INTRODUCTION
I began this project in 2003, when I went hunting for information on a doll crafting magazine("The Cloth Doll") at the Library of Congress' website. I was trying to figure out when it ceased publication so that I would know when I had a complete run. I thought it would just be a matter of plugging in the ISSN# and reading a file. I discovered that not only does the Library of Congress not archive a copy of all periodicals, it isn't even aware of most craft magazines. I felt betrayed! But I took a deep breath and thought it likely they just hadn't caught up to the 21st century yet with their website. Surely the information was safely locked in some microfiche cabinet or even a dusty card catalog, waiting for some poor intern to pull out and start entering it into the electronic record. But when I queried, I received a brief reply that said, "we can't concern ourselves with women's hobbies."
It shocked me. Profoundly. And then I got genuinely angry.
Every English teacher I'd ever had confidently informed me the Library of Congress collected and cataloged everything ever put in print in the United States. It was a sacred trust they had that I had bought into with all my heart. They are our countries' library - the bastion of all our printed works. In the back of my mind was always the confidence I would be able to look up anything, if I really needed to, if I just made a pilgrimage to Washington DC - and I use the word pilgrimage deliberately to reflect my exact emotions - and with the advent of the internet, I didn't even need to physically go there. I'd always envisioned an army of unpaid interns and an underground bunker full of metal desks lined in rows, each armed with a scanner, a microfiche reader(and then later a computer) and sharp-eyed Librarians passing among the desks to ensure their interns from the local colleges weren't sneaking in a game of pong on government time. The Library of Congress was our mecca for all our recorded history - ALL our recorded history. I've always thought that women's history is inextricably tied to textiles, and has been expressed through them via their hobbies since, well, since history as we know it began. The published record of that history began much later, but still covers centuries. So what the Library of Congress effectively told me was that they couldn't be concerned with women's history.
Did you know there has never been a woman in charge of the Library of Congress until September 2016? The Library of Congress was founded in 1800. Only fourteen men have ever held the post, until Carla Hayden was sworn in. I find it interesting that one of the few intellectual careers a woman could choose for herself historically, Librarian, never had one at the head of the most important library we have, until the last decade. The crime here is so large in scope and so diffuse in responsible parties(the President of the United States makes the appointment of the Director for the Library of Congress, and the Senate confirms it) that I can't begin to define it. The history we've lost isn't calculable, because we don't know everything that's missing and we have no means of finding out. The contempt suggested in the email I received was a blessing in disguise. Without that e-mail, it would never have occurred to me someone needed to at least make the attempt, or be angry enough to do it. It baffles me that I am apparently the front runner on this issue, and that anyone could simply shrug upon hearing about it. My anger about this has kept me at it almost nonstop for over twenty years now.
I went searching elsewhere for bibliographies of various craft magazines - and came up with nada. Even Wikipedia was largely silent on the subject. (I have since discovered that the magazines "THREADS" and "PIECEWORK" keep searchable databases of all their issues(kudos to these awesome periodicals!!!) and that there are some women out there(I'm referring to June Schwede Myers and her brilliant index) as dedicated to the dead publication "WORKBASKET" as I am - but there was no collective database of all of them as I'd hoped to find.) So I've been building one, one found issue at a time.
I had also been discovering there were a great many magazines and newsletters out there that I'd never heard of, that had all sorts of wonderful information packed into their pages. Magazines for me are a source of patterns and recipes and inspiration for my own projects. I may not have made those leg warmers from "Workbasket" yet - but I know I will eventually - and it gives me a great deal of pleasure to know I can easily look up which issue and be able to go straight to the right box it's archived in. Magazines are a direct reflection of the culture they are catering to. That makes them historical documents - ALL of them.
Magazines both reflected and helped form our culture for nearly two centuries. They still have their effect - but the internet has been slowly leeching this power away, just as tv did to radio. One thing the internet cannot take away from old periodicals, however, is their permanence - which seems like a funny thing to say about a form of media that has always been considered as disposable as newspapers! Websites come and go like mayflies - the information they impart can be gone tomorrow without explanation. So far as I can see, the only things that have any staying power on the internet are funny cat videos and porn. But I have magazines dating as far back as 1864! They will still be there when I die and this website is gone. My collection will go to a textile museum along with the database, so that it will continue to enlighten and inform on these small arenas of textile arts long after I am gone.
Between the books on Soft Sculpture I'd been finding and periodicals like "National Doll World" and "The Cloth Doll" I began to get a hazy picture of this huge renaissance in soft sculpture art that got started in the 1960's and peaked in the '80's that I'd completely missed! I grew up in exactly this time period, sewing hundreds of (Barbie)doll outfits, making furniture for doll houses for my sister and cousins, making cornhusk dolls, applehead dolls, whittling articulated dolls, and designing stuffed animals that I could make out of my mother's scrap bag. I was completely unaware that there was this great movement going on at the same time. I was a rural midwest kid, always too busy to be bored, but pretty insulated from the larger crafting community. My only contact was through books, which could be checked out for a week from the book mobile that came in from Grand Junction from the public library there. Did I mention that I was a (very) rural kid?
Which brings me to this long-winded point: 1) I felt that someone should be collecting, organizing(! - very important, that part) and archiving the documentation for this wonderful time period, 2) that most of it was quickly ending up in landfills as the generation before mine starts dying, and their heirs look at the amassed mountains of paper in the forms of patterns and magazines and catalogs(because we ALL buy and collect more patterns and materials than we could ever use in ten lifetimes), and decide a shovel and industrial trashbin on the lawn is their best option for getting through the stressful mess, and 3) that the person who recognizes the problem is typically the person who should do something about it. So here I am. I have no formal training as a librarian or curator, and my research training was all geared toward lab work. I had to teach myself HTML and Javascript in order to build this website, so while it doesn't have a lot of bells and whistles(though I'm proud of my slideshow on this page!), I can make any needed changes myself - and of course, continue adding information! I'm not wealthy - not even well off. My husband owns a comic shop. Comic shops don't make money - they make back-issue comics. But we are happy, and I've learned so much working on this project. Of course it has been worthwhile, and it has only barely begun. There is still so much more to accomplish!
I started with the soft toy, doll and teddy bibliography page, and it sort of swallowed my undivided attention for the first eight years of this project. You'll see why when you get down to the magazine reviews - soooo many magazines on that subject. There is a catalog of all the soft toy books I am aware of, and reviews of those books in the catalog I happen to own(only about eight hundred - don't laugh, to my husband and me, that is a paltry number!), and what has turned out to be the black hole for time consumption - the magazine bibliographies. I have since put serious time into putting together the tatting bibliography - hopefully, it shows with over 1,500 reviews! I also have the beginnings of bibliographies for candle making(because I owned a custom candle shop), polymer clay, quilling(filigree paper) and scherenschnitte(paper silhouettes), quilting, leatherworking, string art(symmography), chainmail knitting, origami, and duct tape(yes, to my surprise, this is a small but definite craft). I have a list of other crafts I want to set up bibliographies for, but simply don't have the necessary library of books to do the job they deserve yet. If you have a library of any craft that you wish to see preserved, please contact me. My contact page is at the top of this page.
I delayed putting the website on-line until I had a certain checklist of things done - but I kept adding things to the list! I finally realized I would never get the bibliography up if I continued to wait until I had the list all checked off. So keep in mind that the Craft Bibliography Project is a Work-In-Progress, will always be a work-in-progress, until I die.
And of course donations of books and magazines are greatly appreciated. I try to have at least three quarters of a magazine run before I start building a full catalog page for it, and I have a great many partial runs that I'm still working on filling in. I've built a ginormous catalog so far, and figure I've got at least 20 more years in the tank before I have to retire and let someone else take over.
I will post updates on what has been completed in the column to the right of this introduction, so you can check back periodically and see if there's anything new you are interested in.
Please read the FAQ if you have a minute - at least skim the questions in bold to see if any are questions you might have yourself. Yes, it's dry and unentertaining, but there's a good reason why it's called "Frequently Asked Questions!"
Feel free to drop me a note with any questions, suggestions or complaints. If you find errors, PLEASE let me know. I try very hard to be as accurate as possible, but I have no one checking behind me, and if there's a broken link or misspelled word, there's no one to blame but me. Taking a minute to send me a note is always appreciated! :)
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UPDATES
SEPTEMBER 20th, 2025:
I've caught up my catalog of Palmetto Tat Days Catalog of Patterns!!! I don't know of anywhere else you can get this much exposure to such a wide variety of talented designers and the cutting edge of techniques for tatting. Take a gander at all the names in the catalog - a genuine Who's Who of the tatting designers we know and love. If you have favorite designers and want to be sure you have all their patterns, I'd double check here to see if there are any in their collections.
If you need to contact me, use "akamoraih[at]gmail[dot]com" and you know to replace the "[at]" and "[dot]" with the appropriate symbols, right? Spammers look for those symbols when trolling for addresses to try - hence the dumb encryption. There's a mailing address on the contact page now, if you need to mail me stuff, and if you're having trouble figuring out the incryption, you can pm me on Facebook.
SEPTEMBER 15th, 2025:
I'm back from Palmetto Tat Days!!! I have some books to add to the Tatting Bibliography, got my first experience with Nina Libin patterns and loved the story Bonnie Swank told of how she became a teacher for Mrs. Libin's patterns, learned Helix Tatting from Richard Embrey, and got my first Shuttle Ship from the live auction(which I will need if I'm going to continue with the helix tatting - which I am, because I really love this 3D shrimp pattern). My cute little tatted amigurumi hedgehog is looking more like a bear right now, so I'm naming him Chubby. I wasn't as terrified as I was last year - don't do well with large groups of strangers. Everyone was so kind last year, and I got a lot more of the same this year. I got to look up stuff for people to identify the books they want, and got to share the antiques with my friend Martha for her current research project! Life doesn't get better than that. Rick was patient throughout, as always.
AUGUST 23rd, 2025:
Okay, hear me out. On a whim, I ordered and read Sam Posey's "Playing with Trains: A Passion Beyond Scale," just because I happened to run across it, and I like reading other people's obsessions about their hobbies - they can be very illuminating. I spent six months just hunting down books on the history of Dungeons and Dragons to read, so this small quirk of mine has provenance. It was an entertaining read, and I became idly curious about what was available on the subject of model trains in the form of magazines. So far, not so far off my usual beaten path - I do this often as a form of entertainment. It doesn't usually lead anywhere other than to educate me on how popular a particular hobby is. Rabbit holes like this are a common fact of my life.
I am now the proud owner of about 170 years' worth of model railroad magazines - only two periodicals that go back to the 1930's. They cost me $150 - and gas - and ultimately some truck repairs, but I'm digressing. That is an insane price - less than 10% of their worth, not mentioning the insane amount of money and time and effort it would have cost to assemble these two runs of magazines all the way back to 1933/1934. You ask how I know this? Because I've done it several times before. Finding intact runs like this is RARE. It's like winning the lottery. The catch was, I had to pick them up, of course. (can you imagine trying to mail 170 years' worth of magazines that published monthly?!!) So I drove to Virginia(I live in North Carolina) after completely emptying the back of my pick-up truck except for a dolly and Rick's wheelchair. Rick went with me for moral support(he's paralyzed on his right side, so he can't physically help, but he's good at shouting encouragement).
The reason the magazines were available was a sad one - a model railroad enthusiast had passed away, and his 80+ year-old brother-in-law and sister were helping deal with the estate. The magazines were as advertised - two nearly complete runs of the two most prominent periodicals for model railroading. A deal with an estate flipper had fallen through the week before, and the house closing was coming up in just a couple of weeks. Those magazines had to be moved. So I moved them. All I had to do was move them all from the basement, around this beautiful house, to where I'm backed up to the gate to the back yard, and into the pick-up truck. It was sunny, but not too hot. They were all neatly organized into boxes the gentleman had specially bought for their assignment - 1-2 years of periodical per box. Once you hit the 1970s, magazines start getting much heavier because of the high clay content in the paper that gives them that slick look that shows off color well. They also got a lot thicker per issue. The lovely couple I bought them from helped set the boxes as far up the stairs as they could sling them so I didn't have to go up and down the entire staircase a hundred times. I can't imagine how stiff and sore they must have been by the next morning after that much excercise. And I did the rest. By the time Rick and I got back to our own home town, lights were popping up on the truck's dashboard that I didn't like, so we drove directly to my repairshop with over a 1,000 pounds of magazines riding in back. I warned them about the weight in back and my anxiousness that the cargo not get wet should my camper shell spring a leak because rain is often my enemy - they calmed me down and took a look, and $2,340 later, I had my truck back. Would I have needed those repairs if I hadn't driven to Virginia and bought a 1,000 pounds of magazines? Yes, yes I would have, I say firmly and not looking at Rick with doubt lurking in the back of my eyes. Absolutely not the fault of my decision to take advantage of this deal of a lifetime. Just a badly timed coincidence...
So I am now committed to building a model railroad page - several miniatures pages, in fact, because modelling miniatures is a huge field that can't be handled with just one page. I've tentatively divided it into these catagories: Dolls and Dollhouses, Boats, Military, Planes, and Trains. All aboard?...
JULY 26th, 2025:
I'm going to Palmetto Tat Days! I wasn't sure I was going to be able to this year, but it has worked out. Rick is willing to travel that far, and I had such a wonderful time last year. I look forward to this with great anticipation!
JULY 1st, 2025:
I finished a new page(for now) - TOM TIERNEY PAPER DOLLS. It is not comprehensive yet - but it is as close as I can get it without some help. I haven't been able to get hold of Mr. Tierney's neice yet, or the woman who wrote a really fascinating 16 page article on him for "DOLL NEWS"(UFDC). Trying to get in touch with her led me back to the UFDC(United Federation of Doll Clubs) website, where(drum roll, please!) they have begun cataloging their own periodical! With a membership, you can access all the digitalized issues! They have gotten back to 1970, so I am guessing that it's still a work in progress. "DOLL NEWS" is packed full of well-researched articles and goes all the way back to the early 1950s. My catalog for "DOLL NEWS" is suddenly a lot more complete!!!
JUNE 14th, 2025:
If you see a mistake, let me know - I am always grateful for free editing help. My personal motto is, "I'm not perfect, but I am perfectible." So you aren't criticizing me, you're helping me fix mistakes that others might not catch. I ran a writer's workshop for over a decade - I have rhino hide. So please, please take the time to let me know you found something. You are helping everyone by doing so, and making a new friend!
I finished a new page(for now) - DOVER PUBLICATIONS' PAPER DOLLS. I've been working off and on building a paper dolls page for the soft toy and dolls biblio, and fell down a Tom Tierney-sized rabbit hole, which made me decide if I found it that interesting, maybe people who actually collect and create this toy may want to look up bib detes. I can't call the page comprehensive yet - I've only done the first sweep. But it has over 400 entries already(a little over half of which are Tom Tierney's books). If you are interested in the Dover paper dolls and see a hole in my bib page, please, please, get in touch and let me know what I missed - it helps everyone else who is a fellow fan.
JANUARY 26th, 2025:
Lisa Adams of TATTING CORNER has had a couple of nightmare years trying to keep her husband alive. I'm putting up her GO FUND ME PAGE . If you have any spare in your budget to help out, the family would be grateful. Every little bit really helps.
UPDATE ARCHIVE 2024
NO UPDATE ARCHIVE FOR 2023...
UPDATE ARCHIVE 2022
UPDATE ARCHIVE 2021
UPDATE ARCHIVE 2020
UPDATE ARCHIVE 2019
UPDATE ARCHIVE 2018
UPDATE ARCHIVE 2017
UPDATE ARCHIVE 2016
UPDATE ARCHIVE 2015
UPDATE ARCHIVE 2014
UPDATE ARCHIVE 2013
UPDATE ARCHIVE 2012
BIBLIOGRAPHY LIFETIME CONTRIBUTORS:
(In Alphabetical Order, not in order of contributions)-
These are the wonderful people who have gone way above and beyond the call to provide obscure materials,
solid advice and indispensible expertise. Thank you, one and all.
Karen Cabrera- Has joined the ranks of highly skilled agents contributing her knowledge and savvy to the Bibliography Project. Her facility with Spanish and impressive research skills have made her the obvious choice as Head Agent of the Spanish division. Her knowledge and insights have added substantial value to the BP. She provides excellent tatting tutorials and an entertaining blog at: http://entrelanzaderas.blogspot.com/
Becky Clark- has introduced me to the wonders of Excel in 2015 - and shared her Excel spreadsheets of the bibliographies(mine, Georgia's and IOLI's) with me as well as sharing her own research into what had been published in the way of tatting in Norway, Denmark and Sweden!!! She is a lot more conversant with WorldCat and those particular languages than I am, and dug out a tremendous amount of information I would have remained ignorant of. She is smart, knowledgeable and funny, and I am so glad to have gotten to know her. She's done an amazing job of entering books and links into Craftree's library, and has done a lot of badly needed proofreading for me. Becky is AWESOME!
Bobbi G.- has donated a couple of hundred books in the form of credits for www.paperbackswap.com, so I could cherry pick what I needed for the bibliography pages. I am so grateful for her generosity - she single-handedly filled in several areas of the quilting bibliography that would otherwise still be feeble and anemic. She is retiring her membership in PBS at the end of the year(2025), but has given me permission to acknowledge her substantial aid in this endeavor of mine. Thank you, Bobbi G. - I do not forget.
Kristy Effinger- Colette Wolff's biggest fan and a fellow collector of all her patterns - Kristy has been a huge contributor to the CW bib page - it would look very thin without her contributions!
Jennie Gaskin- Jennie has been very generous with her time and knowledge of the amazing crochet designer Elizabeth Hiddleson. She was instrumental in making the page as informative and complete as it is. She also still has a large stock of the books and single patterns for sale! Jennie can be reached through her website at: http://www.countryyarns.com and she has a blog at: http://countryyarnscrochet.wordpress.com/.
Phyllis C. Keller(In Memoriam, Oct 12, 1918 - Jan. 7, 2011)- Doll Making and collecting were her hobbies and passion for 40 years. Her loving husband Bob donated most of a decade of "Doll Castle News" and "Dolls" to the bibliography in her memory, enabling me to put both titles on the list of bib pages I can set up! In memory of this lovely lady and her generous husband, you have my heartfelt thank you.
Carolyn Kotlas- I think of her as a renaissance woman - superb at anything she puts her mind to. She was finally convinced to submit some of her work for competition at the state fair this year(2015), and came home with a stack of blue and red ribbons - Not surprising at all for those of us who know her. She opened her tatting library to me so that I could expand the tatting bibliography - and her generosity has taken the review count to over 900! Carolyn made that possible. Thank You, Thank You, Thank You!
Barrett and Susie Lagerquist- started sending me quilting books and magazines in 2019, while I was getting through the first round of my mom's big library and I'd started ordering books to fill in some holes mom had. They didn't just send me the books I ordered, but other stuff as well that they thought would be useful. It's 2020 now - and they're still sending me little gems! They clearly love books as much as I do, and have an extensive collection. I'm deeply grateful for their willingness to share it with everyone.
Marian Lynn(In Memoriam)- Her loving daughter, Linda, passed on her mother's collection of "The Toy Trader", spanning from January 1954 to March 1972, to the bibliography. Linda's words about her mother- "My mother was kind and generous. She started her first doll collection when she traveled through Europe with my Dad, and upon her return gave the collection to her friend’s daughter who was starting to collect dolls. Later she started collecting dolls again. She taught (us) her children to share and that good deeds are a reward in themselves. She would be happy to know that her collection of The Toy Trader Publication went to someone who will appreciate them." Linda is also a fellow tatter along with being an accomplished knitter and crocheter. Thank you for your generosity, and for allowing me to help keep memories of your mother's many kindnesses alive in thought and memory. It is an honor to acknowledge her living legacy - the family she clearly cherished. Best wishes to you and yours, Leigh
Arlene Medder is chiefly responsible for getting me back into tatting in a big way. She is an avid tatter herself and has become an instructor at the prestigious Palmetto Tat Days over time. I've known her, gamed with her, and laughed with her for a couple of decades now. I feel lucky to know her. I really believe if it weren't for catching Arlene publicly tatting and striking up a conversation with her about it, we probably still wouldn't know there were more than just a few hundred tatting books...
Anitra Stone- Has been a mentor and friend for several years now - shoulda added her name to this list a long time ago for all the information she has hunted down for me and funneled my way. I'm so deeply grateful. I remember I was very excited to meet her for the first time. I already knew her for years, you see, from the eye-catching Captain's Wheel tatting pattern she published in my beloved "Workbasket"! She is a very talented designer we hope to encourage to put out her own books. Anyone who has seen her array of birds can attest. Her help with the tatting bibliography has been substantial and long running. Her friendship and patience have been deeply appreciated. Thank you.
Marilyn Thompson loved to make beautiful things. She created because it brought her joy, not to make money. Her first creations were Raggedy Ann and Andy dolls that she made while in high school and stuffed with old cut up nylonstockings. While she did counted cross stitch and other crafts, her speciality was her stuffed creations. When Care Bears were popular in the 1980âs, she made so many that she was featured in the local newspaper. She made jointed teddy bears out of fake fur and a variety of other fabrics including reusing old quilts and mink coats. In the days when she was regularly attending crafts shows, she would sew while her husband tightened the bolts in the jointed bears and her daughters helped with stuffing. Marilyn loved to create and share her creations with others. Her family is thankful to have some of her stuffed creations as a way to remember her doing what she loved. Marilyn's family really buffed up the teddy bear craft page to make it the most comprehensive bib page for this craft online.
Ruth Wilson- Librarian extraordinaire and another fellow Colette Wolff fan - also clued me in and introduced me to Joan Chiara Cigler's amazing work, gives advice freely on this arcane business of documenting and archiving vintage materials, and has helped complete several runs of important doll magazine titles from her private collection. Lovely lady, you Rock!
Hope Wright- Yet another goddess of tatting information disguised as a Librarian Without Portfolio who out of the blue contacted me with so much information it's going to take me a while to add it all! I've started with her complete list of all the tatting references found in the pages of the famous Godey's Lady's Book of the 19th century.
Zendelle- Donated an obscure run of "Milady In Miniature" out of the blue after seeing my website during the first time I was able to put it up - the only issues I've ever been able to locate of this title. Zendelle is a veteran doll collector and very knowledgeable in this field - she's my GO TO for questions about collectible dolls. Zendelle's website is here:
https://vintagedollcollector.com/ and has some educational videos up on You Tube:
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCSc1GqCu4B83wGMpSM3OVCw
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