Thursday, November 06, 2003

By Alisha Hipwell

Back in 1973, Dorothy Myrter's daughter saw rug hooking demonstrated at La Roche College in McCandless.

Myrter had quilted for years, and her daughter, Judy Rieger Hanley, of Satellite Beach, Fla., knew her mother would be intrigued by rug hooking, too.

"She said, 'Mom, you've got to come with me tomorrow. I know you're going to love it,' " Myrter, now 90, recalled. "Of course, I fell for it right away."

In the 30 years since, Myrter, of McCandless, has hooked dozens of rugs.

About a dozen of her works will be featured Saturday and Sunday in the Pittsburgh Rughooking Guild's biannual show at Shaler North Hills Library. Hooked rugs made by the guild's other 35 members and some samples from the 1930s and '40s will be among the roughly 150 rugs displayed.

In rug hooking, a hand hook similar in shape to a crochet hook is used to form a looped pile from wool strips on a base fabric. The rugs are not the same as latch-hooked rugs, in which a different hook and yarn, instead of wool, are used.

The art of rug hooking began in mid-19th century New England when women salvaged strips of wool from old clothing and pulled them through burlap sacks or other fabric to create wonderfully patterned rugs for their homes.

According to show organizer Fritz Mitnick, of Indiana Township, rug hooking was wildly popular after the Civil War when up to 90 percent of American women made the rugs. "Now it has evolved into a fiber art," she said.

Mitnick said few true antique hooked rugs exist because homeowners used them until they fell apart.

While it is possible to buy wool for rug hooking, it is expensive. Mitnick said guild members generally follow the tradition of using "found wool" from discarded clothing.

Like many rug-hooking artists, Myrter started out using patterns but now creates her own designs.

"She has a unique style," Mitnick said.

Myrter has never sold a rug, preferring instead to give them to family members.

"I love working with my hands," she said. "I don't know what I would do without my quilting and hooking, especially. I can't stand just sitting and doing nothing."

The Pittsburgh Rughooking Guild show runs from 10 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Saturday and from 1 to 4:30 p.m. Sunday at Shaler North Hills Library, 1822 Mount Royal Blvd. It includes a raffle for a rug created by 15 guild members.

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