The Fleece of Their Flock: Homespun & the American Identity

and feel both softer and finer. Like the dye, the soap would
be beneficial “as the Merchants in the Colonies propose
[and carry out] a Manufacture of Cloths.” 29
Quality Control
Though one of the main goals of homespun was to produce
and embrace all-American products, the standard of
quality that manufacturers strove for was that of the British
goods. 30 Ads and articles frequently praised colonial fabrics
for reaching, and sometimes surpassing, British fabrics in
excellence. The aforementioned soap advertisement guaranteed
that the soap, which was apparently “so well known”
and widely used abroad, would even give homespun “a
nearer Resemblance of the English Manufacture.” 31 One
North Carolinian found the American homespun textiles
to be “not at all inferior to those imported from England”
in 1765. 32 By 1770, another colonist claimed that his homespun
fabrics were actually “superior in Quality, and equal
in Price, to those from England.” 33
The colonists may have been embracing the appearance of
the laboring classes’ dress in their homespun, anti-fashion
attire, but it is clear that the middling sorts and colonial
elites who spearheaded many of these endeavors and wore
the resulting garments appreciated homespun more for
what it symbolized than how it really looked and felt.
- 56 -