Edith Melchior-Hawkins

The same member, another account of her: Who's Who in Leathercraft, Spring 1979 — the Society's own profile, written while she was still working

• Member of the Canadian Society for Creative Leathercraft - Tillsonburg Branch
• Achieved Associate designation 1956
• Achieved Fellowship April 12, 1958
• Executive Council – 1971 -1972
• Lifetime Membership April 25 1992

Edith Melchior-Hawkins 1922 -1995 Accomplished Leathercraft Artisan

Edith made her life as a Tobacco farmer just outside of Port Burwell, Ontario with her husband Mario Melchior. Along with the various household chores and the daily rigors of maintaining the tobacco farm, Edith found the time to make dresses and clothing for her two daughters Shirley and Marg. One of Edith’s favorite interests was Leathercraft to which she had excelled. In 1955 and 1956, she was fortunate to have trained under Robert Muma and was awarded a Certificate of Merit from Mumart Studios of Creative Leathercraft. She won many awards and ribbons over the years. As she became a proficient Leathercrafter, she shared her talents with others and began to teach folks the skills of leathercraft. Shirley and Marg often remember 6 or 7 people in their home learning the craft from Edith. They still have the teaching aids she used to help new comers to the trade.

You will see from the photos, Edith’s level of skill she possessed. The fit and finish are far superior from most leather work done today. These items were made in the 1950’s – 1960’s. After 60 years, these items have aged so well, they will serve very well for generations to come.

The love of the arts was shared by both her daughters, Shirley and Marg. Both ladies did have their chores around the farm, and there was many. They always made time to sew a new dress or do something creative. As Shirley explained, Marg has the natural artistic talent while she had to work extra hard. It was Marg however, that took up leathercraft. Learning from her mother in the 1970’s, Marg did leathercraft for about 3 years making purses, wallets, key cases, belts and also recovered a Western saddle. It was through doing leather work that led her to her lifelong career. From sewing change pockets for wallets led to repairing canvas tents and fabric camping trailers which branched into truck tarpaulins and Industrial sewing.

Marg Hornsby, mother of two daughters, Grandmother of two, is an Entrepreneur whom started her own business in 1975, “Hornsby Canvas and Tarpaulin Ltd”. After 47 years, she has turned the reins over to her daughter. Marg is not really retired, just changing phases to try her hand at quilting.

Shirley Biro chose a different career from the arts. As a mother of three girls, and a Grandmother to eleven, is now a retired Registered Nurse. She went to Fanshawe College in the late 1980’s and received a designation as a Canadian Certified Occupation Health Nurse (CCOHN), which is the highest certification for an OHN, at that time. She recalls working in the off season for Imperial Tobacco before it shut down it’s processing plant in Aylmer.

Thank you to both Shirley and Marg for sharing your Mother, Edith’s work with us. Edith’s Leather work is truly inspirational.

What the newsletters add

Her daughters wrote this page from family memory. The Society's newsletters confirm every date in it and carry her through another thirty years of the Society's life.

Both membership dates are in the Society's own minutes, and both name her home town. At the Annual Meeting of April 1956: “The following were elected Associate members: … Edith Melchior, Port Burwell.” Two years later: “The following were elected Fellows: … Mrs. Edith Melchior, Port Burwell, Ont.”
Spring 1956 · Volume 5, No. 3 · Spring 1958 · Volume 7, No. 3

She wrote for the newsletter as well as exhibiting in it. The Spring 1958 issue carries “Purse Pockets, by Edith Melchior, F.C.S.C.L.” — a full illustrated method for the three kinds of pocket she had worked out for her classes, beginning “Many times during my teaching career in leathercraft I have been asked by those in my class, what about some pockets on the inside of this purse?”
Spring 1958 · Volume 7, No. 3

Her branch changed, which this page does not say. She founded the Tillsonburg Branch in 1957; when it dissolved she was a member at large until the Woodstock Branch formed, and it is as a Woodstock member that the newsletters carry her from then on. By the autumn of 1973 she was showing the Woodstock members how to mould boxes from heavy leather, bringing examples of her own work.
Spring 1979 · Volume 27, No. 3 · Winter 1973–74 · Volume 22, No. 2

The “Executive Council – 1971-1972” on this page is confirmed by the council table printed in Summer 1971, where she is listed among the Executive Council members alongside Anne Hook, Fred Brown, Olivia Smith, Sadie Roebuck and Nan Astley.
Summer 1971 · Volume 20, No. 1

The hyphenated name appears late. She is Edith Melchior in every issue up to 1984; from 1988 the newsletter prints her as Edith Melchior-Hawkins, F.C.S.C.L., of the Woodstock Branch. In that year she contributed the Angelfish Mobile — a pattern for a rawhide fish, whiskers and all — and “The Craftsman's Creed”.
Summer 1988 · Volume 36, No. 4

She was still working in her last years. Her “lovely translucent rawhide fish mobiles” were singled out at the 1989 Weston Trophy appraisal, and at the Society's 40th Annual Meeting in 1990 she demonstrated “Fun with Leather Scraps” and served on the organising committee, thanked by name by the Woodstock branch president. The Woodstock Branch's report to the 42nd Annual Meeting has her hosting its June potluck and demonstrating tool sharpening in October; and at that meeting, on 25 April 1992, Madeleine Mitchell presented her with a Life Membership and she answered a question on purse interiors from the Question Box.
Spring 1989 · Volume 37, No. 3 · Spring 1990 · Volume 38, No. 3 · Summer 1992 · Volume 41, No. 4