Album Book of Sarah Folger Crane

Date1826-1840

MediumPaper, paint, ink, and red leather

DimensionsClosed: OH: 8" x OW: 6 1/2"

Credit LineMuseum Purchase Conserved with funds donated by the Miami Valley American Needlework Guild in memory of Doris G. Davis (4/26/22-3/12/06)

Object number2005-16,3

DescriptionThis is an album book bound in red leather with the name "Sarah Folger" embossed on its front. Inside the book are poems entitled:

"1. For Sarah
2. E. A. Fxxxxx -- 2 poems signed by E. A. F.
3. Poem entitled "Charity" -- Cincinnati Sept. 24th 1848
4. "To the Memory of my Sister" -- S. F. -- Cincinnati Sept. 28th 1826
5. "My Mother's Grave" -- Sarah -- Cincinnati June 11th, 1827"
6. "The Parting" [from a friend to Sarah] N. W. F. [Nancy Folger]
7. "Consencious [sic] Rectitude" -- L. S. Osborn [?] B. M.
8. "To Sarah" -- Bxxxxx
9. "Home" -- L. D. B.
10. "A Wish" -- M. W. J.[?]
11. "A Wish" -- Cincinnati -- 1831 A. G. Swain [?]
12. "The Beauty of Life" Charles April 9th 1828
13. "She Has Passed from the Earth" Dec. 26th, 1833 Sarah F. C.
14. "Selected" -- Eliza
15. "Love of Country" by T. C. C."

The book includes writing from several different hands, as well as magazine clippings.
Label TextCollecting small drawings, watercolors, mottos, and autographs in paper album books was a popular pastime in the 1830s and 1840s for young women. As in this album book, many often contained sentiments of friendship and remembrance. Sarah Folger continued to collect autographs and keepsakes in her memory book long after her marriage to Rufus Crane in 1829. The album records about twenty signatures, including that of her sister and husband, and the locations of Cincinnati, Ohio, and Cambridge City, Indiana. The book, along with family Bibles, unfinished needlework projects, two samplers, and a signed Cincinnati, Ohio, sampler dating 1820 by Sarah, descended in the family.
InscribedThe first page of the album book is embellished with a painted open book, flowers and an inked inscription: "Go forth--thou little book!/ Go forth--and gather thy store--/ Oh! many a token which friendship leaves here,/ May long to the heart of thy owner be dear,/ When the friendship or friend is no more."
ProvenanceThis album book marked "Sarah Folger" is part of a group of samplers and books that descended in the Folger-Crane family of Cincinnati, Ohio. The sampler maker was Sarah Folger (b. July 11, 1808; d. 1871) seventh child of Tristram (b. 1772; d. Oct. 15, 1815) and Mary Folger (b. 1773; d. 1823). The Folger family, originally from Nantucket, Massachusetts, was in Ohio by 1814. Members of the Society of Friends, they are first listed in Hinshaw's ENCYCLOPEDIA OF AMERICAN QUAKER GENEALOGY, Vol. V, as transferring to the Miami Monthly Meeting in Warren County, then on to Cincinnati, where they were listed among the founding families of the Cincinnati Monthly Meeting (set apart from Miami MM on March 23, 1814).

Sarah Folger married Rufus Crane on May 14, 1829. Because Sarah married out of unity (contrary to Quaker discipline) she was disowned from the Cincinnati Monthly Meeting in 1830. The Cranes moved for several years to Cambridge City, Indiana. Sometime between 1836 and 1843, they returned to Hamilton Country, Ohio. Sarah and Rufus Crane had seven children born between 1830 and 1849, the last three being born after their return to Cincinnati. Rufus Crane died on April 8, 1861 of "laryngites", and is interred in Spring Grove Cemetery in Cincinnati. Sarah died of consumption on May 22, 1871 in Cincinnati.

The samplers, family bibles, and books probably descended through Sarah's daughters.