Illustrated instruction book for the Bickford family knitting machine
This is a late nineteenth-century instruction book from about 1875, issued by Dana Bickford in New York to teach home users how to operate a Bickford knitting machine. The pictures show finished knitted garments and stitch work: a glove with a ribbed cuff, a close-knit bonnet with a gathered crown, a sample of knitted seam rows, and a sock with a scalloped top. A designer could take the fine knit textures, ribbed cuffs and scalloped edges as period patterns for textile or vintage-style apparel graphics.
