Some dedicated women on Tancook Island are doing their best to revive the art of rug hooking and encourage younger generations to pick up a hook.
Lucy Neatby, a seasonal resident of Tancook, says that rug hooking was important to islanders because, like quilting, it is making the most of everything you have.
“It started as an activity of necessity and was a way of being frugal. If you have old clothes and cut them into strips and make them into rugs you have a warm rug for your floor, and you’ve still utilized that fabric,” she said.
Neatby and her friend Hetty van Gurp decided to connect older rug hookers on the island with younger people who wanted to learn. Van Gurp along with Verta Rodenhiser and Sheila Rodenhiser, are older residents that are actively involved in rug hooking.
“All the older ladies on the island used to do a lot of rug hooking and currently there are three older islanders actively engaged in hooking, and the new generations weren’t taking it up, so we decided we needed to revive it because rug hooking is such an island thing to do,” said Neatby.
She says in order to get started in rug hooking you need a frame, hook and fabric, but most importantly you need support.
“We were able to secure a grant from the Nova Scotia Department of Communities, Culture and Heritage’s Support4Culture which helped us provide equipment and education and we were able to get a lot of people started in hooking-both seasonal residents and full-time islanders,” she said.
They began holding meetings last summer every two weeks with up to 20 people in attendance.
“It became a nice community activity,” said Neatby.
The Hooked On Tancook collection features work that has been created as a result of the project including the first rugs of participants as well the work of islanders and some older rug examples.
You can come and see the collection for yourself at the Tancook Rec Centre; hours are to coincide with ferry arrival/departure times which are Tuesday – Friday 11:30-4:00, Saturday 2:00 – 5:30 and Sunday from 11:00-4:30. The show will run from July 14-August 8.