In 1976, Joan Tewksbury walked into the Lilly Pulitzer store in Edgartown and purchased a raffle ticket for one dollar. With that one ticket, and a bit of luck, she won an intricate needlepoint rug.
The rug followed Ms. Tewksbury from her summer home on the Vineyard through her time in Connecticut, Massachusetts and Santa Rosa, Calif., where she resides today.
Fifty years later, the rug has found its way back to the Vineyard.
The rug was originally donated by the Silver Needle of North Summer street in Edgartown, and was raffled in August of 1976 for the benefit of Felix Neck Sanctuary. A few weeks ago it returned to Felix Neck after Ms. Tewksbury decided it needed to be back on the Vineyard, where she has a long family history.
“My family started going there in 1922,” she said. “My mother’s family built a house the year I was born. So the first time I went was in June of 1937.”
“It was sort of a no-brainer when I thought to give it back,” she added.
Claudia Mohr, who was artist-in-residence of the Silver Needle at the time, designed the rug, and seven Vineyard women worked together to create it. This drew Ms. Tewksbury to the rug, as she knew how difficult it was to collaborate on needlepoint.
“If you know anything about needlepoint, the hardest thing is being consistent, even when just one person is doing it. When you’ve got this many people working on it, it is amazing that it turned out so incredibly beautiful,” Ms. Tewksbury said.
The rug is made up of six squares, each of which consists of 60,860 stitches. The combined total for the rug is 365,160 stitches.
“I love the fact that it’s got all these features of the Vineyard, the birds and the flowers,” Ms. Tewksbury said. “I think the design is really very special.
Each square features a creature who calls the Vineyard its home, including the American kestrel, least tern, belted kingfisher, sandpiper, plover and bobwhite.
“I think the sandpiper is probably my favorite, just because I love sandpipers,” Ms. Tewksbury said.
In 2023, Ms. Tewksbury reached out to Suzan Bellincampi, the director of Felix Neck. She visited Felix Neck that summer, and they spoke about the rug and its possible return to the Island.
“She told me about this rug and I thought it was amazing,” Ms. Bellincampi said. “She said, ‘Maybe someday it will get back here.’”
A couple of weeks ago, the rug arrived in the mail. Ms. Bellincampi said she plans to display it at the Felix Neck facility while also preserving it for as long as possible.
“I want to be really careful about it,” Ms. Bellincampi said. “It’s lasted 50 years…I want to make sure that it’s safe and secure for another 50 years.”