Johann Friedrick Blanck (1747-1827), his son, Gerhard (1771-1849), and his grandson, Christopher (1817-?), where linen weavers in Lehe, Germany. Lehe is a suburb of Bremerhaven.

To see images of Lehe, Bermerhaven and Bremen go to Bremen/Bremerhaven/Lehe now or at the bottom of the page.

Linen is made from the fiber of the flax plant. Linen has many advantages as a fiber but the process from seed to fabric is labor intensive.

The small oily seeds are sown in the spring. They are sown close together so there is less branching of the plant and minimal weeding is necessary. Flax quickly depletes the soil so it is planted as a rotation crop.

Examining a Field of Flax, Saskatchewan, Canada

This image shows flax harvesting in the sate of Washington, USA. In the United States flax was generally grown for seed. The quality of the fiber was not as fine as that grown in certain European countries.

Flax seed oil (known as linseed oil) is used in paints and varnishes. Flax seed is also used in cattle feed.

I thought these images represented flax harvest in Germany. However, I am a city person and I was wrong.

In August 2010 Gary A Mischke wrote:

"When I was a boy, my father occasionally raised flax in Minnesota. During WWII it was an important commodity in the war effort and I remember many barn sized stacks of flax straw bales stacked along the highway south of Windom, Minnesota, destined for war production, although I don't know what was actually made from them.

On two of your photos you suggest that they may show flax harvest in Germany, but that as a city girl you are not sure. These are most likely photos or illustrations of oats or barley harvesting. The bundles are too long for flax and the seed heads visible on the first "shock" in the left photo appear most like oats. As a boy, I helped harvest oats in Minnesota in this manner. The grain is cut with a machine called a "binder" and tied with twine in bundles. Workers then walk through the fields and stack the bundles in these upright piles called "shocks". They are piled this way to allow the grain heads to dry. These "shocks" also allow rain to shed down the sides and prevent the seed heads from staying wet and rotting. After a week or two, farmers gathered the bundles in horse drawn hayracks and hauled them to a central point, usually near their livestock barns where a "Threshing machine" separated the seed heads from the straw. The straw was blown into a large pile to be used for animal bedding through the winter.

In the 1940's we harvested flax with a "combine", a threshing machine that travelled through the field separating flaxseed from the straw. The straw was expelled onto the ground and a "baler" followed along behind compacting the straw into bales tied with twine or wire. These were then sold as part of the flax cash crop, I assume for the production of linen."

After Gary Mischke informed me that I did not have an image of the flax harvest, I went looking again.

"A PROFITABLE CROP: SHEAVES OF FLAX DRYING IN A FIELD

Flax is not reaped, but is pulled by hand when golden-ripe in seed, fastened in small bundles, and set up in sheaves to dry. Besides being laborious it is often painful work, the tiny thorns upon the branches pricking the skin and being apt to cause blood poisoning."

La culture du Lin

Printed on black:

Entassement

Engrange ou entasse a l'air, le lin attend sous le ciel mouvant et l'atmosphere humide de la vallee le moment du rouissage.

Very loose translation with the aid of Google translator: Harvested or reaped linen awaits the moisture in the valley atmosphere to ret the flax.

In looking for images of flax bundles I took the above picture in 2005. I'm a city girl and missed the finer details. It turns out these bundles are more likely straw or reeds for thatching the roof.

In March 2012 Teri Comans kindly set me straight when she wrote:

I don't think that the sheaves in the pictures are flax. I think they are more likely to be reeds for thatching. The bunches are too straight and neat. The bottoms are cut not pulled and they have been banged on the ground to make them all uniform. This is a typical thing to do with reeds or straw for thatching.

Teri Comans

Retting Flax Courtai, Belgium

Retting Flax Courtai, Belgium

In order to separate the fiber from the woody stalk the flax must be retted. Retting allows bacterial action to cause the stalk to loosen and decompose. Needless to say it is a smelly process. There are two methods of retting. The flax can be submerged in a pond or stream for a few days. This method produces a golden or cream colored thread. The flax may also be retted in the field allowing the morning dew to do the same work as the pond. Field retting takes up to six weeks and the flax must be turned periodically. It produces a silver grey thread.

When the outer stems are sufficiently decayed the flax is laid out to dry.

"AFTER THE FLAX HARVEST IN WUTTEMBERG

One process in the preparation of flax is known as "scutching." In this the stems are passed through a rude mangle or press, and are then beaten in order to remove all traces of woody core. The fibre is then tied up in bundles known as sticks, seen on the right, and is ready for market. Although scutching mills are now very general, the process is still preformed by hand in many places"

This type of residual of the flax was used to stuff seats.

Light blonds were called tow headed or flaxen haired.

"STAGES IN A HOME INDUSTRY OF IMMEMORIAL ANTIQUITY

The culture of flax for manufacture into linen goes back to prehistoric times. Of almost primitive simplicity are these flax-combs with which the Belgian women draw the flax to cleanse and separate the fibrous portion from the rest and make it fit for yarn."

From back of card: "The work is in one sense rough and heavy, in another sense very delicate. An unskilled man, drawing a bundle of long flax fibres over those ugly, sharp teeth, might easily break them so that the result would be a mere handful of broken remnants. An expert worker knows how to handle the stuff so as to comb out each course fibre into a bundle of smaller, parallel fibres, with the least possible waste in the way of unevenness and breakage."

The long thin fibers resembling human hair have to be handled carefully to keep them from tangling. A distaff is used to keep the fibers separate and in line during spinning. The flax wheel is traditionally a small wheel. The flax needs to be continually moistened while spinning.

Young ladies with spinning wheels and distaffs

Schwarzwalder spinnstube

Flax is a valuable crop not only for the linen. The seeds are harvested for linseed oil. Linseed oil has been used for wood treatment, paint, animal fodder, lamp oil, cough medicine, laxatives and other medicinal purposes. Linoleum was make from linseed oil and ground cork.

Flax-Spinners, 1887, by Max Lieberman (German Artist, born 1847)

Linnen weaving and spinning.

A woman at her linen loom in Monchgut, Island of Rugen, Germany.

Unbleached, bleached and died line thread and bleached linen cloth, Museum Cloppenburg, Germany.