I was asked by Charlene to talk a bit about the Roc Day history. I had written an article about it with emphasis on Mississippi since it was for the digital Mississippi Folk Life publication, but it describes what Roc Day is and some of its origins.

There were door prizes. One of the participants won a lovely box of various cottons to spin: Pima, Acala, brown and green. She came to me to ask me how they were different. I could answer some of her questions, but I couldn’t remember all the details. I told her that I had written a one - page flyer “a couple of years ago” for inclusion in some of the Roc Day goodie bags and I promised I would go home, look for it and send it.

And I did. But the “couple of years ago” were actually 12 since the last revision!

I remembered that Ply magazine recently published an issue on plant fibers which included an article on cotton by Jill Duarte. There wasn’t much new in the article about the cotton plants from what I had written in the flyer, but it made me focus on clarifying my descriptions. I added the article in the bibliography and when I emailed the cotton flyer to my new spinning friend I recommended the article to her so she could learn more about spinning cotton.

Happy Weaving and Spinning in 2026!