The
The Joseph Downs Collection of Manuscripts and
Printed Ephemera
Henry Francis du Pont
5105 Kennett Pike, Winterthur,
Delaware 19735
Telephone: 302-888-4600 or 800-448-3883
OVERVIEW OF
THE COLLECTION
Creator: Verity, Kirk, 1870-1968.
Title: Student notebooks with weaving drafts and designs
Dates: 1883-1937
Call No.: Col. 977
Acc. No.: 2017x128
Quantity: 9 volumes and a folder of
loose items
Location: 39 G 7
BIOGRAPHICAL
STATEMENT
Kirk Verity was a designer for woolen textiles. He was born in Bramley, Leeds, England, the
son of Sarah Young and John Verity, and lived at The Billingbauk. The Verity family owned a textile mill in the
Bramley area. Kirk attended the Yorkshire
College (now Leeds University) and went into the textile business as a designer. In 1907, Kirk Verity immigrated to the United
States, and lived in Massachusetts, Connecticut, and Maine. He worked for the French River Textile Co.
(Mechanicsville, Conn.), Arlington Mills, Bolton Worsted Mills, the American
Woolen Co., and other companies. In
1912, he married Miriam Tate. He became
a naturalized citizen in 1919 while living in Lawrence, Mass. He died in 1968.
Miriam Tate was born in Armley, Leeds, England, in
1880, the daughter of Grace E. Bannister and Joseph Tate. She was a typist and stenographer and arrived
in Boston in 1912. She and Kirk had a
son Joseph Kirk Verity, who was born in Boston in 1914 and died in 1975. He graduated from the Philadelphia Textile
School in 1937, and became an assistant styler for the American Woolen Company
in New York City. After military service
during World War II, Joseph worked for Drycor Felt Company in New Jersey and
Connecticut. Joseph married Margaret
Anna Maule (1911-2004), the daughter of Hanna Brown Jackson and Charles Edwin
Maude. Both Joseph and Margaret died in
Connecticut but are buried at Sadsbury Friends Meeting House near Christiana,
Pennsylvania.
SCOPE AND
CONTENT
A collection of volumes which were kept by Kirk
Verity and his son Joseph Verity when they were textile students, Kirk at the
Yorkshire College in Leeds, and Joseph at the Philadelphia Textile School. Kirk’s volumes include a two volumes of
weaving drafts, two notebooks pertaining to worsteds, a notebook on miscellaneous
textile production topics, textile designs, and notes about colors. Joseph’s volume is from a class in which he
analyzed woven fabrics to determine the types of yarns or thread and the
weaving drafts used to produce those fabrics.
An outlier to the collection is a collection of dye
recipes which was created in 1883, apparently in the United States. At a later time, Kirk Verity acquired the
volume and he attributed it to Professor J. W. Smith. Smith recorded what he dyed (quite a number
of hats) and the recipes used to achieve his colors.
ORGANIZATION
The volumes are arranged first by creator, and then
by date.
LANGUAGE OF
MATERIALS
The materials are in English.
RESTRICTIONS
ON ACCESS
Collection is open to the public. Copyright restrictions may apply.
PROVENANCE
Gift of the American Textile History Museum, which
received them from the widow of Joseph Kirk Verity.
ACCESS POINTS
Topics:
Yorkshire College.
Philadelphia
Textile School.
Victoria Mill
(Bramley, Leeds, England)
Color in the
textile industries - Study and teaching.
Dyes and dyeing
- Hats.
Dyes and dyeing
- Study and teaching.
Industries -
England - Yorkshire.
Textile design -
Study and teaching.
Textile fabrics
- Specimens.
Textile schools
- England - Leeds.
Textile schools -
Pennsylvania - Philadelphia.
Weaving -
Patterns.
Weaving - Study
and teaching.
Woolen and
worsted weaving - Study and teaching.
Bramley (Leeds,
England) - Industries.
Notebooks.
Swatches.
Weaving drafts.
Additional
authors:
Verity,
Joseph Kirk, 1914-1975.
Smith,
J. W., Professor.
DETAILED
DESCRIPTION OF THE COLLECTION
Location: 39 G
7
2017x128.1 a slightly oversize volume of weaving
drafts, compiled by Kirk Verity, 1891.
The drafts are numbered, and some include additional information. Several swatches of cloth are also included.
This is a
smaller version of the volume below. The
graph paper used was printed by J. Broadbent & Co. of Huddersfield.
In 1927,
Verity added his name and address in North Berwick, Maine, in two places.
(ATHM
0022.362.4)
2017x128.2 oversize volume of weaving drafts, reported
to have been used in the Verity family textile mill in Bramley, Leeds,
England. The drafts are numbered, and a
very few include some additional information.
Several swatches of cloth are also included.
Although
Kirk Verity did not write his name in this volume, it is similar enough to the
volume above (acc. 2017x128.1) to confirm that he kept this one as well.
(ATHM
0022.362.5)
2017x128.3 Verity, Kirk. Workbook on worsteds, 1885.
Title page
of volume: The Textile Designer’s Plan
Book, arranged by Professor J. Beaumont, Textile Department, The Yorkshire
College, Leeds.
The volume opens
with a charts and rules about worsted yarns, including numbers of skeins to the
drahm and number of hanks in ten pounds of wool. Most of the volume is filled with weaving
drafts, peg plans, and notes about them.
Three fabric swatches are in the volume as well. A page from a 1929 issue of Textile World is taped into the volume,
evidence of Verity’s continuing use of the volume.
WARNING:
Some pages are stuck together because of adhesive tape. DO NOT attempt to force these pages apart.
In 1927, Verity
added his name and address in North Berwick, Maine. (ATHM
0022.362.1)
2017x128.4 Verity,
Kirk. Lecture notes at The Yorkshire
College, 1887-1893.
As with the
volume above, Verity added his name and address in North Berwick, Maine, in
1927.
Label on
front of volume: Cut checking patterns, stitching cloths, dissecting, finishing,
scouring, carding, condensing, jacquard calculat., spinning, combing, wages for
weaving & spinning, lists, hand loom statement.
Label inside
front cover: stitching cloths, dissecting, finishing, carding, condensing &
links for looms, jacquard calcutions [sic]., spinning, combing & name of
part of machine.
Lecture
notes on the topics mentioned in the labels, with some sketches of textile
machinery and weaving drafts as well.
Kirk’s
sister Lucy seems to have been responsible for the pencil sketches at the end
of the volume.
(ATHM
0022.362.2)
2017x128.5 Verity, Kirk. Notes for third year evening designing class,
1890-1891.
Title page
of volume: The Textile Designers Drawing
& Colour Book, arranged by J. Beaumont, Instructor in Textile Industries
in the Yorkshire College of Science, Leeds.
Notebook
includes many colored and penciled designs for textiles, plus notes about
different kinds of patterned (or figured) textiles, instructions for
transferring sketches onto point [graph] paper, methods for enlarging figures,
shading etc., and a few weaving drafts.
Most of the textile designs are florals; a couple include animals.
Attached to a
page at the end of the volume is a printed permit issued by Yorkshire College
for Verity to attend a class.
(ATHM
0022.362.3)
2017x128.6 Verity,
Kirk, Color Book & etc., 1894.
Title page
of volume: The Textile Designers’ Drawing
& Colour Book, arranged by the late John Beaumont, formerly professor
of Textile Industries at the Yorkshire College, Leeds. Tipped into the volume is an advertisement for
textile works by Professor Roberts Beaumont.
Verity’s
notes on colors and on weaving colors.
Includes some weaving drafts, simple designs, and color charts.
(ATHM
0022.362.6)
2017x128.7 [Verity,
Kirk.] Worsted notes, 1904-1907.
Volume
includes a number of price lists for different yarn or textile production
processes, such as spinning, dressing, and twisting, including for cotton and
for worsteds. As well, the volume
includes formulas for calculating weights of fabrics, weekly production, wages,
etc.; and miscellaneous other notes pertaining to textile production.
(ATHM
0022.362.8)
2017x128.8 Smith,
J. W. (Professor). Daybook a/c goods
delivered; daybook on dyeing, 1883.
It is not
known who Prof. J.W. Smith was, but he must have been an American because the
volume was acquired from J.L. Fairbanks & Co., stationers, Boston [Mass.]
Accounts of
dyeing, apparently done by Prof. J.W. Smith.
The first pages of the volume have been removed; next are found a few
weaving drafts and a textile swatch; then the dyeing accounts begin. Smith listed the items dyed, such as leghorns
[hats], shansee, braid, mackinaw, manillas [more hats], etc.; the color, and
the recipe for the dye batch. About
halfway through, Smith wrote notes about setting a vat on July 23, 1883, and
included some samples of dyed wool.
These notes continue through Dec. 28.
The volume closes with notes on sulphuric acid, hydrogen sulphate,
oxalic acid, etc.
By 1927,
Kirk Verity had acquired this volume, but he does not indicate when or from
whom; perhaps he was interested in the dye recipes, although he is not known to
have been directly involved in dyeing.
(ATHM
0022.362.7)
2017x128.9a-g Verity,
Kirk: miscellaneous items.
Two blank forms:
Victoria Mill, Bramley, [blank] Dr. to J. Kirk Verity, for weaving, with spaces
for date, lot, number, length, rate, and charges.
Two loose
weaving drafts with textile swatches attached; these may belong to the sheets
described below.
Three sheets,
numbered 1-3, with notes about weaving, including two weaving drafts and three
textile swatches. Kirk Verity wrote his
name on two of the three sheets.
(ATHM
0022.362.10)
2017x128.10a-b Verity,
Joseph Kirk: Weave formation notebook, 1936-1937.
Joseph
Verity kept this when he was a student at the Philadelphia Textile School. This includes a printed form for the analysis
of textiles, including type of yarn or thread used, a weaving draft, detailed
sketches about how the weaving was accomplished, and other notes. Most of the analyses included a textile
swatch.
Also
a separate sheet with weaving drafts of many different designs.
The
analyses are on forms printed for the Philadelphia Textile School.
(ATHM
0022.362.9)