Dear BHA Members,

Leila Cartier, Curator of the William King Museum in Abingdon, has invited
the Bristol Historical Association and its members to contribute
items to an exhibition the Museum will be hosting at the end of this year.
Ms. Cartier and her staff are looking for portraits of children and children's

clothing made in southwest Virginia and northeast Tennessee prior to 1940. 

The clothing, of course, would be handmade/homemade, and items that come

with a story of who wore the article and where they lived in this area would be

extra special!  If any of you have items which fit this criteria that you would
be willing to allow the Museum to use for this exhibition or if you need further
information, please contact either Ms. Cartier at lcartier@wkmuseum.org (telephone 276.628.5005 ext.112), or our BHA Collections/Acquisition Chair, Jane Copenhaver
at JDC@BVUNET.NET

The following is a working description of the exhibition:

Dress-Up: A Regional Portrait of Childhood
Dec 16, 2011 - May 13, 2012
Price-Strongwell Galleries

In conjunction with the 2012 program MINDS WIDE OPEN: Virginia Celebrates
Children in the Arts, William King Museum will playfully evoke the lives
and adventures of nineteenth-century children growing up in Southwest
Virginia and Northeast Tennessee. At all social and economic levels,
children of this time period dressed like miniature adults, with only
slight differentiations in lengths of skirts or knickers.  This exhibition
will explore the interaction of art and fashion with children's lives in
this region, through examples of historic regional costume and period
portraiture.