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Mom and dad had a dress making business in the mid 1940’s during the middle of WW II which affected their ability to get adequate dress fabric. Those two photos show  their success. This is the block dad made to print original labels for the dresses. Of course, the actual block is reversed but through the wonders of Photoshop we see it as the label appears. Mom designed dresses for women and dad applied designs as requested. Even though they were up in the isolated northeast corner of the state, 200 long miles in those years from the capital, they nonetheless receieved notice. Articles appeared in two newspapers about them and the business, and they put on a show in Salt Lake City in the ZCMI, the premier store of the state. Dad also showed pictures, all of which appears in this gallery:
I was really surprised when I opened a manilla envelope of yellowed, soiled, water-damaged sheets of foolscap to discover that they were drawings that mom made back in the 1946. I ws surprised, first, to see the drawings, and second to see that she had been drawing. Up to that day in 2007, I had figured that the only drawing she did was in Seward which I talked about on the Charcoal Drawing page. That was around 1954, so she had already been drawing in Vernal.
All except one of the drawings is a dress design. They are simple line drawings and are the rough quality of a beginner but some of them show imagination in the sleeves or neck. One of them lists the names of the women who ordered that particular dress and describes that material they requested and the block print or hand-drawn design that dad applied. This dates their Dress Making Business. I have assembled these drawings in this gallery: I’ll use an art nouveau frame for each since that was a dominant style in that era. Most of the drawings are faint but you get the idea.
The really surprising drawing was this one:
I find it hard to believe that she drew this techical design but the evidence is convincing. First, the sheet matches perfectly the other sheets with dress designs. Second, the style is different than dad’s style. But where did she get her designs? Imagination or magazines? The most intersting feature of the design is the long curved lone in the bottom half. It was probably drawn with a French Curve and extends from the center of two circles. The double set of three curved lines by the lower circle is attractive. She used one point perspective, the point lying to the right background. I am impressed. I had no idea she ever tried any technical drawing. She was a remarkable woman.
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