Bygone era made efficient use of cotton feed sacks

It took two feed sacks to make a dress and four to make a sheet. One feed sack might make a pillowcase, a small tablecloth, place mats or a whole stack of dishcloths.

These simple facts were common knowledge among frugal Maine housewives trying to make ends meet – literally and figuratively – during the Great Depression and World War II years. Those were the days when animal feed – and flour – came packed in colorful, printed cotton sacks. Those sacks were coveted as sewing material.

Joni Roths of Southwest Harbor says that her great-aunt Laura Jordon braided rugs from feed sacks. Jordon also made clothing from feed sacks. One day, Roths said, Jordon went into town and insisted that a worker at the Feed and Seed store unload an entire truckload of chicken feed so she could find the sacks that matched the dress she was making. That story, Roths said, was told around town by Cal, a worker at the store, who helped unload the truck.

“She was the kind of woman,” Roths said, “who would invite us over to skate on the dining room floor. She’d put wax on the floor, give us heavy wool socks to put on and let us ‘skate’ around the floor. That was how she got the floor polished.”

Alice Hawes of Hampden grew up during World War II in Chicopee, Mass., where her father owned McKinstry Farms. “Those were the days when many items were rationed, so this sturdy fabric was in demand and used many ways,” Hawes wrote in an e-mail. “After the sacks were empty, my mother would wash them and keep a supply for her own use and for neighbors. My skirts and blouses were made of these feed sacks. At school, classmates would compare the outfits they were wearing. Many [of those outfits] were made of the feed sacks from our farm.”

In 1949, before a cousin’s wedding, members of Hawes’ family got together to make the bride a quilt made from a pattern in the Ladies’ Home Journal magazine. The embroidered squares of the quilt top depicted the wedding customs of the world. Hawes’ mother ended up finishing the quilt and she used feed sacks as the quilt backing – red flowers and love birds on a white ground. The cousin gave Hawes the quilt when she married in 1958.

Hawes, a local historian, said an old quilt once owned by Claris Frost of Hampden, sported a feed and flour sack backing marked with the logos of the Park and Pollard feed company in Massachusetts, and Washburn’s War Time Corn Flour from the Washburn-Crosby Co. in Minneapolis. John Crosby III, a founder of the Washburn-Crosby Co., was the grandson of John Crosby, an early settler of Hampden. John Crosby IV was one of the organizers of General Mills Inc.

Quilt scholar and historian Eli Leon of California, curator of the exhibit, titled “No Two Alike: African-American Improvisations on a Traditional Patchwork Pattern,” currently at the University of Maine Museum of Art, 40 Harlow St. in Bangor, said via e-mail that “vast numbers of quilts were made from feed [and flour] sacks in the 1940s, 1950s and earlier.”

By the 1960s, sacks made of printed cotton material had been phased out and were made of synthetic, nonbiodegradable materials, which proved more of a hindrance than a help when animals ingested the artificial fibers or they became tangled in their fleece.

Today, quilters collect old cotton feed and flour sacks for use in their creations. Others simply collect them.

To learn more about feed sacks, their history and uses, visit www.fabrics.net/joan301.asp.

Snippets

Mrs. Leola McGregor, who lives at Cummings Health Care Assisted Living in Howland, will celebrate her 100th birthday on Dec. 21. What’s even more remarkable is that Mrs. McGregor has been a knitter for most of those years. She was 2 years old when she was first introduced to knitting. She still knits daily, making socks, which Cummings Health Care staff members often buy. Mrs. McGregor even knits when she plays beano, said Rita Smith, activities director at the health care facility. She said Mrs. McGregor knits about 10 pairs of socks each month – the traditional boot socks using knit 2, purl 2 ribbing.

“She can knit with her eyes closed,” Smith said. “I’ve seen her do it.”

Those who wish to extend birthday felicitations to Mrs. McGregor may do so by contacting Cummings Health Care Assisted Living, P.O. Box 367, Howland, ME 04448, or call 732-4648.

Ardeana Hamlin may be reached at 990-8153, or e-mail ahamlin@bangordailynews.net.