Flax is a plant with long fibers and can be worked into linen. If you visit historical farms and such there almost always is a set of combs that were the tools to do this. Linen is a valuable fabric that would take hard work to make. We call flax batchelor buttons now. Hemp is turned into rope or twine. It can still be purchsed. It also has long fibers and is woven into rope by twisting several strands together. We had lots of this growing as a weed. Seems someone had the idea to have farmers grow this to help the war effort in the 1940s. Indigo was another crop that was used to make dyes and quite valuable. Think how lucky we are these days. Jo Ann Patterson Baxley teacherbaxley@earthlink.net