Framed hair wreath possibly made by Isabella Rooney, Elba, Dodge County, late nineteenth century.
Object name
Wreath
Alternate object name
Hair wreath; Hairwork
Maker
possibly Rooney, Isabella M.
Date
1880-1900
Dimensions
16 ½"H x 14 ¼"W (frame)
Materials and techniques
Flowers formed from wire wrapped with hair; Muslin; Gessoed frame
Current location
Beaver Dam, Dodge County, Wisconsin
Description
Framed wreath made from gray, white, and blond human hair wrapped around wires. A calling card printed with blue flowers and the inscription "Belle M. Rooney" is at the center of the wreath. Surrounded by folds of white muslin and displayed in a carved and gessoed wood frame.
History
The calling card at the center of the wreath suggests it was made by or for Belle M. Rooney. Eighteen-year-old Isabella Rooney appears in the 1880 federal census for the community of Elba, Dodge County, Wisconsin, a daughter of Irish immigrants John and Eliza Rooney.
Fashioning elaborate wreaths from the hair of family members and friends was a type of "fancywork"--a craft activity pursued by a Victorian woman with the intent of beautifying her home and putting her good taste and, by extent, her good moral character, on public view. At the same time, hairwork was a physical representation of a woman's personal connections to the people whose hair she wove together to create a wreath.
Sources
For more on the social meanings of hairwork, see Helen Scheumaker, Love Entwined: The Curious History of Hairwork in America (University of Pennsylvania, 2007). A hair wreath from the collection of the Helen Louise Allen Textile Collection at the University of Wisconsin-Madison (object # D.C.US.108) was included in the 2001 exhibition "Pixels and Textiles" (accessed August 20, 2010): http://textilecollection.wisc.edu/exhibitions_pages/pixels_and_textiles_exhibition/D.C.US.108.html This wreath was included in the exhibition "Handmade Meaning: The Value of Craft in Victorian and Contemporary Culture" James Watrous Gallery, Madison, 2011.
