Help Identify the Mystery Tapestry
Ecorse history buff Tom Enright sent me this email last weekend and has kindly given me permission to post it in the hopes that someone may know something about this tapestry. He said that since it is about 80 years old the possibilities of anyone who worked on it being still alive are slim, but I am hoping that someone’s descendants or someone from the former St. Francis could shed some light on the subject.
Thanks for your help.
Kathy
My mother had this "tapestry" stashed away in her things and we only discovered it last month. My mother is 96 and her thinking is not as good as it once was and she’s not able to communicate anything about the “tapestry”. Her name is not on it,a s near as we can tell. I have many relatives who's names are on it. But some prominent Ecorse names are not: Voisen, Underill, etc. However they could have been out of town.
We, of course, don’t know why this was done or when, other then it was in 1936. We guess that at some event or gathering of some kind, people signed this cloth in pencil. Later someone needle pointed, stitched, in red thread, over top of the signatures, or names if they actually didn’t sign (see the “Nurses” section next to the heart). I know my dad’s signature (Regis T. Enright, middle right hand edge) is exactly how he signed his name. I looked it up on the internet and that type of RED embroidery was called REDWORK. It is very fine embroidery with usually one strand of thread, worked on a tapestry type of fabric and is called PETIT POINT...comes from France. Since Ecorse was a town of Frenchmen and women, it would fit as a French skill.
We thought it might be just people from St. Francis Xavier, because of the priest's names in the middle and maybe it is. We are working on finding out if anyone who signed is still alive. It's large, about 20x24 inches.
Tom Enright
Thanks for your help.
Kathy
My mother had this "tapestry" stashed away in her things and we only discovered it last month. My mother is 96 and her thinking is not as good as it once was and she’s not able to communicate anything about the “tapestry”. Her name is not on it,a s near as we can tell. I have many relatives who's names are on it. But some prominent Ecorse names are not: Voisen, Underill, etc. However they could have been out of town.
We, of course, don’t know why this was done or when, other then it was in 1936. We guess that at some event or gathering of some kind, people signed this cloth in pencil. Later someone needle pointed, stitched, in red thread, over top of the signatures, or names if they actually didn’t sign (see the “Nurses” section next to the heart). I know my dad’s signature (Regis T. Enright, middle right hand edge) is exactly how he signed his name. I looked it up on the internet and that type of RED embroidery was called REDWORK. It is very fine embroidery with usually one strand of thread, worked on a tapestry type of fabric and is called PETIT POINT...comes from France. Since Ecorse was a town of Frenchmen and women, it would fit as a French skill.
We thought it might be just people from St. Francis Xavier, because of the priest's names in the middle and maybe it is. We are working on finding out if anyone who signed is still alive. It's large, about 20x24 inches.
Tom Enright
Updated List of Names
ecorse_names_on_tapistry__1_.pdf |
ecorse_names_on_tapistry__pencil___1_.pdf |