Appalachia’s Storyteller: The Sack Dress (How Appalachian Women Clothed Their Families)
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- Опубліковано 10 лип 2024
- Appalachia’s Storyteller: The Sack Dress complete history of how Appalachian Women used flour sacks to make sack dresses and sack quilts, and linens for their families. #sackdress #floursackdress #appalachianhistory #appalachia #appalachian Did you ever wear a sack dress? Leave a comment below.
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Photos Ashville Historical Commission
Note: This story represents history and this video is for educational purposes, commentary and critique. - Фільми й анімація
![Forties Fashions - Everyday Women's Clothing in 1940s USA [COLORIZED]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/pqQo0AccOsc/mqdefault.jpg)
I am 77 years old. My mother made me clothing from flour sacks in southern California in the 50's! This frugal trend was not limited to the Appalachian area! I remember Mother being particular about which sacks of flour she bought, so she could get enough of the same print to make a dress out of.
Indeed, Although it started in the 1860s in Appalachia, by the Great Depression in the 1930s, it quickly spread across America and even became fashionable by the 1950s-1960s
California here and 72. We loved those clothes...Mama was wonderful and I have photos of the little starched pretties she made for us.
My mother also made my sister and me dresses from flour sack material.
@@cpcolgate6903 awesome
My mother and her siblings wore them in the prairie land of central Indiana
I proudly wore my feed sack dresses! My mother was an excellent seamstress and my dresses, skirts, blouses and shorts were prettier than most store bought clothes. I was born in 1947, my mother was born in 1916.
Great memories ❤️
Same here! I was born in 1947 too. My Mum was an excellent Seamstress who made delicate silk dresses for herself and me for Easter.. but feed bag play clothes for summer.
I was born 1049 and I wire dresses made from red rose flour sacks in idaho
1949
We may be twins. I was born in 1947, my mother in 1916. I had many flour sack dresses.
It wasn't just Appalachian women who used sacks for sewing. My Michigan Mom made dresses for me from feed sacks. I've been told my grandma made diapers for her preemie baby from salt sacks. I remember going to the feed store and picking out the sack with a pretty pattern for a dress.
indeed, the movement spread all across America
Maybevit didn't spread maybe it existed out of necessity you see farmers all over had little money.
@@annabrahamson4320 It was rough all over
As in South Africa. Well made and passed down the line. Dresses, blouses, pants and short
And yes MEN and boy's also.
Lucky you. It sounds great.
I was watching a YT video about how some companies, during the great depression, would purposely put their flour and grain in printed sacks knowing the women could use the material to make dresses/clothing from it! That's ingenious, considerate and charitable without being patronizing.
yes indeed, thanks for sharing
Here in UK the feed sacks were just plain white and could be hard to get sometimes. I was born in 1947 when my mother was 39. She had married my father in 1940 and became Stepmother to his 3 children from his first marriage. Life was extremely hard for her as dad was in the Royal Navy and part of the WW2 action. My 3 half siblings were aged 11, 13 and 15 when mum got them and they truly loved her…. Even more so when she gave them their own wee baby to Love and Spoil and dress up in flour sack dresses. Much embroidery was done on those dresses and romper suits with hand smocking etc. all that I have left of those days is one table cloth embroidered with baskets of flowers and ladies in crinoline dresses. And of course there’s the memories, precious memories, worth more than diamonds to me:).
Thank you for sharing those memories, I learned a lot
You are blessed with those memories.
A precious memory that can warm any reader's heart.
Thank you for sharing your precious memories.
What a beautiful memory to share!
I’m 63 and yes, flour sack material was good quality fabric that everyone reused. My grandmother often made my sister and I shorts and tops to play in and even dresses from flour sacks. We would look at the Sears catalog and show my grandmother a dress we liked, she would use old newspapers to create a pattern and then like magic we had a beautiful new dress.
Great memories
Wow ! You're grandmother had skills !
By any chance, did you also learn how to sew from your grandmother ?
@@SpringNotes
I can sew a little but nothing like my grandmother could, she never owed an electric sewing machine only the manual pedal, she gave it to me before she passed and would not take anything in the world for it.
I have an apron that my grandmother made from a couple of flour sacks.. I am 71 years old and the apron has to be over 100 years old.. it was hand stitched and has the smallest stitches I have ever seen. I w
There was no better dish towel than a flour sack! The logos washed right off and they turned white! I still have some, they were a wedding gift made by my husbands old auntie. She wouldn’t give them to to my until after the reception because she didn’t think they were a WORTHY wedding gift! They are beautiful, they were embroidered on one corner and crocheted all around with beautiful variegated thread! I cherish them! They will be passed down to my daughter! Not worthy enough, not likely! Worth more than gold to me!
Well said
How lovely; cherished handmade gifts from all those years ago and you still have them! That’s awesome! Did that aunt get to know how much you loved her gift?
Do you have to hand wash and drip dry them? I might start using my old ones that are stored.
I was born in 1964. My granny made me a dress from her dress she made and wore to my parents wedding March 21, 1963. Her dress was originally made from ? Yep ! You got it ! A flour sack material . I wish mom would've kept just that one dress. My favorite. 🌼💛🌼💛🌼💛🌼💛🌼
That’s a great memory, thanks for sharing
Love the yellow hearts and flowers!
My great grandmother who died in 1945 at 99 years of age, pieced a quilt out of feed sack material. That quilt top was given to me and I quilted my first ever quilt. It's a lovely, meaningful reminder of my family's history.
Beautiful, thanks for sharing
A picture would sure be nice.. Bet it is beautiful..
I have a sheet made out of flour bags that my granny made. I don't use it on the beds anymore but keep it with fancier embroidered pieces that her mother had made.
Reminders of the beautiful, thrifty hard work of women. My own efforts aren't so wonderful but it's lovely to have the inspiration to keep trying.
@@ps603 I'm not sure how to share a photo in this thread.
I have a quilt like this. apparently it's worth thousands of dollars. My great grandmother made it so I'm never selling it.
The best glasses were jelly jars!
💯
Texas and Oklahoma. My daddy says that he didn't have any store-bought clothes until he was around 10 or so. My grandmother sewed so beautifully, and I asked her if she'd teach me. She said "NO! I HATE sewing, but I did it because I HAD to, and now I DON'T have to." We were at a family wedding at the time, she was standing with my grandfather, and both were wearing beautifully tailored and fitted his-and-hers dress suits that she'd made out of the same fabric. Still, I was so impressed, and that's when I started to learn.
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This moved me to tears. I’m not from America. However I’m from a very large family by today’s standards and as the oldest girl I got the job of making many of the clothes for myself and my siblings. While learning my skills from my mother she told of how she and her sisters wore flour-sack dresses during the earlier parts of the 1900’s. My mother is in her 90’s.
My grandmothers apparently made flour-sack clothes here in my country and they were not as pretty as there. Here it never became a fashionable thing, there were no flower prints, just company labels but was still a huge necessity especially during the depression. I really was touched by this extraordinary video about the innovative and fashionable women who made this a normal part of life during such hard and frugal times. Thank you for taking the time to share this information and transporting me back to my early childhood and the fabulous stories told by my mother.
❤️
Mother made dresses for me from flour sacks. I loved the prints. Sunday dresses she made for me were of dotted swiss, organdy, or taffeta. After my father came home from the war, I had a skirt and shorts made from his whites and a skirt from his blues.
such great memories
Years ago, I read a story about a WWII paratrooper who managed to keep his parachute, and somehow go it home. He gave it to his fiancée so she could make her wedding dress out of its material.
@@agresticumbra My grandfather, a navigator in the RAF in Egypt in WW2, in his spare time on base used to make wedding dresses for the women using parachutes. I'm hoping the parachutes were damaged and hence not needed... 🙄
Must have been a Navy man my dad was a Marine I had shorts and skirts out of pieced together kaki for every day. School clothes were different she bought fabric at a shop. When I got older I had store bought clothes. It was just a different time.
I remember that fabric got as expensive as ready-made clothes so she stopped.
I would alter my clothes to fit better, now I don't even have a sewing machine and my daughter can barely sew on a button. Different times just look at the technology we have now.
Flour sacks were made from better fabric than some fabrics used for clothing. We used ours for many things around our home. Also have used a treadle sewing machine. I’m 71.
amen, great memories
I'm 65 and learned to sew on my grandmother's treadle machine. I wish that type of machine was still made.
@@lisamcdonald2877 you can still buy them
My mom was born in 1939. Many of her clothes came from feed sacks when she was a child - a baby’s gown was made from a 5 lb sugar sack, a toddler was 2-3 sugar sacks, a small child was 1 100 pound feed sack, an adult’s dress was 4 100 pound feed sacks, etc. Great granny would carefully pick the sacks so they went together, so if there weren’t matching sacks, you used coordinating colors or patterns. My mom still remembers when she had to go to school with a dress that was one color on the front and a different (and not complementary) color on the back. You made do or you did without back then.
Amen
Thank you for the history of the needs for clothing. This so good.
Ohhhh if more people nowadays could...
🎄🎄"Use it up🎄🎄
🎄🎄Wear it out🎄🎄
🎄🎄Make it do🎄🎄
🎄🎄Or do without".🎄🎄
I'm 73 and I still remember the little dresses my mother made me from flour sacks. They always had a little white collar and bow in the back that never stayed tied. We moved to a big city when I was eight, but I still wore those dresses. Only now they were decorated with hand stitched smocking that momma had practiced over and over so she could get it just right. One I remember the most she had made me for Easter she crocheted white lace that she run ribbon of yellow down the middle of. The fabric was from a flower sack fabric that had tiny yellow flowers and she added a tiny cap sleeve instead of a puff sleeve. I thought I was something in my new white shoes and white socks with ruffles wearing that dress. That was also the time I got my first piece of real jewelry. My sister bought me a beautiful mustard seed neckless at a discount store that I promptly lost two days later.
That’s awesome!
but you never forgot it.... :D
Sounds like a gorgeous dress!
I had a mustard seed necklace, too, ages ago. I think my granny gave it to me.
What a beautiful memory! My mom gave me a heart shaped clear plastic mustard seed necklace too!
Incredible tribute to the hardworking appalachia women
thank you sir
@@iancrozier8068 Agreed. And what about the poor, hardworking people who produced the cotton too?
How I wish that I had Jessie’s girl…
Yeah my mom just turned 85 she said her mother would make her and her sister little dresses out of the flour sacks . It was nice that companies made pretty designs on the sacks
Great memories my friend
My mother would be 108 she was part of a blended family as her mother died in 1918 flu epidemic. She grew up in MN and said her stepmother kept the prettiest flour sacks for her own daughters. They used them everywhere in real Americs, not just Appalachia
@@annabrahamson4320 Indeed, It started in the mid 1800s in Appalachia, and within 75 years it was all over America.
Companies made pretty designs and they also started putting their logos on the sacks in ink that could easily be washed off so a poor kid didn't have to go to school with "Martha White" or some such thing on her back.
Aww I was curious how with a sack item, it is neither pieced nor can I see printing. Thanks for solving that.
It was not just there,all over the Americas in the rural areas. I had clothing, curtains, tablecloths, tea towels pillow cases. We were happy to have them.
👍
My parents were probably 10 years older than my classmate's parents, having been young adults during the depression. In the 50s I remember Mom making me several blouses out of feed sack material. I thought it was a novelty and I loved them. She was an excellent seamstress and made me wool blend sewed-down pleated skirts that rivaled the expensive brands, and then when I started having baby girls they were decked out in the most beautiful little dresses you could imagine. I'm 82 years old and I miss my mom.
💜
Old ways are gone sadly
I loved my flour sack dresses graced with white collars, pipping, rickrack, ruffles, puff sleeves, tie backs, and any other fancy thing Mom could dream up. Thanks for reminding us that thrift can equal beauty and happiness.
Yes ma’am, they were hand made with love
they were cute dresses!
Ive had many a dress made by my mammaw. Im 60 but mammaw made my clothes. And i know i had rick rack and very seldom lace. I hate lace to this day.. lol. But id give it all to be able to sew like my mammaw did.
@@zelindahodgkins3235 I had a Mamaw too! I decided, when my girls were born, that I'd start sewing right then, so they wouldn't know that they were wearing something ugly!
Now they're grown and I can make custom-fitted and custom-designed dress clothing, but I sure did rip a LOT of seams to get here!
My mother had entered a dance contest held by one of the radio stations in 1950's Texas. She won. Her vote ballots were empty flour sacks of Pioneer Flour. Her competitors had other flour brands. She had over 1,000,000 flour sacks. I still have the glossy of her posing in her two piece ruffled skirt outfit with piles of flour sacks behind her.
I am 72, and sack dresses were a part in our family in the 1950's.
I grew up in Southern Oregon.
The flour sacks also were used for pillow covers.
Great memories
Hi from Beatty Oregon 🌲
Im 71 years old, my mother ( fathers mother) who raised me from birth used to make me dresses and blouses from rice sacks - light beige material- she used take out the sawing ), bleached them , iron the cloth make me a dress or a blouse and some times embroider something on it, I enjoy them and I still remember them with so much love ❤️
This was in Havana, Cuba 1950
Wow!
My grandmother did this during the Great Depression for my mom who was born in 1930. Grandma was a talented seamstress by profession so she could make pretty dresses from the flower sacks. They lived in Central Wisconsin.
thats awesome
My grandma made all my dresses and my cousin's dresses when we were little. She made quilts, curtains and towels. I never knew when I was young we were poor, I just knew she loved making stuff for us. I'd give anything to have a dress like that again. I was born in 1966.
Thanks 🙏
My Mom used to tell me about how soft and comfortable underwear was that came from feed sacks. I still have the quilt my Great grandma made for my Mom from feed sacks. That makes it about 90 years old.
Such great memorizes
I have a quilt top from my Grandmother and now I am thinking that she probably used the printed flour sacks for that. 🥰
Printed feed sacks that I had were rather rough material. But a lot of clothing came from those sacks.
@@rubynelson1164 feed sacks with whole or cracked grains would have been a coarser material such as burlap but flour sacking needs a more densely woven cotton that would be softer. Not that I'm old enough to know.
I'm soon will be 77 and have worn many flour sack dresses and blouses. The fabric was really pretty. Grew up in the mountains of East Tennessee. My parents were honest, hard working Christians and always helped their neighbors.
Indeed, sounds like good people and a good family
They did this all thru the Midwest
How lucky you were growing up in that beautiful part of our Country.
72 and same here...😊
@Susan Thompson- my father was from Chapel Hill Tennessee
I am 64 and remember pinning up patterns with my mother as a small child! Thank you for the memory!
You are so welcome!
For someone, like me, who doesn’t come from US but who is interested in historical clothing, that was fascinating and informative. Thank you.
Thank you 🙏 my friend
Natalie you will find the same stories in your country speak to the OLD people. You purchased everything in sacks until brownpaperbags and plastic toke over.
To my knowledge this did not happen in the UK. I think because we are more densely populated it wasn’t common for people to buy in really large quantities. There was usually a grocer within bus distance for most people. The sacks I have seen from the mid 20th century were quite rough hessian so would not have made the most practical clothes other than perhaps aprons. Drapers shops were also widespread. The culture of hand me down, cut down, patch, ends to middle and mix and match was well established, tapering off towards the middle of the 1980s. We also dont have a culture of thrift shops, although the Vintage Shop is now becoming very common. Most second hand shops are charity shops, but I regularly look for items I can take apart and make into something lovely. Probably because we have easily accessible high street and online cheap clothing available such as Primark, which import clothes from the East, there isn’t the pressing need to make our own clothes - oh, and this foul Tory government also removed Textiles and Sewing from the National Curriculum of Education too.
Abigail Wrigley I remember the Hessian sacks and making clippy rugs I still have my great grandmothers hook I also remember where unpicking knitted garments washing and remitting the wool
At 76 you can bet I wore flour sack dresses as a kid, and I STILL think they're cute. With several kids my mom sewed and she didn't even need a pattern. We'd browse high-end stores to look at the latest fashions, and then she could just go home and copy the designs from memory when we had what she called 'uptown fabric' to splurge. Anyhow, thrifty ways learned early are hard to shake. Even though I could afford a few nice brand-new ready-made items now, I seldom even feel the desire. Especially not when TinyTown where I retired has a church-run thrift store where everything's just 25 cents. Even if it still has store tags on it.
But there's so much very good like-new clothing that I seldom sew anymore. Very few people buy cotton slips around here though, so here's how I hand-sew them for almost nothing: A single flat twin size sheet makes up easily into TWO nice jumper-style cotton slips for a little old lady. I can cut and stitch one up while sitting on the sofa listening to NCIS. I can make lightweight jumpers for summer from the colored ones too, and use them for transitional clothing as the seasons change. No extra top in summer. Short sleeves in fall and spring. Long sleeves in winter. I also raid the clothing dept for things I can easily upscale or even entirely repurpose. And I don't care how ugly or worn out something is, if it has pretty buttons (which can cost around $5-10 a card retail!), Imma take it home, remove and save those gorgeous buttons, and let the garment itself become stuffing for the dog's bed. "Use it up, wear it out; make do or do without." Words to live by. One of the most impressive books I read in my teens was titled: "How to Make Something From Nothing" It was like a hippy's bible.
Just fyi: While I also create new and exclusive clothing from pieced-together denim, the handiest use for old jeans is to make a toy for my huntin' dawg, a smooth-coat JRT. I cut off a jeans leg, roll it up tight lengthwise, and knot it in the middle. Then when I throw it for her to catch, she scoops it up from that middle knot and the sides hang down either side of her mouth just like a dead squirrel would. She hasn't written an essay about it yet, but I'm sure that's the association in her mind. Especially since I got a catch away from her (now departed) step sister and rubbed one of these toys around in it. We have tons of squirrels around here, some living in 2 of my giant maple trees. There are days when Brigid turns up her nose completely at kibble bc no thanks, she's dined already.
Great memories
I love this story
My mother was born in 1933 in Canada. All the girls in her neighbourhood wore blouses made from bleached flour sacks. The pictures show stylish garments that the girls were proud to have made themselves. Thanks so much for this great video
amen!
I knew that they used flower sacks for clothing back in the day, but I certainly didn’t know all of what you have said here. Thank you.
thank you for watching Sir, I appreciate your kind words
I was very curious about the flour sack items, and didn't know that people really liked them and valued them.
I wish they’d go back to that. I love cotton feed sacks and have made some really nice throw pillows out of them.
Those were some good times
My great grandma was from Arkansas. She sewed all of my dresses when I was little. I loved them so much, that I'd get really mad when I outgrew them and had to pass them down to my little sister.
💜
I am 82 and my mother made baby dresses out of flour sacks. She embroidered the front of dresses. They were beautiful. My dresses were made from cow feed sacks. Beautiful dresses. Cow feed sacks were made with flowers on them.
I am from east Tennessee, hill country. We had a cow so we got quite a few feed sacks.
I wont say my age but i wore dresses and underwear made from flour sacks. The material was sturdy and some had really nice colors and print patterns. I have been known to say, i wore so many flower sack panties i started smelling like a dumplin
great memories, thanks for sharing ma'am
My mom said she had a new dress for school because her mom had two sacks that matched. Grandma also made all the night clothes that weren't quite so pretty. When you went to bed you might wear PJ's that said flour or sugar across your bottom.
Great memories
My Grandma said all her and her sisters' underwear had the name of the flour brand across their bottoms! She had two dresses, one for school and one for Sunday.
I think it would be cute to make a child’s outfit that said “sugar” on it!
Too cute! 😊
@@evelynsaungikar3553 That would be adorable! I love to sew though I've never had to make use of flour or sugar sacks to do it. But I try to be thrifty with obtaining fabric and you'd be amazed at how cheaply you can pick up fabric at the thrift store. I think I'm going to work on your idea for my little great-granddaughter because she sure is a sugar.
My momma has her daddy’s baby dress in her cedar chest. It’s also made from a flour sack and it’s very well made! He was born in the 1920’s in Missouri. Thank you for sharing this story with us!
Thank you friend and thanks for sharing your story
@@TheAppalachianStoryteller The Vermont Country Store has flour sack kitchen towels made from flour sack fabric, alas they are white.....Nervous Nelly, the jams and jelly maker has flour sack kitchen towels the a local artist sell at their shop with block colorful hand printed designs them.(USA)
The sturdiness of this fabric lends itself for tough usage.
I remember when I was young in NE Oklahoma mama would trade feed sacks trying to get two alike to make a dress. LOL that was 70+ years ago
Great memories
I wore my share of flour sack dresses and drawers. I am 76 and was the only one in my grade who had them.
Great memories
The dresses the woman wore then are amazing and a lot of the style of dresses are still worn today
👍
My precious Momma said that her prettiest dresss were made by feed sacks. My former Mother in in law gave me a quilt made by her Mom. It has to be at least 90 years.
That’s awesome, something to be cherished
@@TheAppalachianStoryteller Yes it is
At 78 I can still remember my grandmother making summer dresses for me from flour sacks. They were cute and comfortable.
Great memories
My mom was born in Oklahoma in 1921 and her mother (b. 1900 in OK) was already making clothes out of flour sacks. The only thing I remember mom talking about was underwear. Thanks for the memories.
💜
Yup.we appreciated the cotton prints from flour sacks in 1950 s /1960s. Loved dresses that we made, Canadian born, Ukrainian and rest of folks loved and looked forward to these cotton bags.
💜
Mom mom was the aised in West VA. and always talked about her flour sack dresses
Great memories
I'm 71. As a little girl in the 1950's, I remember sorting through flour and sugar sacks for matching fabric. After being the container for flour and sugar, the fabric was so soft. That's what I remember.
💜
I'm 72, I wore feed sack underwear being the only girl with 7 brothers, I got the flour sack material.
Precious memories, thanks for sharing
My Mama and her mama told me about the lovely feed sacks. The clothes were sewn on a old Singer sewing machine using your foot. Later the clothes were made into quilt squares to make quilts. They grew up in TN.
Yes ma’am, those are some great memories
I'm blessed to own a running 1904 foot pedal singer. I often wonder how many items were made on it, who owned it, what was her life like????
I have my great grandmothers quilt...now im going to look at the fabric! Thank you!
I am also from Tn.. I grew up wearing dresses, shorts and tops made from four sacks.. I remember how pretty they were.. I am 71 years old and I never knew we were poor but I guess we was..
My mom use to save flour sacks,when flour came in cloth bags. She'd save until she had enough to make 4 girls dresses,one for each of us girls.We were so proud of the flour sack dresses. We wore them to school and church.
💜
I am in Southern Illinois. My grandma, who was born in 1914, had a lot of sack cloth left, even when I was a child, in the early 1970s. I had sack cloth pajamas, gowns, dresses, rompers, etc. My dolls had matching clothes. I have a few quilts made from the scraps. We were farm people. We wasted nothing. I proudly carry on that tradition. I use and reuse everything. My favorite quilt is one my grandmother pieced together when she was a teenager. She finished it for me and gave it to me on my 16th birthday. 💜💜💜 I love finding sack cloth goods in thrift stores and at sales. 💜💜💜
❤️
I'm Peggy Lynn Smith from Corbin Kentucky I was born in Harlan county Kentucky I lived there till I was 14 then we moved to Corbin Kentucky I love my mountain people and I thank you for these wisdom filled videos it sure gives me joy remembering so many wonderful things my mother could sit down at a sewing machine and make covers and curtains and clothes she was a genius with making something out of nothing and her work was so flawless thank you for that reminder my mother has been gone since March 14 2013 everyday as soon as my eyes open I still miss her and my Daddy there names are Eva Jean and my Daddy name was James Henry Melton God bless you and keep you safe and meet your every need
such great memories, thanks for sharing them with us my friend
I love that you name you parents and yourself. To me it shows the respect you have for your parents, your family line, and your heritage. I come from south GA but have lived in AL for the last 40 years of my life when I got married. I learned how to quilt in my 30’s as a way to preserve not only my but my husbands heritage as both our grandmothers were quilters. I have some of my Granny’s feed/flour sacks she gave me before she passed away. God bless you and keep you every day.
My mother grew up in rural Virginia. She often mentioned that she and her sisters wore cotton feed and flour sack dresses, made by my grandmother, when they were growing up. Now I know what she was talking about. Thank you so much for enlightening us!
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I'm 71, and when I was 9 to 11 yrs. old, we lived in rual Louisiana in the early 1960's. My mom gave me the flour sacks to sew with. I sewed on the sewing machine at that age. I made all my doll clothes...blankets, pillows, dresses, bonnets, aprons, and even Barbie and Ken clothes when they came out. Nobody could afford to buy ready-made doll clothes. With mom's sewing scraps and flour sacks I was in designer heaven! Lovely memories!
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I remember, in the 1970's when I was in elementary school, reading a short story about a family who were farm migrants in the Southwestern USA in the 1930's. The pre-teen daughter had a flour sack dress that she decorated with dots of mecurochrome for her first day at another new school; her dress was complimented by her classmates.
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My grandmother made my dresses , tops and shorts out of sack cloth. She was an incredible seamstress. She made most every piece of clothing I ever wore as a child.
❤
Some of those dresses look really nice!
yes ma'am
My grandmother made beautiful flour sack dresses for my mom and aunts. I was born in the 50s and she made clothes for me until I was about 9 or 10 and then made each of the grandkids gorgeous elaborate quilts.
Thanks for sharing your story
Good info. history. Great sturdy,. Re-use of potato sacks & such ,!! We should do this now. 👍😊👗 Seems the beginning of the "house dress""
💯
Thank you for sharing these wonderful ways of life and living stories. I love them ! I never had a feed sack dress. But my Mom made me nighties from old pillow cases when I when I was little. Today I am still learning more and more to reuse and recycle. I have learned to darn socks, sew things, mend things and quilt things. Because of stories like these.
💜 thank you
My grandmother had a grocery store and she gave us the sacks with nice prints for my mother to make dresses for me, it was a treat!
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My mother grew up wearing flour sack dresses. She was born in 1919 in Arkansas. Her brothers wore flour sack shirts. The leftover scraps were turned into quilts by my grandmother.
Precious memories
I make clothes from other thrown away or thrift store clothes
thats awesome, thanks for sharing
My mother remade winter coats fot us kids, my first store bought new coat for my Christmas present was 5th grade. I am from WI poverty us the mother of invention.
Me too
AWESOME!!!!
My grandma and mother made dresses and quilts from flour sacks. They made me dresses, too. Flour sacks were actually very pretty, all colors and patterns❤ Missouri here.
Thanks for sharing 💜
I had a few! I learned to sew from my grandmother. The quality of the fabric was much better then what they call fabrics today!!
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My grandmother let me pick out a feed sack in 1943 for a new dress. I was so excited.
🙏
My Louisiana mamma would use Feed / Flour Sacks in the 40’s for my play clothes! She made her own patterns a cute open blouse that tied in a knot at the chest with matching shorts. It made me the princess of my New Orleans neighborhood!
💜
My favorite pillow cases are made of flour snacks.
They are soft and cool to the touch and I love them!
I'm Appalachian by birth so I totally understand and appreciate repurposing materials!
Indeed- great pillows
I have feedsacks that were made to be sewn into pillowcases ! That's what we had as a child and so soft . In Florida my grandma's made quilts with scraps that were so warm in winter . Stitched by hand an hand quilted . Only two of us grandkids quilt now .
I have a picture of my grandmother, mom and aunt in sack dresses from 1957. She made all of their clothes. And she made her own till the day she passed.
special women 💜
I'm 70, and clearly recall a dress my grandma made for me, when I was a little child, from that she called a gunny (flour) sack. I loved the dress because it was so unique, and also because the cloth was so soft.
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I am 61 years old. My mother grew up in the absolute southernmost tip of Ohio in Northern Appalachia. She talked about how her mother made clothing - - shirts and dresses - - from sack material! The topic came up one day when she noticed a book I was reading titled Strawberry Girl, by Lois Lenski. In the ensuing discussion about the book, she told me so much of her own childhood being a lot like the book's heroine -- Including sack cloth!
Awesome
I'm from Iowa so it wasn't just in the hill that people needed cheap ways to clothes their families. I wore many dresses made by my grandmother. I'm 79 now but I remember the pretty dresses I wore.
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Mom told me about flour sack dresses. She lived on the Biltmore Estate on Pine Top Farm .
Wow, that’s cool, what was it life living there?
My mother spoke often of these dresses. Very beautiful and well loved.Very talented seamstresses, self-taught and frugal. Made complete use of everything. Could we live like this today?
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I was born in 1948 and raised in Nashville, and my maternal grandmother (born in 1890), in addition to being a housewife, was a seamstress. She used to sew my sisters and me (six of us, including me, the youngest) flower sack dresses AND panties! I vividly remember the pretty pastel material with delicate flowers on them. You didn't have to live in rural Appalachia to have worn these beautiful dresses and panties! We city kids wore them, too. Thanks for giving me a reason to reminisce and be nostalgic about the "good ole days"! Btw, I wish I had saved some of these items as family "heirlooms". Sigh.😍😍👍👍❤❤
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Thank you for sharing the rich history of Appalachian Women
Yes ma’am
Beautiful! A true underrated fashion trend, I love those prints so much. So simple and fun!
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I'm 55 so I didn't have any of the dresses. But my grandmother used the old dresses to make quilts for all of us grand kids. They were beautiful and I still have mine.
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I remember my Ozark family in flour sack dresses and feed sack shirts. Poverty doesn't discriminate. I always thought the dresses were beautiful, still do, and a feed sack shirt is the sign of a real man. Greetings from Arkansas.
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Thank you for this story. Born, raised and still live in Appalachia. My great grandmother made several quilts from feed sacks. They're stored in my living room cupboard to admire and cherish.
Priceless possessions
How lovely to have them ❤
My foster mother was raised by a depression era, Oklahoma Dust Bowl refugee. We averaged 20 kids in my teens. We loved the nightgowns she made us out of flour sacks! They were cute and kitschy to us - to her, they were a lifeline to her childhood.
wow, Dust Bowl Refugee, thats quite a story
I'm 70 and I wore flour bag dresses my girls wore them. Made diapers,tea towels,table cloths. I still make for grandkids
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My grandma always took me with her to the feed store. She let me pick out the patterns because this is what my clothes were made from. I loved it. I wore a coat she made me. Like a coat of many colors. Those were the best days of my life
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I am 79 years old in South Carolina at the foothills of the Blue Ridge mountains and I wore a lot of dresses made from flour sacks. My mama would always try to get some of the same colors.
Great memories
Loved this video!! I grew up listening to the stories my mom & Grandmother told about carefully picking out the sacks of flour. My mom & each of her sisters, as they needed a new dress got to go 'shopping' with their mother to pick out the bag of flour with the print fabric they chose! Grandma would then make the dress. Her patterns were made from newspaper that the girls had to lay down on so she could sketch around them!! Thank you so much for bringing back some wonderful memories!! God bless!
Thanks for sharing your memories, God bless you
I’m 82 years old I made me skirts from the sacks, wore white blouses, white socks, penny loafers. I loved them. The fabrics were so pretty. Lived in Texas.
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Oh my God the same with me. I am 77 years old but there's a difference, I am from Mexico City and my grandmother did the same beautiful dresses. To me at a young age they were the most beautiful dresses I have ever seen.
Proud to wear them 🌹🌹🌹🌹🌹🌹🙏
Amazing
I’m 64 and I made my daughter’s school clothes in elementary school. My grandmother had saved a lovely flour sack since the 40s for “something special.” She decided that a dress for her Great Granddaughter was pretty special so she gave it to me to make the dress. My daughter was born in 1988 and we still have that dress, soon her daughter will be able to wear it. I think that’s pretty special.
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I was charmed by these pretty cotton sack dresses. The 1930s summer dresses were so attractive. Here in the UK sacks were made of Hessian which were far too coarse for dresses, etc. They were, however, used as protective covering for labourers, and farm workers. The only cotton bags I remember were the 2lb flour bags. My mother used these for making cheese from sour milk (no fridge) or as jelly bags. They were also used, opened out, as handkerchiefs if one had a heavy cold (no tissues then) and boiled after use. My dresses were handmade with remnants of Liberty cotton bought in the annual sales (my mother would not have been able afford to buy this rather expensive material from the original bolt of fabric) with matching knickers (in US panties). Living on the outskirts of London allowed my mother to shop in the beautiful Liberty's in Regent Street which displayed a lot of artefacts and fabrics from the Far East. You have probably concluded by now that I am ancient - true, I was born in 1932.
Wow, you opened up my mind to a place and time I know nothing about, thanks you for sharing your memories 💜
Thank you for your kind response to my comment on the cotton sack dresses. I have happy memories of a visit to the USA in the 1980s based on my university friend's home in Princeton, NJ. I was privileged to spend a fewness days in her American mother-in-law's apartment in Manhattan who, in her eighties, was still employed as a publisher's reader by Doubleday. I went on a spectacular trip up through New England as far as Boothbay Harbour in Maine enjoying the fall colours on the way. I also visited Washington and did day trips, etc. to the Amish area in Lancaster County, spent a weekend in a picturesque town on the Delaware, the name of which I can't recall. This was a really action packed 3 weeks. Forgive me for all this nostalgia, it's the tiresome habit of the aged!
@@maryandrews4097 thats a beautiful area of America. I earned my Doctorate from Boston University
@@TheAppalachianStoryteller
Thank you once again for taking the time to acknowledge my post.
Thank you so much for sharing your memories!
My mother had entered a dance contest held by one of the radio stations in 1950's Texas. She won. Her vote ballots were empty flour sacks of Pioneer Flour. Her competitors had other flour brands. She had over 1,000,000 flour sacks. I still have the glossy of her posing in her two piece ruffled skirt outfit with piles of flour sacks behind her.
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My mother, who will be 85 next month, grew up in a mill village in west Georgia not too far from the Alabama line. The ole flower sacks was what she wore, as well as her 2 younger sister's & mother. She loved her dresses. Thanks, once again, for a wonderful bit of info in another enjoyable video. You do a great job!
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I grew up with the feed/flour bag dresses and tops. Remember spending a lot of time at the feed store!! Sorting through an endless amount of Sacks.
That’s awesome my friend
My neighbor across the street, Ms. Rosie, she's 86 and told me about how her and her 14 siblings wore outfits made from the cloth sacks. She told me she remembered when companies would start printing the patterns after they found out what the moms were doing (Country wide, not just one area). So to hear her story, and then to happen upon a video confirming some of the details of her story, is pretty dope. 🤘
Awesome
My granny (December’29) sewed all my clothes when I was growing up. She could quilt, make churn butter, grow & can her own food , make preserves-there wasn’t much she couldn’t do. When she died, I didn’t see her face in my mind as I grieved, I saw her hands. Her old wrinkled, arthritic hands working all the time. The same hands that got me well when I was sick were the same hands she’d use to whoop my butt if I acted up. I miss my granny😭😭😭
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My paternal grandmother made diapers, baby clothes, curtains, dresses, shirts, oh so many practical and useful items from flour sacks!!! She lived and worked in a mining camp along with my grandfather. Money was scarce. She could make so many meals from flour. This was in Oregon.
Thanks for sharing!!
Us folk here in the flatwoods of Tennessee know all about clothing made from sacks. I'm 72 and have worn a many shirts made from flour sacks.
indeed, folks back then were so resourceful
My mother, by way of Texas and Arizona, used her feed sack dresses from the 40s to make dresses for my sister and me in the early 60s in So Cal. After we grew out of them, they turned into patches, quilt pieces or polishing rags. I still have one little dress of mine, meaning the fabric is around 80 years old - faded but intact. I loved the small prints, which is something in short supply these days.
great memories
Back in the early seventies, my parents owned a small grocery store that sold these printed flour sacks. My mother asked her aunt to make me some blouses from them for summer. They were very soft and pretty. I’m 61 now, thx for the memory. ❤️
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My mom is 87, and grew up in Illinois and Wisconsin. She was one of 12 siblings, and talked often about the flour sack clothes they sewed.
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Great hearing this video my mother was raised in Snake holler between Claiborne County, TN & Hancock County, TN lines. My grandparents lived in 2 room cabin.. my mother was the 3rd of 8 children. She said there were many summer they had no shoes. But at Christmas all the kids would get a brand new pair. In 1963 my grandparents moved to "town" which was in New Tazewell TN. Any my parents met at the local high-school an married in 1967. 55 years later, they have 1 Daughter, 1 Granddaughter, & 1 Great Granddaughter. Another great story thank you
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