Mistippee Inspired Bag by Doug Rogers

This bag was inspired by the bag worn by Mistippee.  You can see his image in McKenney-Hall.  There's more than one of these images and a better one is in The Museum of Early Southern Decorative Arts in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, about a block down the street from where my wife went to college, the Moravian-founded Salem College.  That was the first school of higher education founded for girls in the colonies, established in 1772.  In the MESDA image the bag is seen much clearer and it is as the design on the flap of the bag I did.    The design on the sides of the bag is my own; the Mistippee image doesn't show a design on the sides.  The strap is modeled on the strap in Aberdeen.  The technique of beadwork is exactly as that in the Rowan County Museum bag, a bag that was sold at auction a few years ago.  At this point I don't know where that bag is.

Copy and photos by Doug Rogers.