Rebecca Price began stitching her picture in 1861, depicting what may be the Virgin Mary in three stages of her life, although the source for her design remains unidentified. Popular in the mid-nineteenth century, pictures worked from printed patterns in bright, soft wool yarns were called “Berlin work” after the region where they originated. Rebecca’s picture descended in her family, who offered it with the story that it remained unfinished until 1865. The years that Rebecca’s needle remained inactive spanned some of the most tumultuous in American history—the same years her future husband served as a soldier in the Civil War (1861–1865). Rebecca married Charles in 1867, three years after he completed his military service.