The bookmarks shown here were all stitched on paper. These patterns could also be stitched on fabric.

Pressed Paper Pieces

The earliest stitched paper pieces had a pressed paper border.

Cards with elaborate embossed raised paper and punched borders became popular in the late 1840’s. Heavy paper was put through a press which produced raised textures and shapes. This type of embellished paper was often used as a border on invitations and for memorial tributes. It is genius that someone thought of punching small evenly spaced holes as part of the design of this embellished paper for stitching. The earliest stitched pieces have more border than stitching area. The later pieces had more stitching area and less elaborate borders.

These pressed paper pieces were commercially available.

They had a stitching area with 20 - 24 holes per inch.

Finding two similar perforated paper samplers is rare, especially bookmark samplers.
I own the 1877 sampler below. I do not own the 1866 sampler. I came across the forgotten 1866 picture while putting this information together. Usually in my documentation I only use pictures from my collection or with permission. The quality of the picture of the 1866 sampler is poor, but it needed to be included. When you see two similar counted thread samplers, you can guess that this format could be a school project or a family project - where a sibling had access to an older family sampler. The other option is that the format and patterns were commercially available - as bookmark patterns were.