The Woodman Museum is proud to be partnering with the University of New Hampshire and its Flax to Linen Project for Combing History: Flax and Linen in New Hampshire. This exhibit explores the journey of growing flax and transforming it into linen while considering the sustainability of this timeless textile. Community collaboration plays a significant role in this exhibition with many local historical institutions such as the Stratham Historical Society, Newmarket Historical Society, Moffatt-Ladd House, New Hampshire State Library and the Woodman Museum contributing cherished family textiles and material objects. Historians such as Laurel Thatcher Ulrich, Kimberly Alexander, Nancy and Peter Cook, and Marion Dillon will also contribute artifacts from their private collections. Videos and text panels will accompany these artifacts while highlighting the seasonality of planting and harvesting flax in New Hampshire and processing it into linen. The exhibit will not only shed a spotlight on the UNH Flax to Linen Project but will also highlight the historical importance of family and community in the cultivating and processing of flax. Excerpts from diaries, daybooks and account books from New Hampshire vividly portray how family and community relationships were formed from the cultivation and processing of flax.
