Beamer (occupation)
A beamer was an occupation in the cotton industry. The taper's beam is a long cylinder with flanges. Creels of bobbins with the correct thread, mounted on a beaming frame wind their contents onto the beam; the machine is watched over by a "beamer". In early days beaming was done in the weaving shed but the process tended to be transferred to the spinning mill; the spinners would send lorries loaded with of beams wound with thread of the ordered specification to the weavers. Several tapers beams would be attached to creels on the Tape Sizing machine, the threads from these would be sized and combined to create the smaller weavers beams; as a rule of thumb, a tapers beam had thread long enough to make 20 weavers. Colloquially, the term beamer was used for anyone responsible for moving beams of yarn. In a weaving shed that bought its yarn on the beam, the Beamer would be the operative who carried new beams to the looms and gaited them.. A'drawer-in' was sometimes referred to as a beamer
Sharkskin
Sharkskin is a smooth worsted fabric with a soft texture and a two-toned woven appearance. Lightweight and wrinkle-free, sharkskin is ideal for curtains and napkins. Sharkskin fabric is popular for both men’s and women’s worsted suits, light winter jackets and coats. Sharkskin is used as a liner in diving suits and wetsuits. Sharkskin fabric is made with the use of acetate or as a blend of the two, its two-toned woven appearance is achieved by basketweaving, thereby creating a pattern in which the colored threads run diagonal to the white fibers; because both fabric options have a smooth texture, the combination results in the finish for which sharkskin fabric is known. The finest "natural sharkskin" fabric has been made of all natural fibers, being some mixture of mohair and silk. More expensive variations demarcated by fabric content labels bearing "Golden Fleece", "Royal" or the like, indicate an rare and costly "sharkskin" of yester-year; those fabrics, produced in small quantities, were manufactured in South America from the 1950s and 60s and are known to include in some instances small percentages of vicuna, guanaco or alpaca in such blends: inclusion of silk was more common among the "natural sharkskins".
Whereas, "artificial sharkskin", a much less costly substitute, is a fabric variant, more found from that period and can contain synthesized or synthetic fibers that were developed contemporary to those eras. Artificial sharkskin variants used for suiting first appeared in the 1950s and garnered worldwide appeal in artificial sharkskin, attaining broad popularity in the early 1960s and the disco era of the late 70s, followed by brief fashion resurgences in the mid-1980s, mid-1990s and late 2000s: its variations contain some wool percentage blend. More such artificial sharkskin fabrics have undergone technological improvements and have attained new desirability among "fabric purists" who would have conventionally rejected out-of-hand any "artificial sharkskin" substitutes for the real item containing a majority percentage of mohair; the term "Super-Sharkskin" has been used to describe costly sharkskin fabrics which include some percentage of synthetic fibers. The addition of synthetics added flexibility.
Many attribute the "fading in and out of fashion" of sharkskin of any sort to the fact that many of the ubiquitous "artificial sharkskin" variants had "created an indelible public impression that all sharkskin ought to be deemed "tacky", to be eschewed, as it is in Lisa Birnbach's Official Preppy Handbook, 1980, which reflected, in itself, in-turn, many consumers' misgivings regarding its social status. From the late 2000s until the mid 2010s, three piece sharkskin "shiny suits", sometimes incorporating a contrasting shawl collar became fashionable in America and Australia due to a resurgence of interest in the early 1960s fashions depicted in Mad Men. Whether "natural" or "artificial", today the line between the two has been blurred by the advance of innovative blends. Nonetheless, "natural sharkskin" from the 1950s and 1960s men's and women's suits remain sought in the vintage clothing market, commanding extraordinary prices online; the most desired sharkskin colors feature a peacock iridescent palette.
British Diplomat Sir Terence Clark in the 1950s served in Bahrain. He reminisces that the requisite winter evening wear for a diplomat was a white sharkskin dinner jacket. Lucette Lagnado in her prize-winning memoir about her childhood, The Man in the White Sharkskin Suit: My Family's Exodus from Old Cairo to the New World uses the imagery of the white sharkskin suit to evoke the glamorous evening life in Egypt in the 1950s. Early in Justine, Lawrence Durrell mentions the heroine sitting in front of a multi-panel mirror trying out a sharkskin dress. Shot silk
Houndstooth
Houndstooth, hounds tooth check or hound's tooth known as dogstooth, dog's tooth, or pied-de-poule, is a duotone textile pattern characterized by broken checks or abstract four-pointed shapes in black and white, although other colours are used. The classic houndstooth pattern is an example of a tessellation. A smaller-scale version of the pattern can be referred to as puppytooth; the oldest known occurrence of houndstooth is the Gerum Cloak, a garment uncovered in a Swedish peat bog, dated to between 360 and 100 BC. Contemporary houndstooth checks may have originated in woven wool cloth of the Scottish Lowlands, but are now used in many other materials; the traditional houndstooth check is made with alternating bands of four dark and four light threads in both warp and weft/filling woven in a simple 2:2 twill, two over/two under the warp, advancing one thread each pass. In an early reference to houndstooth, De Pinna, a New York City–based men's and women's high-end clothier founded in 1885, included houndstooth checks along with gun club checks and Scotch plaids as part of its 1933 spring men's suits collection.
Oversized houndstooth patterns were employed prominently at Alexander McQueen's Fall 2009 Collection, entitled Horn of Plenty. The patterns were a reference to Christian Dior's signature tweed suits. Checkerboard Tartan Twill Tweed
Gabardine
Gabardine is a tough woven fabric used to make suits, trousers, uniforms and other garments. The word gaberdine or gabardine has been used to refer to a particular item of clothing, a sort of long cassock but open at the front since at least the 15th century, in the 16th becoming used for outer garments of the poor; the modern use of the term for a fabric rather than a garment dates to Thomas Burberry, who invented the fabric & revived the name in 1879, patented it in 1888. It has been used with a general meaning of "closely woven cloth" since at least 1904. Although its origin is unknown, the word may be related to the word kaba, a type of coat reaching to the knees with wide sleeves worn by Muslim men in Puraniya, a region of India. There is another kind of coat, called a qabā, mentioned in Sufī scripture, an ordinary coat, as opposed to a religious coat; the fibre used to make the fabric is traditionally worsted wool, but may be cotton, texturised polyester, or a blend. Gabardine is woven as a warp-faced steep or regular twill, with a prominent diagonal rib on the face and smooth surface on the back.
Gabardine always has many more warp than weft yarns. Cotton gabardine is used by bespoke tailors to make pocket linings for business suits, where the pockets' contents would wear holes in the usual flimsy pocket lining material. Clothing made from gabardine is labelled as being suitable for dry cleaning only, as is typical for wool textiles. Gabardine may refer to the twill-weave used for gabardine fabric, or to a raincoat made of this fabric. Gabardine was invented in 1879 by Thomas Burberry, founder of the Burberry fashion house in Basingstoke, Hampshire and patented in 1888; the original fabric was waterproofed using lanolin before weaving and was worsted wool or worsted wool in combination with cotton. It was woven and water-repellent but more comfortable than rubberised fabrics; the fabric takes its name from the word "gaberdine" a long, loose cloak or gown worn in the Middle Ages, but signifying a rain cloak or protective smock-frock. Burberry clothing of gabardine was worn by polar explorers, including Roald Amundsen, the first man to reach the South Pole, in 1911 and Ernest Shackleton, who led a 1914 expedition to cross Antarctica.
A jacket made of this material was worn by George Mallory on his ill-fated attempt on Mount Everest in 1924. Gabardine was used in the 1950s to produce colourful patterned casual jackets and suits. Companies like J. C. Penney, Sport Chief, Four Star and California Trends were all producing short-waisted jackets, sometimes reversible known as weekender jackets. Chambray Denim Cumming, Valerie, C. W. Cunnington and P. E. Cunnington; the Dictionary of Fashion History, Berg, 2010, ISBN 978-1-84788-533-3. Kadolph, Sara J. ed. Textiles, 10th edition, Pearson/Prentice-Hall, 2007, ISBN 0-13-118769-4. Picken, Mary Brooks; the Fashion Dictionary, Funk & Wagnalls, 1957
Textile
A textile is a flexible material consisting of a network of natural or artificial fibers. Yarn is produced by spinning raw fibres of wool, cotton, hemp, or other materials to produce long strands. Textiles are formed by weaving, crocheting, knotting or tatting, felting, or braiding; the related words "fabric" and "cloth" and "material" are used in textile assembly trades as synonyms for textile. However, there are subtle differences in these terms in specialized usage. A textile is any material made of interlacing fibres, including carpeting and geotextiles. A fabric is a material made through weaving, spreading, crocheting, or bonding that may be used in production of further goods. Cloth may be used synonymously with fabric but is a piece of fabric, processed; the word'textile' is from Latin, from the adjective textilis, meaning'woven', from textus, the past participle of the verb texere,'to weave'. The word'fabric' derives from Latin, most from the Middle French fabrique, or'building, thing made', earlier as the Latin fabrica'workshop.
The word'cloth' derives from the Old English clað, meaning a cloth, woven or felted material to wrap around one, from Proto-Germanic kalithaz. The first clothes, worn at least 70,000 years ago and much earlier, were made of animal skins and helped protect early humans from the ice ages. At some point people learned to weave plant fibers into textiles; the discovery of dyed flax fibres in a cave in the Republic of Georgia dated to 34,000 BCE suggests textile-like materials were made in prehistoric times. The production of textiles is a craft whose speed and scale of production has been altered beyond recognition by industrialization and the introduction of modern manufacturing techniques. However, for the main types of textiles, plain weave, twill, or satin weave, there is little difference between the ancient and modern methods. Textiles have an assortment of uses, the most common of which are for clothing and for containers such as bags and baskets. In the household they are used in carpeting, upholstered furnishings, window shades, coverings for tables and other flat surfaces, in art.
In the workplace they are used in scientific processes such as filtering. Miscellaneous uses include flags, tents, handkerchiefs, cleaning rags, transportation devices such as balloons, kites and parachutes. Textiles are used in many traditional crafts such as sewing and embroidery. Textiles for industrial purposes, chosen for characteristics other than their appearance, are referred to as technical textiles. Technical textiles include textile structures for automotive applications, medical textiles, agrotextiles, protective clothing. In all these applications stringent performance requirements must be met. Woven of threads coated with zinc oxide nanowires, laboratory fabric has been shown capable of "self-powering nanosystems" using vibrations created by everyday actions like wind or body movements. Textiles are made from many materials, with four main sources: animal, plant and synthetic; the first three are natural. In the 20th century, they were supplemented by artificial fibres made from petroleum.
Textiles are made in various strengths and degrees of durability, from the finest microfibre made of strands thinner than one denier to the sturdiest canvas. Textile manufacturing terminology has a wealth of descriptive terms, from light gauze-like gossamer to heavy grosgrain cloth and beyond. Animal textiles are made from hair, skin or silk. Wool refers to the hair of the domestic sheep or goat, distinguished from other types of animal hair in that the individual strands are coated with scales and crimped, the wool as a whole is coated with a wax mixture known as lanolin, waterproof and dirtproof. Woollen refers to a bulkier yarn produced from carded, non-parallel fibre, while worsted refers to a finer yarn spun from longer fibres which have been combed to be parallel. Wool is used for warm clothing. Cashmere, the hair of the Indian cashmere goat, mohair, the hair of the North African angora goat, are types of wool known for their softness. Other animal textiles which are made from hair or fur are alpaca wool, vicuña wool, llama wool, camel hair used in the production of coats, ponchos and other warm coverings.
Angora refers to the long, soft hair of the angora rabbit. Qiviut is the fine inner wool of the muskox. Wadmal is a coarse cloth made of wool, produced in Scandinavia 1000~1500 CE. Sea silk is an fine and valuable fabric, made from the silky filaments or byssus secreted by a gland in the foot of pen shells. Silk is an animal textile made from the fibres of the cocoon of the Chinese silkworm, spun into a smooth fabric prized for its softness. There are two main ty
OCLC
OCLC Online Computer Library Center, Incorporated d/b/a OCLC is an American nonprofit cooperative organization "dedicated to the public purposes of furthering access to the world's information and reducing information costs". It was founded in 1967 as the Ohio College Library Center. OCLC and its member libraries cooperatively produce and maintain WorldCat, the largest online public access catalog in the world. OCLC is funded by the fees that libraries have to pay for its services. OCLC maintains the Dewey Decimal Classification system. OCLC began in 1967, as the Ohio College Library Center, through a collaboration of university presidents, vice presidents, library directors who wanted to create a cooperative computerized network for libraries in the state of Ohio; the group first met on July 5, 1967 on the campus of the Ohio State University to sign the articles of incorporation for the nonprofit organization, hired Frederick G. Kilgour, a former Yale University medical school librarian, to design the shared cataloging system.
Kilgour wished to merge the latest information storage and retrieval system of the time, the computer, with the oldest, the library. The plan was to merge the catalogs of Ohio libraries electronically through a computer network and database to streamline operations, control costs, increase efficiency in library management, bringing libraries together to cooperatively keep track of the world's information in order to best serve researchers and scholars; the first library to do online cataloging through OCLC was the Alden Library at Ohio University on August 26, 1971. This was the first online cataloging by any library worldwide. Membership in OCLC is based on use of services and contribution of data. Between 1967 and 1977, OCLC membership was limited to institutions in Ohio, but in 1978, a new governance structure was established that allowed institutions from other states to join. In 2002, the governance structure was again modified to accommodate participation from outside the United States.
As OCLC expanded services in the United States outside Ohio, it relied on establishing strategic partnerships with "networks", organizations that provided training and marketing services. By 2008, there were 15 independent United States regional service providers. OCLC networks played a key role in OCLC governance, with networks electing delegates to serve on the OCLC Members Council. During 2008, OCLC commissioned two studies to look at distribution channels. In early 2009, OCLC negotiated new contracts with the former networks and opened a centralized support center. OCLC provides bibliographic and full-text information to anyone. OCLC and its member libraries cooperatively produce and maintain WorldCat—the OCLC Online Union Catalog, the largest online public access catalog in the world. WorldCat has holding records from private libraries worldwide; the Open WorldCat program, launched in late 2003, exposed a subset of WorldCat records to Web users via popular Internet search and bookselling sites.
In October 2005, the OCLC technical staff began a wiki project, WikiD, allowing readers to add commentary and structured-field information associated with any WorldCat record. WikiD was phased out; the Online Computer Library Center acquired the trademark and copyrights associated with the Dewey Decimal Classification System when it bought Forest Press in 1988. A browser for books with their Dewey Decimal Classifications was available until July 2013; until August 2009, when it was sold to Backstage Library Works, OCLC owned a preservation microfilm and digitization operation called the OCLC Preservation Service Center, with its principal office in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. The reference management service QuestionPoint provides libraries with tools to communicate with users; this around-the-clock reference service is provided by a cooperative of participating global libraries. Starting in 1971, OCLC produced catalog cards for members alongside its shared online catalog. OCLC commercially sells software, such as CONTENTdm for managing digital collections.
It offers the bibliographic discovery system WorldCat Discovery, which allows for library patrons to use a single search interface to access an institution's catalog, database subscriptions and more. OCLC has been conducting research for the library community for more than 30 years. In accordance with its mission, OCLC makes its research outcomes known through various publications; these publications, including journal articles, reports and presentations, are available through the organization's website. OCLC Publications – Research articles from various journals including Code4Lib Journal, OCLC Research, Reference & User Services Quarterly, College & Research Libraries News, Art Libraries Journal, National Education Association Newsletter; the most recent publications are displayed first, all archived resources, starting in 1970, are available. Membership Reports – A number of significant reports on topics ranging from virtual reference in libraries to perceptions about library funding. Newsletters – Current and archived newsletters for the library and archive community.
Presentations – Presentations from both guest speakers and OCLC research from conferences and other events. The presentations are organized into five categories: Conference presentations, Dewey presentations, Distinguished Seminar Series, Guest presentations, Research staff
Weaving
Weaving is a method of textile production in which two distinct sets of yarns or threads are interlaced at right angles to form a fabric or cloth. Other methods are knitting, crocheting and braiding or plaiting; the longitudinal threads are called the warp and the lateral threads are the weft or filling. The method in which these threads are inter-woven affects the characteristics of the cloth. Cloth is woven on a loom, a device that holds the warp threads in place while filling threads are woven through them. A fabric band which meets this definition of cloth can be made using other methods, including tablet weaving, back strap loom, or other techniques without looms; the way the warp and filling threads interlace with each other is called the weave. The majority of woven products are created with one of three basic weaves: plain weave, satin weave, or twill. Woven cloth can be woven in decorative or artistic design. In general, weaving involves using a loom to interlace two sets of threads at right angles to each other: the warp which runs longitudinally and the weft that crosses it.
One warp thread is called. The warp threads are held taut and in parallel to each other in a loom. There are many types of looms. Weaving can be summarized as a repetition of these three actions called the primary motion of the loom. Shedding: where the warp threads are separated by raising or lowering heald frames to form a clear space where the pick can pass Picking: where the weft or pick is propelled across the loom by hand, an air-jet, a rapier or a shuttle. Beating-up or battening: where the weft is pushed up against the fell of the cloth by the reed; the warp is divided into two overlapping groups, or lines that run in two planes, one above another, so the shuttle can be passed between them in a straight motion. The upper group is lowered by the loom mechanism, the lower group is raised, allowing to pass the shuttle in the opposite direction in a straight motion. Repeating these actions form a fabric mesh but without beating-up, the final distance between the adjacent wefts would be irregular and far too large.
The secondary motion of the loom are the: Let off Motion: where the warp is let off the warp beam at a regulated speed to make the filling and of the required design Take up Motion: Takes up the woven fabric in a regulated manner so that the density of filling is maintainedThe tertiary motions of the loom are the stop motions: to stop the loom in the event of a thread break. The two main stop motions are the warp stop motion weft stop motionThe principal parts of a loom are the frame, the warp-beam or weavers beam, the cloth-roll, the heddles, their mounting, the reed; the warp-beam is a wooden or metal cylinder on the back of the loom. The threads of the warp extend in parallel order from the warp-beam to the front of the loom where they are attached to the cloth-roll; each thread or group of threads of the warp passes through an opening in a heddle. The warp threads are separated by the heddles into two or more groups, each controlled and automatically drawn up and down by the motion of the heddles.
In the case of small patterns the movement of the heddles is controlled by "cams" which move up the heddles by means of a frame called a harness. Where a complex design is required, the healds are raised by harness cords attached to a Jacquard machine; every time the harness moves up or down, an opening is made between the threads of warp, through which the pick is inserted. Traditionally the weft thread is inserted by a shuttle. On a conventional loom, the weft thread is carried on a pirn, in a shuttle that passes through the shed. A handloom weaver could propel the shuttle by throwing it from side to side with the aid of a picking stick; the "picking" on a power loom is done by hitting the shuttle from each side using an overpick or underpick mechanism controlled by cams 80–250 times a minute. When a pirn is depleted, it is ejected from the shuttle and replaced with the next pirn held in a battery attached to the loom. Multiple shuttle boxes allow more than one shuttle to be used; each can carry a different colour.
The rapier-type weaving machines do not have shuttles, they propel the weft by means of small grippers or rapiers that pick up the filling thread and carry it halfway across the loom where another rapier picks it up and pulls it the rest of the way. Some carry the filling yarns across the loom at rates in excess of 2,000 metres per minute. Manufacturers such as Picanol have reduced the mechanical adjustments to a minimum, control all the functions through a computer with a graphical user interface. Other types use compressed air to insert the pick, they are all fast and quiet. The warp is sized in a starch mixture for smoother running; the loom warped by passing the sized warp threads through two or more heddles attached to harnesses. The power weavers. Most looms used for industrial purposes have a machine that ties new warps threads to the waste of used warps threads, while still on the loom an operator rolls the old and new threads back on the warp beam; the harnesses are controlled by dobbies or a Jacquard head.
The raising and lowering
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