My friend Esther is a curator at the Museum of Jewish heritage. Occasionally she has asked me fiber-related questions. The other day I received this photocopy of an object in the mail from Esther. She asked me if I knew what it was. The next image ought to help figure out what this object is. Each of the stitched circles holds a fifty Kopek piece. Now, I had never seen such an object before in my life. But I immediately knew what it was. Esther’s letter states that this object belonged to a father of a women who brought it in to Esther to find out what this might be. The father came to the states in 1923. He had sewn rolls of 500 ruble bills into his coat lining. Friday night I showed the image to my daughter. She immediately replied,“ It’s to sew into the lining of your coat.” I asked her why, and she said, “It’s to hide your money when you come to America.” My daughter had never seen such an object either. My cousin’s daughter was at dinner as well...
A blog, mostly about my work making Jewish ritual objects, but with detours into garment making, living in New York City, cooking, and other aspects of domestic life. A note about comments: I love comments from readers, from spammers, not so much. I approve comments before posting them so comments are not cluttered with junk. It may take a few hours before your posts appear. Be patient. If you are a real person with a real comment it will be posted.