content: 2017.0232.39
label: catalog number
content: 2017.0232.39
label: accession number
content: 2017.0232
objectType: label: Object Name
content: Picture, woven
physicalDescription: label: Physical Description
content: wool (overall material)
label: Physical Description
content: compound weave; jacquard-woven (overall production method/technique)
label: Measurements
content: overall: 17 3/16 in x 12 5/16 in x 1/16 in; 43.65625 cm x 31.27375 cm x .15875 cm