Evening Republican, Volume 18, Number 306, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 26 December 1914 — AMERICA'S BEST EXPERT IN LACE [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

AMERICA'S BEST EXPERT IN LACE

Sara Hadley Knows AH There Is to Know About the Delicate Fabrics. IS CONSULTED BY UNCLE SAM . ■■■'' I ■■■■■ I I ■ ■■■!■ 11 Inborn Bklll,/Study Abroad, -and Teaching Have Made This Canadian Wo nan One of the Greatest Lace Connoisseurs in This Country. By RICHARD SPILLANE. (Copyright, McClure Newspaper Syndicate.) Whenever the United States cue-, toms authorities at one of the large ports along the Atlantic have laces or other delicate fabrics about the value of which they are in doubt, there is one rule to follow. That is to send for Sara Hadley. In the estimation of the government, she knows more about needlework than any other woman in America. She is America’s great lace expert. There is not a stitch that is known to woman that sheisn’t mistress of. There isn’t a thread that ever was made that she doesn’t know the history of. There isn’t a precious piece of lace work handed down from former centuries that she doesn’t know as well as'the most famous of art experts know the work of Michael Angelo, Rubens, or any of the other great masters. Whatever she says about the product of the needle is accepted as gospel. Some girls take naturally to needlework. Sara Hadley was one of them. She is a Canadian, having been bom in Chatham, which isn’t far from Detroit. She had a local reputation before she was twelve years old for her remarkable work in the sewing line. Her people were well to do and there was no particular reason why she should apply herself to needlework, but she had so much love for making pretty things and so much patience that her parents determined to indulge her to the fullest and give to her every opportunity to learn all there was to be learned about the art. After she got through school on this side of the water, they sent her abroad. She finished her regular studies in a famous educational institution and then she took a sort of postgraduate course by traveling all over Europe. She didn’t travel as most women travel, but went to live among the peasants to study their work with the needle. There she got more knowledge about lace making than she ever absorbed through books or regular teaching. Through France, Belgium, Switzerland. Italy, Sweden and Ireland she went on her mission of study. It took years of earnest work, but they were happy years. Was Forced Into Business. . When she returned to this side of the Atlantic she had no intention of making a business use of her accomplishments. Some persons are forced into business. Miss Hadley couldn’t help sewing. It was second nature to her. Women who saw her work or heard about it questioned her. Then they told others about her. That led to a lot of visitors. They made all sorts of suggestions to her as to what she should do. Some of them wanted to take lessons-from her. She went to New York and had' the same experience she had in other cities. She was induced to give lessons in embroidery and the most delicate of needlework to a small class of women. That paid her so well that she took another class. Teaching was easy for her. A little later she began to write about lace and as a result of that writing she became editor of a magazine known as the Lace Maker. Collectors consulted Miss Hadley whenever they wished to buy fine Utoes. Museums asked her . judgment and employed her to search the history of such laces as they possessed. The government recognized her officially by using her writings and her examples as the basis tor instruction in needlework in the government schools in Porto Rico, the Philippines and elsewhere. Then she got to buying laces and displaying them. Probably no woman who ever lived has had pore influence on needleworkera than Miss Hadley. She has invented all sorts of- stitches, and created a multitude of new designs. It was she who introduced the doily and table laces generally. The inserting of lace into linen tor table laces was her work. She can copy any picture in lace. She can represent any style or any period with the deft touches of the needle. Now a Great Lace Dealer. From her start as teacher and her work as editor and adviser to collectors, Miss Hadley has grown gradually to be one of the great lace dealers of America. Many of her treasures the public never see. All the more beautiful of her laces are hidden away in great safes, guarded as Jealously as the Maiden Lane diamond merchants guard their most precious jewels. And why not? Some of these laces are eight centuries old. There are pieces of gowns worn by priests', bishops and princes of the church ages before Columbus was born. There are collars that were worn by the dQges of Venice to the time of Venetian greatness. They are very thin, very frail, very filmy. They are worth a hundred times their weight in gold. They are the very finest examples of

Venetian lace making, but Venice played only one part to the history of lace making. ;The Belgians are famous for their work. So are the French. So are the Irish. So are the Danes. People go to see Miss Hadley’s laces as they go to see old friends, or as people-go to the Metropolitan museum to feast upon its treasures. To some persons old laces have a very strong personal appeal. When Miss Hadley disposes of one of her belongings that she has had for a long time, the regulars sigh, if they do not actually mourn. There probably is not another business in all New York just like that of this lace maker from a little Canadian town. She has the histories and the romances of hundreds of families in the goods she deals in. Many of her laces are heirlooms., Some are old-time lace shawls that have been in one family for two, three, four or five generations. Some of them are very old and very rare. Now it is the fashion for us to use these as wedding veils or as decorations for wedding dresses. The more of history there is to one of these exquisite bits of lace, the more valuable. She Can Repair Anything. Now and then a tearful woman will come to Miss Hadley and throw herself on her mercy. She may be a millionaire or a run-down Knickerbocker. It matters not, if it so happens that

one of her old laces has been torn by accident or through the carelessness of a servant That laee has been the joy of her life, the pride of all her possessions. If Miss Hadley cannot mend it what is she to do? Miss Hadley does mend it It may take months, sometimes it takes a year if the damage is particularly bad, but she can mend anything that a needle is capable of mending. It does not signify if it is point applique, or rose point, oi; bruge, or Venetian, or carrickmacross, or burano; once she sees the stitch and the design, the rest is merely a matter of patience—a patience most trying in some instances. To assist her in her work, the lace expert has had to train quite a large number of women. Some ot these are going to take up the line of teaching later on. The work they are now doing is delicate in the extreme; it is so fine that they cannot work at it more than two or three hours a day. On some of the pieces made by lace makers the needleworker Is employed two or three years. The number of stitches they take is to the millions. They make things as small as a butterfly and they make others things as large as a great tablecloth that would cover a board of the most generous proportions. No painter ever gave more attention to detail than do these remarkable needleworkera in carrying out the designs in these fabrics. They have to know art and they have to know history. They stitch out Egypt’s most famous queen just as easily as they do the plainest of mosaic work. Rich Women Her Pupils. Probably no woman in the world has had more rich women for her pupils than has this needleworker from Canada. One of the first women she taught when she came to New York was Mrs. William Astor. Her second or third was Mrs. Collis T. Huntington. To give the whole list would be like repeating the Blue Book. Mrs. Huntington has come to be one of the greatest collectors in America. Her. laces are of fabulous value. She has given more earnest study to the history of lace than any other of the rich women that have shown expertness In needlework. She is almost qualified to be a lace expert herself. If she lost all her money tomorrow, she could earn a good living from her knowledge of laces. To Miss Hadley’s mind no business open to women today offers greater opportunities than lace making. It is broad in its scope. It takes in the poor glri and the girl who is gently bred. Ito rewards are large to those who master it It practically it in its

infancy in the United States. So long as there is wealth, and the tore of the beautiful, lace making will endure. There is no reason why American laee makers should not, if well taught WK. come the equal of the European. The American girls who have taken up lace making and have been ambitions and have had their heart to their work, have made surprising progress. Some of them, to filet lace make parts of the mesh Just as well as do the most expert lace makers of Europe.

A Tearful Woman Will Come to Miss Hadley.