Originally Posted by McQuilter
in the "olden days" everyone had a hair receiver on their dresser. Usually a pretty china box with a hole in the top where they would clean out combs and brushes and deposit it in the hair receiver for future use.
This is absolutely true. We toured an historical museum/repository in the west a couple years ago, and women's long hair from brushes was prized for all kinds of things, many hairfilled pincusions were displayed. We even saw some arts/craft pictorial sceneries made from hair, very detailed work, and preserved all this time in glassed frames like artwork. Stunning.
Also saw some wedding clothing made with couched hair on the embroidery work, for good luck. I might think it was pretty special to have my mom's or granmom's or even great granmom's (several generations lived together oftentimes) worked into my wedding gown.