Powdered wigs and leeches make for a unique job fair

By: Stephanie Prokop
   MANSFIELD — Candle-making, wig-making and learning to polish a silversmith’s bowl — these were just some of the things that the fifth-grade class of Mansfield Elementary School demonstrated during their Colonial Fair on Feb 22.
   The fair, which is put on every year around this time, is part of the social studies curriculum, said fifth-grade teacher Lisa Dolci. The students are placed in groups of three or four, and must create a poster and props to explain a typical occupation in the 1700s.
   Parents, students and other teachers milled around the fair as they learned all about the customs and trades of the late 18th century. Most of the 101 students were dressed to mimic the clothing worn during the time period — that is broomstick skirts and bonnets for the girls and plain black trousers and white button-up shirts for the boys.
   The fair was held in the school’s multi-purpose room where the students each had a station demonstrating Colonial jobs, including wigmakers, a blacksmith and silversmith, a weaver of buckets and baskets, a cobbler, a tanner, wheel makers, glassblowers, and cabinetmakers.
   Students created props and activities to provide a hands-on learning experience for other students. On the apothecary table, students Sydney Pezzub, Margaret Parzyck, Logan Barnes and Irwin Narayan demonstrated how Colonial doctors used natural herbal remedies to treat common ailments, such as heartburn or a hacking cough.
   According to Irwin Narayan, using a mortar and pestle to grind up chalk to eat during the time period was a common treatment to ease heartburn.
   Logan Barnes pointed to a jar full of (paper) leeches and explained that were commonly used for "bloodletting," a popular medical treatment for illnesses associated with bloodstream infections. He said that leeches would be taken out and left on a patient’s skin.
   There was also a hat-making station. According to Aaron Kelsey, a dress hat for wearing indoors would only take a day to craft, however, a hat made from leather that a gentleman might wear outside would take much longer to create.
   Important tools of the hatmaker were knives, brim measurers, and a comb, to make sure that the person being fitted was wearing his or her hair right.
   Perhaps one of the more time-consuming goods that Colonial people made was leather, because animals had to be hunted, the hides had to be washed, and then strewn over a log to carefully remove any fur with a knife.
   Cole Clauser said that it was a very time-consuming process, and it took Colonial people about seven months to make a piece of clothing from a deer’s hide.
   Wigmakers were tireless workers in Colonial times, according to the students.
   There were different wigs for all budgets, they said. The less expensive was the "minor bob" and the more expensive wig was the "major bob."
   The major bob was the shorter of the two wigs, and it had a flip to the back side of it.
   Wig construction was something that kept the wigmaker quite busy during the year, as they were chiefly made from horsehair, human hair, and thread. After the wigmaker finished sewing the wig together, he would then powder it and bake it in an oven.
   Many prominent men in society would have their wigs powdered for special occasions, and a chalk-like dust would be liberally applied over the wig while the gentleman wearing it would breath safely through a paper cone.