The Rural Voice, 2005-07, Page 16Angelika and Kristine Hammel show some felted wool processed on their felting table at Lindenhof Wool Mill.
Spinning a dream
Angelika Hammel hopes to make wool a valuable commoditg for Ontario's
sheep farmers, not a near -useless product that often costs more to shear off the
sheep than it brings in the marketplace
Story and photos by Keith Roulston
Angelika Hammel has a vision
for the sheep industry in
Ontario. Instead of wool
having little worth, a nuisance that
costs more to shear than it brings in
the market, she wants to see it as a
Below left, the draw frame
stretches and twists the "rovings".
Below right, the spinning machine
has eight spindles.
profitable part of the sheep
enterprise.
Hammel knows from bitter
experience how little Ontario farmers
can expect to get from their wool.
She got an unusual start in the sheep
business when she was given two
sheep for her 50th birthday. She
became a hand -spinner and got more
sheep. But with the first shearing of
her flock of Romney sheep, she
12 THE RURAL VOICE
received three cents a pound for her
fleece. As other sheep farmers
discovered before her, the return on
wool didn't pay for the shearing
costs.
Unlike other shepherds, however,
Hammel was determined to do
something about it. From magazines
from hand spinners she knew of a
company in Prince Edward Island
that made mini -mills for small-scale