Images(2)

Embroidered Terrestrial Globe

Maker Hume/Hulme Family

Periodca. 1821 - 1825

MediumInk and embroidered silk on linen, stuffed with wool

Dimensions5.25 in. (13.3 cm)

ClassificationsNeedlework

Credit LineGift of Mrs. Henry M. Post, Mrs. Lewis Waring, and Amory L. Haskell in memory of their mother, Mrs. J. Amory Haskell, 1944

Object number1917

DescriptionA spherical globe style sampler made of fine off-white silk over a closely woven linen base, stuffed with wool. The continents are outlined in black, dark blue, and brown ink, with painted pale gray watercolor shading along the continent lines, but are not embroidered. Latitude and longitude lines are delineated with pale yellow silk thread, couched at all intersections. The elliptic line is marked with multiple yellow silk threads held in place with off white silk couching threads wherever it intersects with longitude and latitude lines. The continents and many countries are named, including "United States," "Canada," and "Africa." Australia is noted as "New Holland." All major oceans as well as some major rivers are identified.The globe's finely sewn seam lines are hidden under the silk longitude threads. At the bottom of the globe, a small maroon leather circle with pinked edges is held in place with a small wire wrapped head pin, to protect the globe's delicate surface from wear.
Curatorial RemarksEmbroidered maps were particularly popular as schoolgirl projects in England from about 1770 to the middle of the nineteenth century. In America, a unique three-dimensional interpretation of this subject was produced during the first half of the nineteenth century at the Westtown School in Chester County, Pennsylvania, about 25 miles from Philadelphia. Founded in 1799 by the Friends' Philadelphia Yearly Meeting and modeled after English schools, Westtown was originally a boarding school for the education of Quaker youth and has continued to accept students, now of any faith, to the present day. By the end of its first year of operation, Westtown had enrolled about one hundred boys and girls, all of whom studied subjects including geography, history, writing, arithmetic, and astronomy. Students came from the middle Atlantic states and from as far as North Carolina, Michigan, and Ohio. From its founding in 1799 to 1850, Westtown also welcomed 37 students from Monmouth County Quaker families. Girls spent less time on arithmetic in order to devote one-third of their time to sewing. With "a pair of scissors, thread-case, thimble, [and a] work-bag" brought from home, Westtown girls stitched practical marking and darning samplers, decorated thread-cases and pin cushions, and worked display samplers featuring "extracts" or verses combined with floral, animal, and geometric motifs. The most difficult needlework project a girl could undertake was an embroidered globe, either terrestrial or celestial. In 1816, Westtown student Rachel Cope wrote to her parents, "I expect to have a good deal of trouble in making [the globe] yet I hope they will recompense me for all my trouble, for they will certainly be a curiosity to you and of considerable use in instructing my brothers and sister..." As Rachel noted, the globes were both a challenge to a girl's needlework prowess as well as a practical instructional aid in teaching geography and, in the case of the celestial globes, astronomy. Once completed, the globes could be mounted on specially-made wooden frames or kept in small wooden storage boxes. Mary Passmore, a contemporary sewing teacher at Westtown, has been identified as a likely instructor for the girls making globes. Approximately thirty Westtown globes are known to survive and makers identified for more than half of them. The Westtown globes were an inventive interdisciplinary lesson for the girls who made them and show an extraordinary degree of skill and patience in their execution. In addition to being singular examples of the quality and creativity of American needlework, the early globes are also significant to the history of cartography as some of the first globes produced in this country. The Association's collection includes a second terrestrial globe made by Westtown student Hannah E. Deacon, who attended the school between 1815 and 1817 (see accession number 1975.21.1).NotesThe silk globe entered the Association's collection with the following description, "Belonged originally to the Hume family of Mt. Holly." Research indicates that this needlework piece may have been made by either Rebecca Ann or Sarah Biddle Hulme, daughters of George and Sarah Hulme. Quakers George Hulme (1777-1850) and his wife Sarah Biddle Shreve (1775-1847) first lived in Bucks County, Pennsylvania, but relocated to Mount Holly in Burlington County, New Jersey, around the time of their marriage in 1801. The couple had six children. At least three of the Hulme children were students at the Westtown School in Chester County, Pennsylvania. Records indicate that Sarah (1804 - 1843) was enrolled in 1820, and her younger sister Rebecca Ann (1806 - 1862) two years later in 1822. The girls' brother, James (1802 - 1880), also attended Westtown School. Sarah married Samuel Franklin Levis (1805 - 1887) in 1832 and died at the age of thirty-nine. Rebecca Ann remained single. She died at the age of fifty-six and was buried in the Hulme family plot in Mount Holly.

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