Tribute on Miriam Rice’s 90th birthday
by Anna-Elise Torkelsen
Lillemor writes on February 26, 2025: “When looking for pictures I found the short talk I gave at Miriam’s 90th birthday during the 4th IFFF Symposium in 1988 in gratitude for her work that means so much to fungi dyers all over the world.” Other news from Lillemor on the Norwegian mushroom dyers here.
Dear Miriam, dear friends,
I’m so pleased to be here tonight on this very special occasion, celebration of Miriam’s 90th birthday. This is the best opportunity ever, for me to express my sincere thanks to you. You have been a great inspirator to me and all the other Norwegian mushroom dyers. Back in 1979 (5 years after it was published) I got your first book “Let’s try mushrooms for color”. I got the book from a friend living in the States and I believe this is the first copy that came to Norway. Well, my first thought was, can really mushrooms be used for dyeing wool and silk? The Norwegian tradition was to use plants and lichens for that purpose – mushrooms were to be eaten or avoided – they could be poisonous. But your book showed me my first steps into a wonderful world of colours. Together with Brit Jørgensen and Inger Næss, I began to experiment with different fungi. I gave lectures and classes and many got interested, and now we are a group of 140 mushroom dyers in our country.
I went to Sorø in 1985 where I met you, Tigerlily, Andrea and Lollie and you all said: “Come to Mendocino in 1988 for the fourth symposium”. And you showed pictures from this nice town. And I went, together with Brit, Inger and her husband Dagfin, and we had a wonderful time at Albion River. I know that among us today, some of you were at that symposium, and it has been nice seeing you again, 20 years since the first meeting.
This was the beginning, and I have been to all the symposia since 1985. Both Inger and Brit wanted to come this year, but since they have health problems, they could not make the trip. But they send their warmest greetings to all their friends.
I’m very impressed by you Miriam and what you have done for the mushroom dyers all over the world. You got us all started, you have developed new technics and made a lot of experiments which have been of great importance. The paper making, making watercolour paint – just to mention a few of your themes.
It is a common habit in Norway to bring flowers to those who have birthday. Since bringing fresh flowers all the way from Norway is difficult, Betsy came up with the idea of making felted flowers to bring. She led a workshop, about 10 dyers met and under her instructions we felted, crocheted and made flowers from wool, silk and old nylon stockings. And these flowers we want to give to you today. Miriam, this is a gift from all the Norwegian Mushroom Dyers – Happy Birthday!!
We also want to thank Nancy and Dorothy for all they have done to make this symposium such a wonderful event – thank you very, very much.
Myco-Roaming with Miriam
by Dorothy Beebee, founding member of the IMDI
How did it all start? In 1973, I had just completed illustrating the book “Warping All by Yourself” by Cay Garrett, which was finally published by Christine and Robert Thresh of Thresh Publications in Santa Rosa in May 1974. We were living in Monte Rio at the time, Bob was working as a ranch caretaker up in Philo at El Rancho Navarro while I stayed back in Monte Rio with Martin. The photos up there in Philo date to April 1974 so Martin turned 5 in April and would have started kindergarten the following September. We would go up to El Rancho on the weekends by Greyhound bus to hang out with Bob.
At some point during this time, the Threshes contacted me and asked me to illustrate a little book they were putting together about natural dyes from mushrooms written by an artist living up in Mendocino, Miriam C. Rice. They drove me up to Mendocino to meet Miriam (when?). If I am remembering correctly, all the Threshes had at first were some notes and mushroom dyed wool samples which Miriam had brought to show them. Thresh Publications had already published several small pamphlets about spinning with a drop spindle and making natural dyes, which is probably how Miriam had heard about them.
There were a lot of fiber artists living in the Mendocino area at that time and Miriam was teaching children’s art classes at the Mendocino Art Center and also at College of the Redwoods in Fort Bragg. It was apparently in one of those classes at the Art Center that she was teaching the kids how to make what she called “garbage dyes” out of such things as onion skins and carrot tops. She was also an avid hunter of edible mushrooms and one day on a whim picked some inedible bright yellow “sulphur tuft” mushrooms and threw them into the dye pot with some white wool to get an amazing bright yellow dye. (This is all detailed in the Mushrooms for Dyes, Paper, Pigments & Myco-Stix™ book). She immediately began experimenting with other mushrooms and kept notes of her mushroom dye experiments.
Robert and Christine convinced Miriam to return and put all her findings into manuscript form, which they then sent to me to make some mushroom drawings. I remember being so taken with it that I convinced the Threshes that they really needed to have color photos, rather than just pen & ink drawings in this book for it to make any sense at all.
At this time, Martin and I were spending weekends and longer periods of time up with Bob in Philo, and we started hunting mushrooms in the verdant woods to draw for Miriam’s book. We also had a challenging arrangement by which she would send mushrooms about 30 miles from the Mendocino post office via a very patient postman to an exceedingly patient postmaster in Philo who would then call me up at the ranch to walk down across the swinging suspension footbridge over the raging Navarro River to pick up a bunch of “smelly mushrooms” at the Philo post office! That is how the drawings of one Coprinus comatus mushroom turned into three drawings, as the “Shaggy Mane” on the frontispiece of Let’s Try Mushrooms for Color slowly and deliberately deliquesced in front of me!
Martin, who was 4 or 5 at that time, was my best mushroom collector since he was so close to the ground and so observant and curious about everything, and he always had Mama Dog following him and so if he got too far ahead of me, I could always call on Mama Dog (who was part shepherd, I think) to round him up and bring him back toward me. And I would study and draw the mushrooms at night, trying to learn and identify everything I could.