Their Manners Pleasing, and Their Education Complete: Newport Samplers 1728-1835

By popular demand, the Newport Historical Society is pleased to announce the return of the exhibit from the 2012 Newport Antiques Show, Their Manners Pleasing, and Their Education Complete; Newport Samplers 1728-1835 at the Society’s restored Seventh Day Baptist Meeting House.

The exhibit, featuring eighteenth and early nineteenth century samplers from the Society’s textiles collection, reflects the evolution of Newport needlework over the course of a century and includes examples of the different types of samplers that a girl might produce during her lifetime. “Sampler-making was a vital part of a young woman’s education in the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries,” explains Jessie MacLeod, exhibit curator and Newport Historical Society Buchanan/Burnam intern. “Stitching a plain sampler helped a girl practice her sewing skills, and elaborate pieces of fancy needlework served as evidence of a young lady’s refinement and accomplishment.”

Most decorative samplers were made in female academies, where pupils learned needlework along with subjects like reading, arithmetic, painting, and music. Frances Townsend ran one such school for the daughters of Newport’s elite, promising in a 1787 advertisement that her instruction would “render their Manners pleasing, and their Education complete.” Newport samplers are well-known for their lively and distinctive designs and many fine examples will be exhibited.

The exhibit, which initially debuted during the weekend of the Newport Antiques Show, August 12 – 14, 2011, can be viewed in the restored 1730 Seventh Day Baptist Meeting House, attached to the Newport Historical Society headquarters at 82 Touro Street. The exhibit is open to the public from December 19, 2011 through February 24, 2011 on Monday through Friday, 10am to 3pm. (Closed on December 23, 2011, December 26, 2011, December 30, 2011, January 2, 2012, January 16, 2012 and February 20, 2012.)