Bookcase Treasures

I have recently purchased a couple of old books for my stitchery bookcase.  They are both aimed at children, but I am sure adults would find them very interesting and entertaining.

This is the first one, which I found in the secondhand bookshop at Farfield Mill.  It is 'Educational Needlecraft' by Margaret Swanson and Ann MacBeth, both of whom taught at the Glasgow School of Art.  The book was published in 1913.  It has several colour plates and some lovely b&w diagrams too.  Thought you might like this quote contained in the Preface ....

"Learn by doing" we say, yet even from this diligent "doing" we expect very little.  With child-drudgery in all its forms we are familiar, as, for example, with the work of the little "doffer" in the North Country mills.  But that a girl entering her teens should construct, should take her own measurements, recognize the type of garment, clothe herself and her sisters, is not expected by many teachers.  In vain have the greatest physico-psychologists declared that the development of the hand must take place between eleven and thirteen, and that failing this rapid gain in the manual skill power in the early 'teens, there is little hope that these will come later.

This one dates from 1965 and gives instructions on basic embroidery stitches and ideas on how they may be used to make useful items.  Again lovely illustrations.