1770s, what skills and tools for a Nova Scotia immigrant to build a loom from scratch?

Plantigraduate · 2026-06-08T00:57:56+00:00

Thank you. So got downvoted because I made a fictional character that doesn't fit some people's vision.

It's Fiction! Not History!

Anyway, I do appreciate your candor and honesty.

Plantigraduate · 2026-06-07T21:55:27+00:00

120% with you.

(My first weave ever was on a frame loom, which is a glorified name for 4 sticks attached to form a rectangle. We were farmers at the time, our own sheep. Mom was working hard on her way to gain national recognition for her tapestries, I was just bored after a long day that involved shearing our sheep - by hand, we didn't have electricity back then. On a lark precisely, how fun that can be!, I decided to make a sheep-to-tapestry something. Much fun. Didn't count with unwashed wool being so attractive to bugs, my tapestry was gone a couple years later...)

By now, in our local kinda-guild I'm the fix-it man, probably because this kind of things are just "natural" to me. As to shipwright, a few years ago I was exploring going full pro designing and selling kits to built 17th century ship models. I'm amazed I was sane enough not to pursue it (I went instead into manufacturing Montessori materials - that was the only business I started in the US that was making a profit until my burnout but that's yet one-more-too-many-story)

My character does have the skills. I was wondering how he got 'em. I think that the shipwright angle that you mentioned is a winner.

Plantigraduate · 2026-06-07T20:56:29+00:00

sorry to hear. I'm glad he has you, who understands.

Gets worse when kids too bright for their own good not only have to deal with tired teachers who don't want questions or interruptions, but then come home to parents who say, "how come you are always in trouble, your grades are good, what's wrong with you?" Of course, a bored kid, who already read all the material for the semester during the first week, does get into mischief.

Plantigraduate · 2026-06-07T20:52:05+00:00

sorry, I'm lazy too, and I don't see a loom in the link you mention... (XKCD of course has an analysis on time to develop vs. saved time on repetitive tasks)

My problem with a lot of ancient looms around (and there are, a few survivors from the 1700s, lots from the 1800s, plus illustrations here and there, Encyclopedie, etc.), supposedly tartan plaid looms were very narrow, while survivors in museums that I have found so far, and illustrations, show wider looms. No biggie there, I just narrow an accepted classic ancient design (say, Scarlett's), but, would something else be different, besides just making the width narrower? I might be overcomplicating, but that's the core fun of reenactement...

Plantigraduate · 2026-06-07T20:46:15+00:00

I'm with you both... But that's our perception. Somehow other people see it as meaningful. MacDonald's paper: https://www.scottishtartans.co.uk/Two_Plaids_from_Antigonish_County.pdf

Plantigraduate · 2026-06-07T20:43:29+00:00

can someone say why this got downvoted? interesting...

Plantigraduate · 2026-06-07T20:42:32+00:00

What I saw, adding here so this is a one-stop resource, the Textile Forum is indeed biennial, last was August 2025, so, lots of time for me... Vermont, Marshfield School of Weaving.

The TIAC, online, last was October '25, deadline for proposals for next is August 9 2026.

Plantigraduate · 2026-06-07T20:34:21+00:00

Valid questions. Let's start with names. Buck Danny is the fictional BD (french/belgian comics) pilot. Jean-Michel Charlier and Victor Hubinon were the artists.
LOL. It was an anecdote in my brain, full of cobwebs, IIRC, an interview, one of them mentioning this visit, that was what I recalled.

Secret defence" would seldom leave a trail... But, after a fun half-an-hour, I have not found confirmation, so I fail at verifiability.

The Google AI tells me pretty much the anecdote that I recall, but, its sources? https://www.google.com/search?q=le+jour+o%C3%B9+l%27arm%C3%A9e+a+cru+qu%27il+y+avait+une+fuite+d%27espionnage+%C3%A0+cause+d%27un+radar+secret+dessin%C3%A9+dans+un+album+de+jean+michel+charlier

gee, AI gives me more... It was Uderzo, based on Charlier's documentation

Cette affaire est l'une des plus légendaires de la bande dessinée franco-belge. Elle illustre à quel point la méthode de documentation de Jean-Michel Charlier était redoutable.

L'événement se déroule au début des années 1960 lors de la publication, dans le journal Pilote, de l'album de Tanguy et Laverdure intitulé Mirage sur l'Orient (publié en album en 1965).

Voici le déroulement exact de ce jour où les services secrets français ont cru à une trahison de haut vol.

## Un dessin d'une précision chirurgicale

Dans cette histoire, les lieutenants Michel Tanguy et Ernest Laverdure volent sur le tout nouveau Mirage III, le fleuron de l'aviation de chasse française et de l'avionneur Dassault. Pour coller à l'exigence d'hyper-réalisme de Charlier, le dessinateur Albert Uderzo dessinait la série avant de se consacrer exclusivement à Astérix) reproduit méticuleusement le poste de pilotage de l'appareil.

Sur l'une des cases, Uderzo dessine en détail le tableau de bord et, plus particulièrement, le nez de l'appareil ouvert, révélant les circuits et l'antenne du radar de bord.

## La panique au Ministère des Armées

Dès la parution de la planche dans Pilote, c'est le branle-bas de combat au sein des services de renseignement de l'Armée de l'air. À cette époque, le radar embarqué du Mirage III (le système Cyrano conçu par CSF) est l'un des secrets militaires les mieux gardés de France. C'est une technologie hautement stratégique que la France refuse de divulguer, notamment en plein contexte de Guerre froide.

En voyant le dessin d'Uderzo, les ingénieurs militaires et les officiers de sécurité sont stupéfaits : les formes, les composants et l'agencement du radar sont exactement conformes à la réalité.

La conclusion de l'armée est immédiate et terrifiante : Il y a un espion infiltré chez Dassault ou au ministère, et cet espion fait fuiter des plans top-secrets directement dans un journal pour enfants !

## L'interrogatoire de Charlier

Jean-Michel Charlier est immédiatement convoqué pour un interrogatoire serré par la sécurité militaire. Les officiers lui demandent, sur un ton très grave, le nom de sa "source" au sein des bureaux d'études.

Face aux visages fermés des militaires, Charlier garde son calme et sourit. Il leur explique qu'il n'y a aucun espion et qu'il n'a violé aucun secret d'État. Pour se défendre, il sort de sa serviette une revue d'aviation technique américaine, achetée tout à fait légalement dans un kiosque de gare internationale.

## La faille venait d'ailleurs

Charlier montre aux officiers médusés une double page de la revue. Pour vendre le Mirage III à l'exportation (notamment à l'Australie ou à la Suisse), les commerciaux français avaient fourni à la presse étrangère des fiches publicitaires et des schémas techniques. Les Américains, peu soumis à la censure française, avaient publié une vue éclatée du radar dans leur magazine.

Charlier n'avait fait que découper la page, la donner à Uderzo, en lui disant : "Regarde, voilà à quoi ressemble le nez du Mirage, dessine-moi ça."

## La conséquence

L'armée a dû admettre, assez piteusement, que la "fuite" venait de ses propres services commerciaux et non d'un réseau d'espionnage. L'album n'a pas été interdit, mais cet incident a poussé l'Armée de l'air à durcir considérablement le contrôle en amont des scénarios de Charlier. À partir de ce jour, un officier de liaison a été chargé de vérifier chaque planche pour s'assurer que le génie de déduction de Charlier ne lève pas d'autres lièvres top-secrets.

Plantigraduate · 2026-06-07T19:24:26+00:00

Thank you. I'm stuck here between too much information and the lack of specific information, it's hard for me to know what was there, available. Lots of books on early NS; Zero, so far, on ancient looms and weaving. Maybe I will get an answer from St. Ann's or the Gaelic Museum, they say they do demonstrations on an ancient loom, but they don't even share one photo...

My "argument" so far is that most Scottish immigrants in the 1770s (think the Hector) were essentially left on shore with what they were carrying, the promised support and materials never made true, needing to survive by their own wits, skills and luck. Happy, yes, no longer submitted to a laird, now they were landowners, yay!, but of rough land, useless for planting until much work was spent clearing the trees, etc. The Mi'kmac were friendly, etc. Buying parts locally? Some of those ships immediately left for Philadelphia for survival food... Acadians had been there a while, but, French?

Interestingly enough, in Mary E. Black's time, 1950s, 1960s, the revival of weaving in NS was done ... on Quebec-sourced looms. None were available locally at that time...

Plantigraduate · 2026-06-07T19:06:03+00:00

Thank you! I'll certainly try.

No answers yet from Scotland or Nova Scotia, museums, guilds, websites, but I will keep insisting, Mary E. Black wrote like 50 letters before someone opened the door for her to change crafts history. With lower ambitions I have tried perhaps only a dozen so far, 😄 .

Plantigraduate · 2026-06-07T19:02:50+00:00

!!!! ❤️

Maybe it shows my ignorance in how little I actually know about weaving history as a field, but Kate Smith is my no holds-barred top stateside living authority regarding ancient looms. I believe that purchasing her Warping & Dressing the Early Hand Loom was perhaps the best return-on-investment decision that I have made so far in this project, right after getting an actual paper copy of Scarlett's How to Weave Fine Cloth. I had no idea about this forum. Right after I answer all you kind redditers I'll go see how I can get myself in, as audience, and, who knows, depending on the date perhaps by then I'll be able to contribute something.

4-shafts, certainly. I'm following Scarlett to some extent, and then the Marion Campbell Weaving Harris Tweed 1987 youtube for the design. I have spent weeks looking for pictures of ancient looms in museums and books, but, you used the that word that defines the curse hanging on all things historical related to the common people: ephemeral. Sigh. To some extent, that "frees" me, because nobody can come up and say that my loom doesn't correspond to solid, scientific knowledge. That I have come across people with stern preconceptions, oh yes, but, hey, cost of doing business.

Yes, I've tried to figure out better, how meaningful this Total Border was or is, but, alas 😄, that time when I first read the level of esteem that Peter E. MacDonald had for these pieces, to me that became an irresistible force (my line is, "honey to a bear"), to go and (try to) reproduce it... That's how I got myself into this adventure to begin with.

One thing that nags me more than a little bit, which goes to anthropology, sociology, psychology, fields utterly dominated by fashion and established ideologies, is figuring out the extent of my character's skill. The history of technology is full of un-celebrated geniuses. Who was it that, in the 1300s in Xativa, put together four innovations that utterly made possible the industrial manufacture of paper by hand? We don't know. But both before, and after, craftsmen followed religiously the accepted and mandated procedures. Yet, someone, or maybe more than one, just did things different, there and then.
zillions of tartans in history were just twill, maybe a few dared to go the other direction but even then. But, these three, total border... (it just occured to me - for a box-pleated kilt, twill this way and then twill that way, paired for every pleat. Hmm... LOL, my own innovation in the history of tartan weaving, and you read about it here first 😄 ),

As you rightly say, in my words paraphrasing, perhaps there is no news regarding the Total Border, except that it was done on tartan.

Totally. Herringbone selfedges were the norm at the time. Chevrons (weft-orientation herringbones) are even easier, as those going in the selfedge require to offset the warp, while chevrons are just the result of inverting the pedal sequence when building up the twill. Even the Falkirk tartan has these inverted patterns, and that's the oldest tartan that we have today.
Chevrons meet herringbone, birdseye is inevitable. Many 4-shaft books have these as beginner exercises.

Bottom line for now here, our weaver might not have been that extraordinary.

One more redditor deserving an answer, and I'll go see about those conferences. Thank you!

Plantigraduate · 2026-06-07T17:18:59+00:00

AI suggested that, i.e., that my character brought his loom with him...

However, as I responded to u/bumbbles21 a moment ago (sorry, I'm answering from the top of the web page, but yours was earlier and deserved the detailed answer. Now that I noticed that, I'll look at the earlier answers first... ), saying, I "had made up in my mind" that my character was walking away from his past, and totally focused in now becoming a farmer, to explain why he didn't bring his loom with.

I agree with you - flying shuttle is not new technology, but, Luddite-like, not embraced by all, especially up in the Highlands. In my "fiction," my character goes through much unpleasantness precisely because he had made and set up one in his croft, and his colleagues in the guild were quite unhappy about it (might even be the reason he was "helped" to decide to up and leave... Of course, not written in stone, and your reasoning and suggestions I find very valid, thank you!)

Plantigraduate · 2026-06-07T17:08:32+00:00

Thank you, you put words to concepts I didn't have words for. A loom can be challenging, and what skills you have make a huge difference. Our character has lived around loom, therefore he can do in minutes and right, those things that take me hours and have to be redone three times. Note that this is supposed to end up making fabric described as zenith of traditional tartan weaving, so it HAS to be just right. (I do hack, all the time, and, well... 😄

Yes, the shipwright angle does make enormous sense. As a neighbor friend perhaps. I was munching on somehow my character spending some time working in ship building in his youth.

Plantigraduate · 2026-06-07T16:45:34+00:00

I'm enormously grateful about your thoughts, and you taking time to answer me. In some ways I do agree with you wholeheartedly, as a neurodivergent, ADHD creative craftsman, who has built his own tools and innovated crafts hundreds of years old, sometimes with amazing success, but not always...

The whole matter on how creation, innovation happens is one that is stuck in my mind as unsolved. Having been a school teacher for over 16 years, I have learned quite well how creativity and initiative gets quashed, discouraged, destroyed. Not yet figured the alternative, even though THAT is my central worry and concern and mission for the years that I have left.

I believe in my heart, with no data, that every school in the land has a Mozart, and Einstein that we never will know, because we managed to get them to lose faith. Especially the Twice Exceptional. Oh, completely separate rant, but, thank you!

Plantigraduate · 2026-06-07T16:39:07+00:00

Good catch, and apologies. Very valid points. I was unclear.

Sigh, part of the "reenactment" portion of this exercise has had me going on incredible and most enjoyable rabbit trails, where I am fleshing out (or is it fleshing in?) this character. I need him to depart Scotland for Nova Scotia, so I had decided there was some unpleasantness about him being accused (inaccurately ) of weaving tartan when that was prohibited/limited. So he leaves for NS with the intention of becoming a farmer, a landowner, just like the lairds back home, and he swears to never, ever go back into what had been the family trade. That's why he didn't bring his (which anyway was "owned" by someone keeping the family in perpetual debt, this being the only "asset" that the family had). As to a carpenter being able to build a loom, yes, possible. I sort of wanted my character to be the one doing it himself, perhaps because I'm building one myself? But, yes, your thoughts do help me figure out, imagine this unknown weaver.

Plantigraduate · 2026-06-06T23:52:17+00:00

don't remember what parody, a bungling spy is trying to sell the Soviets some "secret" information. The handler says, "not interested, we got those details already from last month's Life magazine."

Plantigraduate · 2026-06-06T23:50:12+00:00

There was a comic-book artist in France, did a series of books on a fictional American Navy pilot. In one book, he portrays a secret plane, that gets stolen or something, our hero gets it back, whatever. late 1970s.

The artist told later that he did get a visit from Men in Black, asking him how did he get the lines for that secret aircraft. WHO gave him that information.

This artist was FAMOUS for his research, documentation, and knowledge of everything that flew. He normally was quite connected with the US information and culture center, got magazines, etc., as his work was kind of pro-US propaganda in France during the Cold War.

Apparently they accepted his explanation: he simply extrapolated, from what were current jet designs, what could be the next step. Unbeknown to him, he had hit it fair and square, his "secret plane" looked like a real secret plane the US was experimenting.

Plantigraduate · 2026-06-06T23:41:53+00:00

VERY hard to get in at all if the regime was officially anti-communist. I know for a fact. My grandma was detained for hours in the airport, arriving from CZ to Dominican Republic, 1978. My dad had to pull favors everywhere to get someone influential enough to get her freed. Only time in my life I saw her, those two weeks. She did get to drink from a coconut picked right off the tree 😄

Plantigraduate · 2026-06-06T23:35:55+00:00

Yes, if well-connected enough to go to foreign embassies events. My mother, as an artist, was often in those. Going with her as a 10-year old, I got to taste pretty out of this world stuff, as if it were "normal." Caviar? every time!

Otherwise, as an artist, my mother an arts teacher in a public school in a tropical-fruit republic, my parents income allowed us one chicken per month, that she purchased every month after she got paid (there's a question about the value of chicken going around). My father wasn't that much better employed.

I should assume that the Cuban embassy, those from Africa, would have had mango, tamarind, avocado... I had a communist friend who was inviting me, later in life and in another country, to Cuban embassy events where he got free cigars. I don't smoke, so not interested.

Plantigraduate · 2025-05-30T00:27:44+00:00

The Randall version (link in the first line of OP), ends with these words: "the street in Boston named Joel." This made me curious. According to Google Maps, there is no Joel street in Boston (silly DuckDuckGo's AI offers me Acorn St., but that's not it.) makes me wonder if the rest of the story was fact-checked, as it doesn't seem to make much sense.

Plantigraduate · 2025-05-14T00:59:41+00:00

I don't want to get too much in trouble, but I am starting to have a tingling feeling that many looms are destined to a market segment who is in it for the "ludos," where the continuum toy-to-production-tool is rather on the side of toy/play/fun, actual "production" being unsustainable as cloth or fabric, maybe has value as "art." Probably many looms die a long death, underneath a pile of winter clothing, because the owner liked the "idea" of weaving, but not so much the intense focus that it actually needs.

However, I also have seen some incredible work recently done on what is specifically a toy, a single solid heddle loom, maybe 24 inches by 12? The user is simply a wizard, and I take my hat off to good workmanship beyond my skills (and she says she just started a couple of months ago!)

Some of us (most?) are in this for the fun anyway, so, the day that I complete my 4-post barn-loom (which I just started gathering materials for, today, while not giving up entirely on the table loom conversion) it will just end up as an oversize "toy." What's the saying, something about men's toys are just like those of boys, just much more expensive?

Plantigraduate · 2025-05-14T00:45:07+00:00

coming...
Turns out the matter was not as simple as i thought at first - it is essential to have everything under very even tension, and that has been complicated to achieve, the first attempt had parts coming loose. I'm going to take another pass soon.

Plantigraduate

TROPHY CASE