Kitchen Towel, Tuesday, Ironing
Object Details
- Date
- 1943
- Medium
- linen fabric, cotton embroidery thread
- Dimensions
- 27 9/16 × 17 in. (70 × 43.2 cm)
- Cite As
- Anacostia Community Museum, Smithsonian Institution, gift of Theresa Allen
- Caption
- The embroidered design on this linen towel reserves it for kitchen décor rather than for drying dishes. Stitched in cotton thread on a white towel is a woman in a red apron ironing, the housekeeping task scheduled for “Tuesday.” The towel is part of a days-of-the-week set made from a needlecraft kit, a popular creative endeavor in the 1940s, when smaller, single-family homes and new appliances eased the burden of housework for middle-class women. Behind the woman at the ironing board, red-and-yellow flowers with green leaves grow in a yellow flowerpot at an open window. A matching floral border extends on either side of the window, whose blue gingham valance billows in the breeze. Mary Thompson Ford (1861-1960) was both college-educated and a proud homemaker in Jersey City, NJ. Her daughter Blanche Ford Hart (1897-1992) likely embroidered these towels for use in their family kitchen.
- Accession Number
- 2008.0002.0006a
- Type
- towel
- See more items in
- Anacostia Community Museum Collection
- Data Source
- Anacostia Community Museum
- Restrictions & Rights
- CC0
- Record ID
- acm_2008.0002.0006a
