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A life told in stitches and stories

Renowned seamstress Dorothy Mesher also has a book of memoirs to her credit

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Dorothy Mesher creates a little northern world with her colourful embroidery. (PHOTOS BY JANE GEORGE)

Dorothy Mesher made this decorated parka for her granddaughter Lisa.

Two Inuit dressed for winter shake hands in one scene from a parka made by Dorothy Mesher.

Dorothy Mesher sews and knits on the sofa in her duplex in Kuujjuaq.

Tivi,” a handmade doll, was made and dressed in miniature clothes by Dorothy Mesher.

KUUJJUAQ – Cozy up with Dorothy Mesher at home, where she’s busy with her embroidery work, and a door will open to a perfect little world.

It’s a northern world, where friends in parkas greet each other and shake hands; then, they go ice fishing or head off by dog team across the land; partridges hide beside bushes; a hunter kneels to shoot his rifle; and, a kayak travels along the water.

It’s a world Dorothy creates with her needle and thread, according to her whims and choice of designs. Her designs are based on patterns she’s used for years and continues to embroider on parkas for her children and their families.

Born in Tasiujaq in 1933, Dorothy learned to knit and sew at an early age from her adoptive mother, Susan Edmunds.

Dorothy’s birth mother, Alice Berthe, was also a skilled seamstress. Her birth father was a fur trader called Arthur “Slim” Karlsen, who was originally from Norway, a place also known for the quality of its handicrafts.

“It must be in your blood,” Dorothy says to explain her natural aptitude for handicraft.

Dorothy grew up in Great Whale River, George River and later in Fort Chimo [communities now known as Kuujjuaraapik, Kanigiqsualujjuaq and Kuujjuaq], where her adoptive father, Bill Edmunds, was with the Hudson Bay Company.

Dorothy tells how even as a young girl, she loved sewing, and would sneak a flashlight under her bedcovers to sew after bedtime. Her first major sewing project? A memorable pink shirt.

In the 1940s, when the American military were based near the today’s community of Kuujjuaq, Dorothy remembers how she would take old army sweaters and unravel them and then knit them into socks.

At 16, Dorothy received her mother’s old sewing machine as a gift and never looked back.

By the time Dorothy ended up in Happy Valley-Goose Bay, Labrador, where she raised her large family of 11 boys and three girls, she was sewing not just for them, but also for the troops stationed there.

In those days, Dorothy charged $65 for a double parka, decorated inside and out. She also made 35 parkas for the Arctic Winter Games in the 1970s, and, all the time, she was developing her talents with the needle.

However, it was demanding work, and Dorothy’s son Bob can remember listening to the sounds of his mother sewing late into the night.

Dorothy’s first inspiration for embroidery came from a neighbour in Labrador. Later, she picked up other ideas and techniques for embroidery and beading from visits to the Northwest Territories and Greenland.

When Dorothy moved back to Nunavik from Labrador in 1979, she worked as social worker and worked at the Kuujjuaq women’s shelter and group home.

A patient woman, nevertheless she says she sometimes bristled inside when faced with the flood of newcomers she found working in Nunavik.

“I lived here, and all these new people are coming here and telling us how we’re doing it. There’s nothing you can do about it,” she says.

Her strong feelings about the present inspired her to write about the past.

Between her sewing projects and work, Dorothy managed to find time to finish a wonderful book, with Ray Woollam. Called Kuujjuaq: Memories and Musings, the book, which was published in 1996, relates Dorothy’s life and memories, and is illustrated with photos from her youth in Nunavik.

“Maybe some young people will find it useful to read one Inuk’s story,” Dorothy writes in the introduction to her book, which engages readers of all ages.

These days, Dorothy still works occasionally as a cook at Kuujjuaq’s elders’ residence, looks after her granddaughter Lisa and sews.

Dorothy says she’s working on completing several patchwork quilts and other half-finished projects, some of which date back years.

“It’s just something I like to do,” she modestly says of her sewing.

Recently, she completed a large doll, now on display at Tivi Gallery in Kuujjuaq. The doll is dressed in carefully sewn parka, a tiny crocheted nassak and a perfect pair of miniature sealskin kamiks.

Kuujjuaq Memories and Musings (Inuit history), Dorothy Mesher. Price: $19.95;ISBN: 0-9206490-6-8;1996, Unica, softcover, 124 pp.

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