January 27, 1999
Happy hookers and yarn spinners meet
By Carol South
Herald contributing writer
These women like to be called hookers, happy hookers in fact. But don't call the police on them. These women ply their trade using strips of fabric, some cloth and a hook.
They are rughookers, a traditional craft that pulls loops of fabric through the weave of a cloth to make intricate designs.
"The attraction to rughooking is that it is unique," said Kay Tiffany, a city resident who has been rughooking for seven years. "You don't see too many people doing this and everyone is just awed by your rugs. They say, 'You're not going to put that on the floor, are you?' and I say, 'Yes!'"
The craft caught on in the United States during pioneer days when women made rugs to cover floors of their homes, using scraps from old clothes and burlap feed sacks. Many sailors on boats coming from Europe also made rugs to pass the time.
Rughookers today still follow the tradition of self-sufficiency by recycling clothing such as skirts or suits, designing the rug and cutting and dyeing the strips of fabric. Thousands of loops and yards of strips make up a small rug. Rughookers use strips of wool from 1/16 to 3/32 of an inch wide and hook small loops through monk's cloth.
"I worked one fabric from one of my husband's Coast Guard uniforms into a rug," said Jacky Putnam of Garfield Township. "We go to Goodwill and buy up wool skirts or sweaters to cut into strips."
Tiffany and Putnam are members of the North Country Fiber Craft Guild, a guild dedicated to supporting and educating people interested in making crafts using natural fiber. Spinners, knitters, crocheters and quilters come to the monthly meetings, which are held the last Monday evening of every month at the Bethlehem Lutheran Church. Meetings usually draw around a dozen people and even in winter weather some drive from Onekema, East Jordan and Walloon Lake each month to attend.
As spinning wheels whir and knitting needles click, guild members catch up on projects others are doing or have completed. Split mainly into two groups - the spinners and the hookers - there is a good-natured co-existence between the camps. And sometimes even a crossing of the lines: before Christmas, the hookers had the spinners making ornaments.
The meeting also allows members to swap tips and tricks and help out where needed.
"When I needed help on my quilt, I brought my ironing board, fabric and everything and said, 'Get me started!'" said Tiffany, who just completed her first quilt this fall.
The guild began more than 20 years ago to bring together people interested in spinning, the process of making fleece into yarn on a spinning wheel. It gradually expanded to include other traditional fiber crafts. New members continue to come as interest in clothing and household items handmade from natural fiber increases around the country.
Maureen Simmons of Alden started spinning a year ago, drawn to the idea of making her own yarn after years of crocheting with commercial yarns. She realized she loved the idea of working with wool from start to finish. She also spins Angora wool from rabbits and goats into a fine, soft yarn.
Simmons now has an inventory of three dozen fleeces in her attic, some of which she helped to shear from a sheep and all of which she hand washed and carded. She has begun crocheting a sweater for herself with yarn she made and dyed herself and is planning to learn to knit and make socks.
"Spinning is the most relaxing thing I have ever found in my life," said Simmons, who spent her first month after getting her spinning wheel treadling an empty wheel to learn the necessary consistency of motion. "It is just natural, like you're grounded to the Earth when doing it."