CLINTON CO., OHIO PICTORIAL NEEDLEWORK SAMPLER, silk on linen, top with four-line verse of "It is sweet at twilights pensive hours / To tread the vernal sod / Or wander to some fragrant bower / And think of thee, my god.", below depicting a landscape scene with a church-type building flanked by fence and trees, yard featuring a pathway leading to the building with a dog and a shepherd resting to the left and four sheep to the right, a dove with branch flying above the scene in between two floret motifs, below signed "Catharine Strickle / October 1835", two dove motifs at the bottom edge with "LMH" initials in the middle, all encompassed by a scrolling vine border with fruit and flowers. Unframed, sewn onto acid-free mounting. Dated 1835. 17 1/2" x 17 1/2" object.
Literature: For a similar sampler of the period with instructress name, see Studebaker - Ohio is my Dwelling Place: Schoolgirl Embroideries, 1800-1850, pp.79-80, top figs.
Catalogue Note: Identified as Catharine/Katharine Strickle of Wilmington, Clinton Co., Ohio, who was born on March 25, 1823 to parents Jacob Strickle (1782-1854) and Ann Ellis (1785-1863). Her parents married on September 27, 1806 in Berkeley, Virginia (now West Virginia) before moving to Ohio and had seven children who all survived into adulthood.
On October 8, 1845, Catharine married William Toilson Tillinghast (1824-1881), who was originally from Connecticut, and they had six children with three surviving childhood. Catharine died in 1860 and is buried with her parents at Sugar Grove Cemetery in Wilmington, OH.
The "LMH" initials on the sampler are for the instructress, identified as Letitia M. Heston (b. 1791), who was a member of the Society of Friends (Quakers). On p.79 of "Ohio is my Dwelling Place", Sue Studebaker writes, "Letitia Heston came to Ohio from Baltimore, where she had been a teacher before coming west."

Very good visual condition with toning and staining, some scattered holes, thread with some fading and fugitive color, deacidfied and a few support patches along edges.