2 2 2 HIS TOR Y OF COHASSE T. 



meeting, when some of the more wealthy could wear 

 " store clothes." 



Some silks were indulged in by the women of later 

 years ; but before Revolutionary times the garments were 

 almost wholly homemade from the very wool and flax. 



The culture of flax for making linen cloths was early 

 introduced and continued until the days of some persons 

 now living. 



The Indian aborigines used a coarser plant, " swamp 

 milkweed," but our forefathers imported flaxseed and 

 obtained a fine fiber for spinning. 



Many little patches of ground * were devoted to this 

 herb, and it added one more material for human comfort. 

 When the plants were ripe they were pulled and then laid 

 under water or upon wet ground to rot the bark and the 

 stem. After drying them, the bunches were put through 

 the " breaker," which was a homemade machine much 

 like a carpenter's sawhorse, upon the top of which a 

 heavy piece of wood shut down into grooves across the 

 stems of the flax. After a vigorous beating everything 

 was broken except the tough, stringy inside bark of the 

 herb. This was the "flax." 



The bunches of this flax, with its bits of stalk clinging 

 to it, were beaten against a board by a stick or " swingle" 

 until the coarser bits dropped off. Then the splinters and 

 pieces of bark were still further combed out by drawing the 

 flax through a hackle. This instrument, some good speci- 

 mens of which are in our historical collection, was a thick 

 bunch of sharpened spikes standing in a heavy piece of 

 wood. 



After being combed, the flax fiber was ready for spin- 

 ning and bleaching and weaving. 



Towels made from Cohasset flax are still to be seen in 



* In the Sohier estate just west of the observatory a flax field is now remem- 

 bered to have been. Also in Robert T. Burbank's place on King Street is a flax 

 field which he remembers. Many others could be named. In the year 1749 John 

 Jacob was taxed for fifty pounds of flax, and Samuel Bates for thirty. 



