Sister Sarah, Shaker Settlement, Mt. Lebanon, New York

1927

Medium

Platinum print

Dimensions

20.4 × 15.5 cm

Status

In Museum Collection

Collect24 Art ID

C24-879160

Sarah Collins (1855-1947) was an eldress at the Shaker colony of Mount Lebanon. She is shown here holding some needlepoint, possibly from the shop she ran that featured crafts produced by the sect. When Doris Ulmann visited her, this longtime head of the Shaker's South Family society was in her early seventies. Like many of her faith, she would live to an unusually old age, dying at ninety-two. The Shakers' individual longevity, and their imminent disappearance in spite of it, most likely attracted Ulmann to this small but industrious group. (See another member of the settlement [87.XM.89.62](https://www.getty.edu/art/collection/objects/62346/doris-ulmann-sister-adelaide-shaker-settlement-mt-lebanon-new-york-american-1927/)). A few years after Ulmann photographed Collins, the eldress would, at the time of her fellow Shaker Elder Anderson's death (1840-1930) (see [87.XM.89.106](https://www.getty.edu/art/collection/objects/62456/doris-ulmann-brother-william-of-the-shaker-settlement-mount-lebanon-new-york-american-about-1925-1927/)), bring his additional talent for draftsmanship to the attention of the local press and make a donation of one of his drawings to the local art museum. …