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November 1, 2009

Volunteers helping to create window displays for holidays

By Debby Woodin

dwoodin@joplinglobe.com

Preparations for City Hall’s part in the “Joplin Holiday Experience” are coming together a stitch at a time, thanks to the volunteer efforts of a couple of Joplin seamstresses.

June Stokes and Dixie Boyd-Carter spent last week tailoring clothes for a mannequin family and sewing backdrops that are to be part of a special holiday window display at City Hall, 602 S. Main St.

The building that now serves as the center of Joplin government was built in 1910 to house Newman’s Department Store, which was located there until the store moved in the early 1970s to Northpark Mall. The store was once located in the mall space that now is the Macy’s Home Store.

City employees, led by the efforts of City Clerk Barbara Hogelin, building engineer Jeff Tennis and the Joplin Convention and Visitors Bureau, are working to give residents and visitors a glimpse at Christmas seasons of the past with the displays being made for the Main Street and Sixth Street windows.

The displays are to be unveiled as the first event scheduled for the city’s holiday celebration Nov. 30-Dec. 5.

Stokes is a commercial artist who has been involved in living history events and re-enactments for 30 years. She sews custom orders of clothing for Revolutionary War re-enactors, “George Washington-style,” she said.

She said she is working on the displays at the request of the city clerk.

Stokes borrows on her art training and her experience to interpret her own designs from period clothing and old patterns. “I may use a sleeve pattern off one with a collar from another” to craft unique garments for her clients, many of whom are friends she has met in her coast-to-coast travels for the re-enactments.

When Stokes was recruited for the city project, she called on Boyd-Carter, who she knew had the sewing expertise to make the curtains for the window displays and backdrops.

Boyd-Carter formerly worked at a telephone company office and at the Department of Revenue’s motor vehicle licensing office before retiring. “I’ve done a lot of volunteer work since retiring,” she said. She is a member of the Lady Ambassadors, a group that does civic projects and volunteer work.

Working together in a basement conference room at City Hall, the two women have not only made the clothing for the mannequins, but they have turned 130 yards of blackout fabric into the curtains that will serve as backdrops and dividers for the window displays.

Another volunteer, Fred Lemley, who was a marketing manager at Newman’s, has helped design the window displays.

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