When I was a kid in Alderson High School and dating Pearl, my Aunt Mildred gave me a beautifully embroidered Silk Scarf for me to give Pearl as a Christmas gift.

The Immigration & Naturalization Service had confiscated them, as they did many other things as Contraband that was trying to be smuggled into the USA without payment of the import fees. As often happens the INS had no use for the items and they would declare them as surplus and make them available to other Federal agencies for use. Generally it was for things as mundane as surplus military cloths and other similar, I recall that in one of theatrics there were box after box of blue seersucker WAC uniforms, pretty ugly and the inmates would not wear them, and so their they set until someone had nerve enough to send them to the dump. One item of clothing was a great hit, especially among the Girl/Boys was the Army field jacket and the navy raincoat.

The silk scarves came in and some one in a administrative position decided they were too good to give to the inmates and so, there they set also!

At that time, around 1946 the Institution still was having the Annual Far to which the community was invited and where the items sewn or made by the inmates was for sale to the public, someone had the smarts enough to put the Silk Scarves on sale for a bargain, that's how my aunt got one.

I gave it to Pearl for Xmas, it was about four feet square and lavishly embroidered and Pearl never wore it that I can remember, she did however keep it. A few years ago she found it in a drawer, it was rotten and fell apart with even the easiest of handling. I think she kept it even so.