More than 50 people from eight states gathered at St. Mark's Episcopal Church in Le Roy to learn more about Jane Boyer.
As a 10-year-old in Le Roy in 1834, Boyer created a sampler that is popular with cross-stitch enthusiasts today.
St. Mark's hosted a full-day seminar on Boyer and her work in the neighborhood where she grew up and attended church. The seminar included three lectures on Boyer and visits to the Le Roy House and the Jell-O Museum. Each participant received two fully-kitted cross-stitch projects based on her sampler to work on during the retreat and a digital PDF chart of the full reproduction sampler at the end of the retreat.
Leslie Delooze, host of the event, School Girls Samplers of Western New York, said, "it was very common for girls in the early to mid 1800s to make these (samplers) as part of their education."
Samplers allowed the girls to demonstrate their skills at cross-stitch patterns and other embroidery stitches.
D&R Depot Restaurant catered lunch.
Photos by Howard Owens.
