NYCO Gansey

Cool!!!! I am finding Lion's Brand "Fisherman's Wool" impossible to locate locally. I am wondering if, with the introduction of their new felting wool, they might discontinue the Fisherman's. Or, maybe it's just my local stores.

JJMolvik

I saw some at JoAnns today, but not a lot.

Georgia

When I used to knit them, Aaron, it would take me about six weeks to knit an adult size. I would knit while my son was napping and for a couple of hours after he went to bed.

HIgs, Katherine

I think that depends on the stores you're checking. At any rate. The last time I was in a Joann I saw Fisherman's Wool. Ghetto Lobby doesn't carry FW but does carry most other LB stuff. Michael's is hit-or-miss on any yarn that isn't trendy. Reputedly Wally is "shrinking" the craft section but the few times I've had a look the LB selection was quite small and included no wools at all.

You should be able to order it directly from LB if you're desperate and willing to pay postage.

When calculating Working schedules and trying to use this measure to former times , one should remember that people had no cars [ thus walking time was longer, and no all knew how to knit while walkig] , No phones , no washing machines , dish washers , they used out houses, no paper trowels , etc,,, all these added HOURS of work , that could NOT used for knitting. also they tended sick kids , elder relatives , etc,, All THEHE has to be taken into account when trying to decided if people could or could not produce something in the same time a contemporary person does it ,, ps and don`t forget that light wasn`t as good as your`s. mirjam

Joanne's corporate doles out yarn to stores with an eye dropper. Good luck finding 10 skeins in a store, much less 10 skeins of the same dye lot. In course of a year, dye lots do vary considerably.

Wait for a sale, and buy online.

The Fisherman's wool has oil on it that gradually oxidizes - so you do not want it sitting at the bottom of your stash too long. (3 years) Buy it as you need it.

If you are going to knit a masterpiece gansey, go get real gansey yarn. Or, at the very least, some of that Bendigo Merino.

Aaron

Wow. The one and only Aran I've ever done took me months to complete, even with me making sure to do some of it everyday. The sweater turned out very well and I'm very proud of it. I made it as a Christmas gift for my DIL and she loves it too.

Shelagh

With all due respect Mirjam, you have not thought this through!

A warm gansey was the single most valuable thing a fisherman's family could own! Remember that the stitch patterns provided warmth and ventilation. If a fisherman did not have a well knit gansey - how would he stay warm while he was out on the water? Without a GOOD gansey, he would not be able to go out fishing and his family would starve, or he would die of exposure while fishing and his family would then starve. If a fisherman's wife wanted to eat, she knit a good gansey for her fisherman (and sons). If a woman wanted to keep her man alive, she knit him a fine gansey. She patched it when it was torn, and she reknit when it was worn, because it was essential to the family. For a fisherman's family, NOTHING was more important.

A man with a gansey could go out on his own boat, or he could work shares with another fisherman that had a boat or he could sign on to work on a schooner. A fisherman could borrow a fish net, or a fish hook, but he had to have his own gansey. Without a gansey, he could not fish. If he could not fish, he could not feed his family.

Ganseys were a major capital asset of the fishing industry, but history has not recognized the huge value of that asset. Knitting ganseys was a terrible labor that has not been recognized by history. And, it was piled on the other terrible labors that the women bore. Women have not been given the credit that they deserved.

Without finely knit wool ganseys, Europe would not have had fish, at least not cod and herring. Europe would have starved. That is a bit of economics that has been overlooked.

---------------------------------- I have lived in situations without electricity or running water, or paved roads. I do know what it is like to cook over an open fire, and what a nasty job it is to try and clean afterwards when soap is precious. Never the less, women living in those conditions (and worse), knit (millions??) of fine ganseys for fishermen. In addition to the chores that you mention, those women sold the catch, tended flocks and gardens, mended nets, made other clothes for the family by hand, & etc.. . . It is an accomplishment that should rank with the building of the Pyramids of Egypt, and yet history ignores it.

---------------------------------- I admit that I love to knit in our clear California sunshine. (In part, we choose to live in Pleasant Hill because of its fine quality of light.) But today is a foggy mist, and I must knit anyway.

Aaron

And when it came to the end in the event of tragedy at sea, the fisherman was identified by the pattern on his Guernsay which was peculiar to his own family

Ophelia Scotland

This is NOT an Aran. It has no cables, no bobbles, no traveling stitches; just good tight Lizard Lattice stitch, which goes very fast. On the other hand, it is so tight that it is windproof and suitable to wear fishing. Aaron

Yep! Every fleet had its own pattern that was suited to the local climate and every village had local variations. Thus, any seaman could tell what parish a body was from by the pattern. Everyone in a parish would know the current gansey of everyone else in that parish. Thus, every body could be identified.

In my case they will know its "Aaron" by the mistakes in my knitting.

And you have given birth to a child , while you had to tend this fire and cook like you did , and how many children clung to your skirt ? The woman could also do more because they worked together, MIL and non married sisters would/could lend a hand,,, STILL , YOU CAN`T measure your time and your abilty and decide that this is the measure for those woman,,, mirjam

I can measure and say that history does not give all those women due credit.

Are you arguing that those women have gotten full credit? No! You are saying the same thing that I am saying, which is; that they worked very hard. You just think that it took more than 120 hours to produce a gansey or that they could not find 20 hours a week to work on a project that was vital to the family's welfare.

I have had to figure each step out for myself. They learned more than I know, as children. However fast I knit, I am sure that many fish wives knit much faster. And they knew tricks to speed their knitting. For example, when I started knitting sleeves from the shoulder down, I wasted a lot time turning the gansey around and around. Then, I learned to fold the body of the gansey up into a small package and stitch it together with a bit of waste yarn. Much easier to turn and much faster. But, that is the kind of thing those girls would have learned as small children. That makes me sure that they knew many ways to work faster than I do.

Since a gansey would last a year or more, I am sure that it often took a year or more to knit the new gansey. However, that is balanced by the "herring girls" that could knit one in 8 to 10 days depending on the pattern.

Aaron

accomplishment

I am not ARGUING anything with you , I am saying /writing , both from life experience as a woman and as a person living in a different climate than yours , and having lived in various different climates, and having lived through various Different places and times with different levels of having to do manual work, and housework . THAT YOU , like anybody else , CAN NOT MAKE ASSUMPTIONS like that,about How many hours women in another time/place and circumstances, could `find` to knit or do any other chore, unless you find written evidence to that , Also i declare that using the term `could find 20 hours` , is not a very complimentary word.

I am going further to say that , being a man , you can`t measure a woman`s ability to work. All your calculations are done /made on your own ability , a man who grew up in 20th century, with all the better food , better health etc,, than those women. Many of whom had Rheumaticism in an early age, or other illness or bodily problems. have you tried to work with painful arms and or fingers. Have you tried to work with a sick coughing child next to you,,,,, Unless you live in SAME Conditions , like they did, without Any of the contemporary luxeries , YOU CAN NOT use your measurement of speed as a FACT , about their lives. You are not the only person , who does THIS mistake. you remind me of the male doctor, who couched us [years ago] for labour , and ended his course with ; "when we want it we can have LOADS of milk to feed our baby ",,,, the whole group of ladies had the best laugh in years ,,,, every single one of them reacted like me ... that we would Love to see him nurse a baby at his `breasts` .... You also remind me of a student, who came to me , because he couldn`t proove that `all weaving was done on a Triangular Warp`,,, his starting point were the Greek and Egyptian drawing where the warp on a hanging loom was sort of drawn as if all warps met at the middle.... Thus we built a similar loom , i hung up a warp with weights , wove some wefts and asked to measure EXACTLY the place of each warp and weight , Than i invited him to coffee and we let it hang in the air... we discused other matters and after an hour + we went back to the loom ,,, and measured ,,, the weights slowly pulled the warp thread towards the middle , after 2 more hours he understood it.

The only point i do agreewith you , is about women not getting enough credit , so what else is new ????? If you think that by your calculations you give them credit? you ruin your own Pronounced Goal ,,, by using words as ..."could not find 20 hours".... because this is full of assumptions , if indeed you claim , that knitting those sweaters was THE MOST importnat thing, and at the same time you use this terminology , you pull the rug out from under your feet. Women, esp in soceities like those , you are trying to talk about, Don`t find time, they use every moment , to do one two and sometines 3 chores at the same time. They are in constant moove, from one chore to the other!!! they do the knitting both out of need , but also a lot of times as a means to sit down for a while , without feeling guilty about `sitting`. You cannot research such craft , by isolating it out of the `normal` stream of daily life. We have been at another point of this debate before. I have told you the same things, you assume to much , and don`t even have the respect to those people by adding this 2 plain words ;I assume. mirjam

Mirjam, I had written, historical evidence and you did not believe it, so I did an experiment to see if it was plausible.

Let me summarize what we agree on.

1. The life of fisher families was hard.

1. Fishermen required finely knit ganseys to continue their trade.

2. Many of the fishermen's ganseys were knit by their wives or mothers or sisters.

1. Such knitting was very high quality, and produced an essential capital good, the value of which was NOT captured in historical documents.

We differ on how long it took for a wife and mother to knit a gansey.

I have found documentation that it was common for the "herring girls", that migrated up and down the coast helping to process fish catches, to be able to knit a gansey in a week or two. Many of these herring girls were or became the wives of fishermen. Thus, many fishermen's wives knit very fast. They used knitting sheaths to knit much faster and much tighter than anyone is likely to knit for a sustained period of time with circular or single pointed needles. (The physics are different!) That is your real point of your disbelief. Despite all those pictures of knitting sheaths in old knitting books such as Mary Thomas, you never tried knitting with a knitting sheath! Why were there so many old knitting sheaths around? Because they worked!

At this point, I believe the historical documentation is correct and plausible. I now find it reasonable that wives and mothers often produced ganseys in 2 months or less. And, a sister or girl friend or professional knitter could produce a gansey in 2 weeks or less of dedicated, full time work. Of course, the finer Lincolnshire and Sheringham Guernseys would take

Aaron

How can i explain to you , that i am not debating with you about YOUR ability to knit in a measured time . My point is that unless you did it under the EXACT similar circumstances,, i, e living on a shore in a fishermen`s village without all you modern machinery , thus you may have to go out to out house , bring water from outside source , not have proper light, have to cook in same circumstances and have a child or two to take care of [ feeding washing clothes , nending his clothes etc...] than your experiment will come close to those of the women who performed it. and i ONLY asked you to add one NEEDED word to your experiment ,, please write I ASSUME , it will do a lot to make your experiment more Scientific ... As to using a Sheath or not using it ,, how do you know i never tried ???? YOU ASSUME i never tried ,,,, Nothing wrong with assuming , Very wrong to state assumptions as Facts,,, as a matter of fact i have used one in circumstances that needed it , for enough length of time , to make my opinion about the use of it valid. But i am not assuming that my experience shades any light on how those other people used it.

I never said i don`t believe historical evidence i said you [ or any one else for that matter ] can`t take any Experiment under contemporary circumstances and Authomnaticly assume it is similar to another time and area,,,, you have let out many factors that should be taken into account as well ,,, And last not least Even historical written evidence should be read with reserve ,,,, I have seen various Historical evidebces that are diferent , or mot 100 parallel ,,, And ps stop telling what my Disbelif is... i stated clear enough what my problem is with your Statements ,,,, they are too generalized and too many parts are assumptions without leaving Doubt to the many facts you still don`t know. Speaking of Disbelief , maybe you disbelief the ability of other people to use their Life long experience of Checking Documents , and Techniques , and knowing that there are limits to the knowledge we can learn from THESE things, and that it is better to let other know that we assumed,,, mirjam

Speaking of learning to use a knitting sheath, Tell us about your experiences with a knitting sheath

How long did it take you to learn to use knitting sheaths? Did you learn "spring action" (where the left needle is held vertically) methods? And methods where the working needle is pushed left with the palm and pushed right with the thumb (the left needle is held horizontally)? The physics of the two methods are quite different.

Did you use it with long needles or short?? What size??

Were you able to use a spring action socket for sock needles (for sleeves and cuffs, etc?)

Did you use it for knitting tightly? Or, for looser modern style knitting?

Did you use wood needles or spring steel needles or baleen?

Was it faster for you? Was it easier on your hands and wrists? Did you notice the extra effort in the upper arms?

Most importantly, why did you stop using knitting sheaths?

Aaron

Why should i disturb your theory with my facts ... i tried it and don`t do it anymore, and that is that . mirjam

Aaron is talking about guernseys, not Aran patterned sweaters, and Katherine is addressing Aaron... or have I missed a joke?

I knit an Aran style sweater in about six or seven weeks once, but I was in college and did quite a lot of the knitting during Christmas vacation when I literally had all day to knit.

=Tamar