example. Our table is very similar to card tables produced by the same Saco shop but without the moveable leg that supported the hinged leaf of the top to allow space for four players. Card tables were designed to be placed against walls when not in use and moved out into the room as needed for games; pier tables were designed to be stationary and as so, the backs were not decorated to be seen.

Joshua Moody Cumston (1784-1835) and David Buckminster (1799-1849) worked together in a cabinetmaking and undertaking business in Saco from 1809-1816. They are credited with making some of the flamboyantly veneered furniture attributed to Portsmouth, New Hampshire, prior to Thomas Hardiman’s pioneering study and his article published in The Magazine Antiques, May 2001. In the article, Tom, a former curator at the Saco Museum, makes the point that “Cumston and Buckminster’s high-style furniture was not intended for provincial cottages but for highly sophisticated Federal interiors.”  

The pier table was donated to the Saco Museum as a gift from the Birch Lodge Fund of Fox Point, Wisconsin. We are grateful to Tom Hardiman and Gerald W. R. Ward, a noted furniture scholar, for their efforts in steering the pier table to the museum. On your next visit to the Saco Museum, look for it in one of the alcoves to either side of the front door.

arts, particularly hooked mats and rugs. One of the key people in developing the products of the Industrial department was Jessie Luther (1860-1952), an American who was an early proponent of occupational therapy. Grenfell met Luther in 1905 and invited her to join the mission in Labrador. She arrived the following year and set to determining what type of handcrafts might best be developed into a home industry.

The winter months of February and March had long been known as the “matting season” along the coasts of Labrador and Newfoundland. The women of these regions, descendants of the early English and Scottish settlers, all hooked, most of them from an early age. Mat hooking was easily accomplished at home with the use of a simple frame and hand-made hook, but at first it was overlooked as a potential cottage industry. Jessie didn’t mention mat hooking until January 29, 1908, when she noted in her journal,” This afternoon was the beginning of the matting club. Several women came by evidently with the idea of looking around before committing themselves.” The low attendance at that first meeting may have been because so many had already mastered the craft and developed their own designs - often blocks or triangles arranged like patchwork or floral designs. 

colored drawing or scraps of hooking fabric pinned to the appropriate area were also included to be sure that the correct color scheme was followed. Kits were distributed to the mat hookers by Grenfell workers who traveled along the coast by boat or dog team. Jessie Luther was one of those who journeyed thousands of miles along the coastlines to distribute raw materials and pick up finished mats. By 1916, sixteen different patterned mats were in production, mostly distinctive northern scenes of dog teams, bears, hunters, and birds. A decade later, the production of hooked mats had reached assembly-line efficiency.

In the early years wool was used as a hooking material, but by the mid-1920s silk was more commonly used. In 1928, the supervisor of the Industrial sent out a plea through the mission’s newsletter for silk stockings: “Save Your Old Silk Stockings!  When your stockings run, let them run to Labrador!” The silk was then dyed in a range of soft hues, which proved to be very popular and helped propel the mat industry into its years of peak production. Most of the Grenfell mats found today were produced between 1926 and the early 1930s. By the winter of 1929, 3,000 mats had been hooked and the revenue for sales had risen from $27,000 in 1926 to $63,000 in 1929.  

During the early 1930s, mission volunteers toured the resort areas of New England and New York selling the mats. Eventually, retail shops were opened in New York City and Philadelphia where urban shoppers were happy to purchase the mats with their distinctive images. Unfortunately, the Depression years took a toll on the mat-making industry. After nylon was invented in 1938, it became difficult to find sources of the formerly common silk and rayon stockings. With the death of Grenfell in 1940, the driving spirit behind the “Industrial” faded away.

This year marks the 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence. The American Revolution gave birth to a new nation and set of ideals that have been memorialized and reimagined ever since. Remembering the Revolution will feature stories of some of those involved in the conflict, such as Benjamin Simpson, a local mason who participated in the Boston Tea Party and later served in the Continental Army and Captain Jabez Lane of Buxton who fought in campaigns from Boston to New York. The exhibition will also look at how later generations shaped our understanding of the Revolution. After the war, people began saving items connected to the event or associated with those who played a role in the new nation, like George Washington and over the course of the 19th century, mass-production made products with Revolutionary War imagery affordable. The Centennial celebrations in 1876 served to reinforce national unity after the Civil War and emphasized the nation’s history as a triumph of liberty and democratic progress. The Bicentennial in 1976 focused on many of the same themes: national renewal, patriotism, and a nostalgic reflection on the American past, coming as it did after the Vietnam War years and Watergate. Yet neither of these celebrations told the full story of the struggle for liberty or acknowledged the ways in which the United States had failed to live up to some of the ideals put forward in the Declaration.

To do justice to the story of the Bicentennial, we need your help! We would like to include Bicentennial memorabilia in the exhibition and are looking for items that we could borrow. If you have something you think we would be interested in that we could have from May through early September, please contact Tara Raiselis at traiselis@dyerlibrarysacomuseum.org.