COMMON THREADS A historic hooked rug

Bruce Komusin, treasurer of the Cranberry Island Historical Society announced recently that Victoria Murphy of Seal Harbor recently donated a hooked rug, made circa 1901-02, made by island women involved in a hooked rug making industry from 1901-1903. The rug’s provenance, according to Komusin, goes like this: One of several Mount Desert summer residents who established a rug making cottage industry on Great Cranberry Island was Miriam Reynolds. Miss Reynolds also founded the Cranberry Club. The rug, now in the Cranberry Island Historical Society’s collection, almost surely belonged to her.

Miriam Reynolds was part of the family of William Reed Huntington, who spent summers in Northeast Harbor, beginning around 1886. Miriam’s younger sister, Mary, married William Thompson and her family summered in Tamworth, N.H. The rug was in their house there. Their son Charles S. Thompson inherited the house.

When Charles’ daughter Victoria married Dr. James. S. Murphy, a Seal Harbor summer resident, she was given the Cranberry Island rug so that it might be nearer its place of origin. The rug stayed at Seal Harbor for 40 years.

When Victoria’s daughter Alice married Cranberry Island summer resident Bill Bancroft, the hooked rug came home to the island museum.

Cranberry Island rugs were marked with the letters “CR” on the selvage on the back, but this rug does not display that mark. The rug appears to have been repaired and the selvage replaced, so the mark may have been effaced or removed.

Additional work is being done to find out more about the rug and the island rug making industry.

Visit http://cranberryisles.com/photos/hooked rugs.html for background information about rug making on Cranberry Island.

– Ardeana Hamlin