Baby's Bootees in Shetland Floss Bean Stitch (1912): vintage crochet pattern

Materials

• Fine (CYC #2) soft lofty wool yarn in white — approximate; the original was a little more than 1 skein of Shetland floss (skein weight and length not printed)
• A small amount of the same yarn in pink for Round 2
• Crochet hook (hook not printed)
• Narrow ribbon for the ankle (length not printed)
• Tapestry needle
• Hook: Start with 3.5 mm (US E-4) — approximate; no hook or measurement is printed

Abbreviations (US terms)

ch

chain

sc

single crochet

dc

double crochet

st

stitch

sts

stitches

rnd

round

row

row

sk

skip

rep

repeat

lp

loop

yo

yarn over

BLO

back loop only

sc2tog

single crochet two together

inc

increase

Notes before you start

• Source: "Baby's Bootees", Priscilla Wool Crochet Book (ed. Lola Burks Hettich), The Priscilla Publishing Company, Boston, 1912. Public domain in the USA.
• As printed — materials: A little more than one skein of Shetland floss (from the directions; no materials list printed). Gauge: Not given.
• Modernisation note: Stitches converted by the book's own “Explanation of Stitches”, not by name: chain stitch (ch st, “make a series of loops, drawing each loop through the preceding one”) = ch; slip stitch (sl st, “insert the hook into the stitch, draw the wool through that stitch and through the wool on hook at the same time”) = sl st; single crochet (s c, “insert the hook, draw wool through, pass wool around hook (wool over), and draw it through both loops on the hook”) = sc; double crochet (d c, wool around the hook, insert, draw through, then through 2 loops twice) = dc; half double crochet (h d c, wool around the hook, insert, draw through, then “through all 3 loops at once”) = hdc; treble crochet (t c or tr c, wool around the hook twice, insert, draw through, then through 2 loops three times) = tr. For these stitches the 1912 American names already match modern US usage, so no stitch changes height. The book's long crochet (l c: wool around the hook, insert, draw through, then through 1 loop, then through 2 loops twice) is the modern extended double crochet; where used it is written “long crochet” with that definition.
• Modernisation note: The book's abbreviations are written in modern US form: ch st = ch, s c = sc, d c = dc, h d c = hdc, t c / tr c = tr, st(s) = st(s), “wool over” / “thread over” / “pass the wool around the hook” = yo; “miss” = sk; loop = lp; “repeat” = rep; “beginning” = beg. “Widen” is written as increase and “narrow” as decrease, as defined in each design. Ordinal row names (“1st row”, “2d row”) are written Row 1, Row 2; where the book calls a circuit of a round piece a “row” the book's word is kept. “Plain” (a row or round with no increases or decreases) is kept as printed.
• Modernisation note: Long printed paragraphs are split into one row, round or step per line; stitch order and counts unchanged. Section headings added for navigation.
• Modernisation note: Hooks are printed as bone hooks described only as fine, medium-sized or coarse, or by an unstated numbering system, with no diameters, so no exact metric size can be read from the book. The suggested modern hook is an approximate starting point chosen for the yarn weight and tied to any printed measurement.
• Modernisation note: No stitch gauge is printed for this design; work a swatch and match any printed measurement (given in the modern gauge line) before starting.
• Modernisation note: The yarns are 1912 trade descriptions with no exact modern equivalent, and the book prints no yardage or skein/ball weights except where quoted in the materials. The CYC weights given are approximations only: Saxony (a fine, firm yarn) and 2-ply (single) zephyr as super fine (CYC #1); ice wool (a very fine, lustrous yarn) as super fine (CYC #1); Shetland floss (a soft, lofty yarn) and eiderdown wool as fine (CYC #2) — lofty yarns and to be matched by gauge or measurement rather than by weight; 4-ply (split) zephyr, 4-fold Germantown and Spanish yarn as light (CYC #3); 8-fold Germantown and knitting worsted as medium (CYC #4).
• Modernisation note: The bootees refer to the book's bean-stitch directions on another page (“See directions for bean stitch, page 44”); those directions are quoted as the first steps. Bean stitch has no abbreviation in the list and is written “bean st”.
• Modernisation note: “Work loops, as before” refers to the last row of the Baby's Hood on the preceding page (“s c in st, ch 3, miss 1, s c in next”), which is written out.
• Modernisation note: Check: the bootee is begun at the top of the leg; the 14 bean rounds come first and the foot rounds follow the ribbon round, as printed. The book does not say where the top-edge loops are worked if the starting ch is the top.
• Modernisation note: Check: Round 18 (“working 3 s c in 1 between widenings”) and Round 22 (“Increase 6 sts around toe”) do not say exactly where the increases go; they shape the instep and toe.
• Modernisation note: Check: “Work 2d round with pink” is read as Round 2 of the bean rounds.
• Modernisation note: No materials list is printed; the yarn is taken from the directions. Row numbers in the sole, and the finishing line “Weave in the ends”, are ours.