Some years ago I made a beautiful doily from the reprint of Anne Orr's Tatting Book No. 35 which was published by Dover Publications. This book is a reprint of the 1940 Revised Edition, but the original version was published in 1935. I was lucky enough to obtain an original copy of the 1935 edition from eBay last year and then realised that the doily I had made from the Dover Reprint does not appear in the original volume.

A quick comparison of the two books showed me that not only are the pages in different orders but several pieces in each edition do not appear in the other. Here therefore is a full comparison to describe the contents of each book.

Let's look at the Tatting Book No. 35 published in 1935 first of all.

1. Front Cover
   This displays the small version of the circular doily with a border of motifs shown on the inside back cover of the Dover edition. The large version of the same doily is also shown.
2. Frontispiece
   Luncheon Set in Tatting - the rectangular doily set shown on Page 9 of the Dover edition.
3. Pages 4 and 5
   Medallions - these patterns are shown on Pages 20 and 21 of the Dover edition.
4. Pages 6 and 7
   Medallions - these patterns are shown on Pages 12 and 13 of the Dover Edition.
5. Pages 8 and 9
   Medallions - these patterns are shown on Pages 14 and 15 of the Dover Edition.
6. Pages 10 and 11 - Oval Doily Set
   This is shown on Page 11 of the Dover Edition. There is also a further illustration and instructions completing the pattern on Page 21 of the Dover Edition.
7. Pages 10 and 11 - Medallion Shamrock Edge doily set
   This is shown in the Dover Edition with four small doilies displayed on the inside back page which are above and below the large medallion centrepiece. Instructions in the Dover Edition are on Page 28.
8. Page 12 - Rectangular Luncheon Set
   This is the set shown on the frontispiece of the 1935 edition and instructions can be found on pages 9 and 18 of the Dover edition.
9. Page 13 - Baby Caps and Yoke
   These do not appear in the Dover edition. They provide photos and instructions of three exquisite baby caps and a camisole or nightdress yoke in tatting.
10. Page 14 - Large Round Doily
    Instructions for this are on Page 6 and Page 29 of the Dover Edition.
11. Page 15, 16 and 17 - Round Doilies in Tatting for a Luncheon Set
    This is shown on Pages 16, 17, 19 and 29 of the Dover Edition.
12. Page 18 - Edgings and Insertions
    These are not shown in the Dover Edition.
13. Page 19 - Edgings
    These are shown on Page 23 and Page 26 of the Dover Edition.
14. Page 20 - Edgings
    These are shown on Page 22 of the Dover Edition.
15. Page 21 - Edgings
    These are shown on Page 24 and Page 26 of the Dover Edition.
16. Page 22 - Edgings
    These are not shown on the Dover edition.
17. Page 23 - Edgings
    These are shown on Page 25 of the Dover Edition and include the two Split Ring patterns in the book.
18. Page 24 - Baby Caps
    These are not included in the Dover edition.
19. Page 25 - Linen Luncheon Set
    This is in fact an edging using a new technique which Anne Orr invented using the reverse stitch to create knotted picots. It is not shown in the Dover reprint edition.

The remainder of Page 25, Page 26, Page 27, Page 28, and Page 29 contain the remaining instructions for the pieces on earlier pages. This was common practice in old books when diagrams were not used and is the main reason why it is necessary to check carefully that all pages are present.

20. Page 30
    This contains the directions for the Reverse Stitch shown on Page 30 of the Dover Publications edition.
21. Next Page - entitled Good Housekeeping
    The next two pages of the 1935 volume contain an advertisement for the American Thread Company's Book of Tatting Designs No. 1also available as a Dover reprint edition under the title of Tatting with Anne Orr. This takes the form of the full pattern for the large doily shown on the cover of the blue book!
22. The next few pages are unnumbered, but include a set of three doilies which are not included in the Dover reprint of the Tatting Book No. 35. They are however included in the blue book.
23. The last page of the original edition includes instructions for tatting, and an article which would normally be included as an introduction to a book published today.

The doilies shown on Pages 4, 5 and 8 of the Dover edition do not appear in the 1935 edition of the book. There are also no instructions for the fantastic large centrepiece on the front cover of the Dover edition in the 1935 edition.

The reasons for the major changes which Anne Orr made to the 1935 edition of the book when it was reprinted in 1940 are unclear. It is particularly surprising that the instructions for the reverse stitch picots edging did not appear in the later editions of this book considering that this represented a completely new technique correctly described for the first time. I would suggest however that the last few doilies included in the book were a way of getting people to buy books by the American Thread Company which also contained patterns by Anne Orr and that perhaps space was the main reason for the changes. It could also be that the original books had gone out of print so there was no point in including patterns to encourage people to buy them. Anne perhaps also wanted to provide new patterns but did not at the time have sufficient for a whole new book. I am aware of later editions of the Tatting Book No. 35, and it would be fascinating to know whether further changes were made to these as well. In the meantime it has been a very interesting exercise to compare the two volumes of patterns to see where changes were made.