Thursday, April 12, 2018

Quilt Mysteries

A footnote from history by Stephanie Grace Whitson

Quilts played an integral part in my becoming a novelist. Early in my writing journey, I purchased a set of unfinished quilt blocks at a country auction, delighted by the colors (madder browns and rusts), amazed by the maker's skill (diamonds where the points MATCHED), and sad that the pieces hadn't ever been connected to make a quilt. I wondered why. In a fabric dating class, I later learned that those pieces predated 1867, the date when Nebraska became a state. How did they get here? Why weren't they ever finished? What story could they tell? Those musings played a role in the story of Jesse King, a woman traveling the Oregon Trail, and that story became my first novel, Walks the Fire

The stories behind old quilts inspire me to study them and to help research the quilts in the collection at the International Quilts Study Center and Museum, where I'm a member of the Genealogical Task Force, comprised of five volunteers who delight in spending hours researching names and dates. 

Some of the quilts in my personal collection suggest stories, too. Here are a few of the mysteries they represent to my overactive imagination ... and the answers I've found so far:

This wool quilt, purchased at an estate auction in Palmyra, Nebraska, suggests that something important happened in January, 1926. The quilt isn't finished (there's no back), but embroidered initials and symbols surely had significance for the family. Lesson learned: ask questions on the day of the sale. Don't expect to learn much when the sale is over and the family has parted ways. 


I purchased the quilt represented by the single block on the right as an intentional rescue. While it's lovely, it's faded and its price at a local estate sale proved it wasn't valued by anyone but me. I brought it home and it wasn't until I photographed it months later that I realized the maker had quilted both initials and the year 1880 into the sashing. Who was "A.E.S."? What happened in 1880? Quilted hearts make me wonder A.E.S. was a bride-to-be making a wedding quilt, but that's just a story. I don't know. I never will. The mystery remains. 

I purchased this quilt (left) at an antique mall in North Carolina, and while I don't know much about it other than the fact that the vibrant graphics appealed to me,I do think the maker may have lived on a farm. Why? The back is a walnut-dyed feed sack that once contained "Choice Virginia cornmeal." Was the quilt made in Virginia? Possibly. How did it get to North Carolina? Mystery. 

It's not uncommon to find silk ribbons incorporated into Victorian crazy quilts. One of mine includes this ribbon that commemorates an "FE&MVRR" outing October 16, 1888. Research reveals that the Fremont Elkhorn
& Missouri Valley Railroad was established in 1869 Nebraska and often called "the Elkhorn." I imagine a Victorian lady taking the excursion and enjoying it enough that she kept the ribbon and added it to the crazy quilt.  


The origin of the "mysterious" stains on this quilt is no longer a mystery. I was drawn to this lovely quilt in spite of those stains because it's entirely machine quilted, and that's unusual for a late 1800s quilt. A textile expert told me about those stains many years later. This is what can happen when a quilt touches the wood of a cedar chest. This quilt was probably stored in a cedar chest, and the wood oils migrated into the fabric. Ouch. I still love it. 





And here's the last quilt mystery for this post. I wanted this quilt because of the elephant. Someone loved the
circus! Look at those blue eyes! But ... why has the embroidery been picked out of the block that spells NANY? Did someone leave the "c" out of the name Nancy and intend to fix it? Or did Nany do something terrible enough to make a quiltmaker want to remove his/her name from the quilt? (I used that idea in my novel The Shadow on the Quilt.)



Do you cherish something that suggests a mystery you'd like solved?

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Stephanie Grace Whitson's Keepsake Legacies series uses cherished keepsakes (a quilt, a charm string, and a small box of treasures) as a way of telling the story of three pioneer women. 

In book one of the series, Sarah Biddle's patchwork quilt tells the story of her life, but Sarah's niece, Lorna, doesn't realize the stories Aunt Sarah told her were true. 



14 comments:

  1. So fun. My husband has several items from his ancestors with stories.The most unusual one is a flat stone with a hole in it. His ancestor was very creative. He bored a hole in a flat lime stone slab. Then tied it to the back of the small wagon he rode while plowing. He'd plow a furrow and then drop seeds into the row from his perch on the wagon seat.Then the rock on the back covered the dirt back over the furrow. Great idea. He never patented it. He just figured out a way to make his life easier. Thanks to your post my mind is purcolating about many of the items collected from our ancestors displayed in an old legal bookcase in my home. Yes, even the bookcase could have a story. Thanks for a great post.

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    1. Thank you for sharing that about that innovative farmer! I've seen a few photos and read memoirs where the child perched on the plow and assigned the task of dropping the seeds talked about their experience. That bookcase sounds like a real gem, not to mention the contents.

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  2. Oh man, I love this post! Now I'm going to have to look for quilts when I'm out and about!

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    1. Glad it inspired you to keep an eye out for textile history ;-).

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  3. Stephanie, I love this post about your quilts & the mysteries surrounding them. Thank you for sharing & the pictures.
    Blessings, Tina

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  4. I echo Mrs. Tina's comments above.

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  5. Loved this post about quilts and their mystery or origin. Thank you for sharing. Your books sounds like ones I must read.

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    1. Thanks, Marilyn. I'm in the process of putting my Quilt Chronicles books back in print, but you might be able to find a used copy of the original or ask for them at your local library. Three books, the titles: The Key on the Quilt, The Shadow on the Quilt, the Message on the Quilt.

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  6. I loved reading about these quilts and the mysteries around them. The pictures are wonderful. Seeing the stains on the one quilt from being against the wood in a cedar chest has me thinking I need to check on the quilt I have in my mother's cedar chest.

    This post has sent me down memory lane thinking about the quilts my grandmother had on the bed I slept in when we visited her every other summer. My favorite had girls with sunbonnets on. I've looked for "Sunbonnet Sue" quilts to see if I could find the pattern. The one I keep finding looks like a young child. Grandmother's quilt had taller, more slender girls on it. I wish I could find the right pattern.

    I'm going to have to look for this series of books. They sound wonderful.

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    1. "Slender" girls with bonnets were sometimes called Colonial Lady. Maybe that's it?

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    2. Thank you. I will look for that.

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  7. Thank you for sharing your very interesting post.

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    1. You're welcome, Melanie. Thanks for being a faithful reader.

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