From Marty, via the comments:

What would they have kept in their knitted pocket? Also, were these pockets made in other ways, such as quilted or of leather?

We surmise that the colonists kept small personal items in their knitted pockets, also coins, although there was little use for coins during Plymouth Colony’s early years. We guess perhaps a comb or a thimble, a handkerchief, a letter, or ? I recall one interpreter who was portraying the mother of a five year old son. She always kept two or three little pebbles in her pocket as if he’d brought them to her. I thought that was kind of weird, this being long before I was the mother of a small son. Years later, I thought of her whenever I emptied my pockets at the end of the day and found pebbles.

Our interpreters keep all of those things in their 17th-century pockets, plus marbles, or a steel striker and flint and tinder (for period fire starting) and reproduction 17th-century coins. I know they also keep bent nails, bits of twine, yarn or rope, books of matches (for non-period fire starting), hard candy/cough drops and cigarette butts. These things I have cleaned out of pockets prior to washing/dry-cleaning.

If you look carefully at 17th-century paintings, especially crowd scenes, you can find many shapes and sizes of personal bag/pouch/pocket. They seem to be made of a variety of materials. Some look sewn of cloth or leather. Of course quite a number of embroidered “sweete bags” survive in modern museums, but these would have been beyond the means of most of the Plymouth residents. The V&A has a book called Bags, written I think by Valerie Cummings. Most of the examples are post-1650 (alas) but it is worth a look.

We have two or three kinds of small-to-medium-sized leather pockets/pouches represented on our sites as well as the knitted ones. There several more kinds I would like to have, but have not yet developed either the methods to make them or sourced all the components we’d need.

Rebecca only needs a hat and coat, and she only needed the coat because it was raining ferociously that day.

She looks great, and did great even on her very first day. This all happened a few weeks ago; she’s really no longer a “newbie” anymore, and in a couple of weeks when we hire a few more interpreters to end out the season, she won’t even be the new kid anymore.

We have a phrase here, that describes the state of being prepared to receive museum visitors - camera-ready. Often the interpreters will head down to work on the Village site in the morning not quite entirely dressed. They’ve got clothes on, period clothes even, but maybe they’re not buttoned, maybe the women’s hair isn’t tied up, maybe they haven’t removed eyeglasses or nose rings, maybe they’re carrying a Dunkin’ Donuts cup.

Sometimes, we have a film or photo crew on the site before 9:00 and everyone needs to show up “camera-ready.” In that case there’ll be a big note in the Carriage House letting everyone know that.

Here Rebecca is technically camera-ready, but she still needs a couple of items to be really done.

In the comments Meg asked about the small knitted bags several of the female interpreters wear suspended from a belt. In the early 17th century pockets in clothing weren’t as universal as they are now (although Janet Arnold’s Patterns of Fashion 1560 - 1620 has several examples of extant items with either pockets sewn in or evidence that there used to be). People, men and women both, often carried a pouch or bag on their person to hold small items.

We base the bags used on our sites on one found on the Gunnister man, a late 17th-century body found in the mid-20th century in a peat bank in Scotland. The Gunnister man’s knitted possessions are described in Richard Rutt’s book A History of Hand Knitting, and also in an article by Deborah Pulliam that appeared in Piecework magazine.

About 20 years ago Plimoth Plantation, in conjunction with the Weavers’ Guild of Boston, published a booklet of knitting patterns, including one for this sort of little bag. The booklet is out of print, and most of the patterns have been vastly improved through further research in the intervening years. A few years ago a former wardrobe department tailor developed a pattern for a bag the same size as the Gunnister man’s but with a different pattern. I’ll find out if it is available through the museum gift shop and let you know.

Tomorrow is Emily’s last day with us. She did great work this summer, as did Lacey, who arrived home safely a few days ago. We’re going to miss them both, especially since we’re only in the middle of the process of finding a replacement for Shaina, who departed in June. This autumn will be a major transition time for us.

Kandy asked about the exhibit opening in May. I guess I have neglected to mention that much, since we won’t shift into high gear on the planning and implementation of that for another couple of months. We are planning to open an exhibit which will include the completed jacket in May of 2009. I will of course share the details as they develop.

I also have more pictures of Rebecca transforming into her 17th-century character - on a disk at the office.

The other week, when Wendy and Tricia were here working out the directions for the various aspects of the goldwork, my Day Job involved preparing our newest colonial interpreter for work in the 1627 English Village.

When Rebecca came to pick up her clothes Tricia asked if she’d mind getting dressed in the office instead of taking her things to the changing room in the Carriage House. Rebecca was a great sport, posing for photos at each stage of dressing.

We thought lots of other people might be interested in the process, so here are a few photos.

First, Rebecca with her big pile of period clothes.

The second picture is of Rebecca and me sorting through her issue to choose the pieces she needed to wear that day. It was the first week of August, but the day was rainy and cold, so she chose a lightweight wool jacket.

Then we did a “before” picture - Rebecca in her 21st century things before the transformation.

Good sport though she was, we sent her into the bathroom with the first layer - smock, stays, bumroll, under-petticoat and shoes & stockings. You definitely want to do the stockings and shoes Before the stays.

The bumroll is a padded roll, looks like a sausage really with ties on the ends. Rebecca’s wearing it over her smock & stays and under her yellow petticoat to give her that early 17th-century bell shape. These padded rolls were worn in the 17th century, they’re not a made-up modern thing, and they were called bumrolls or farthingale rolls. Didn’t make that up. Here Rebecca is getting ready to tie her garters over her stockings to hold them up. Her petticoat is wicked short, even for an under-petti, but I decided to go with this one because it fit her waist. The stock cupboard didn’t offer many other choices, the goods are pretty picked-over at this time of year. There isn’t enough hem to let down to make much difference. She’ll be wearing at least one petti over it unless she’s doing some sort of exceedingly messy work in which case better to have it short and out of the muck.