By: Virginia Gunn

Nineteenth century women regularly exhibited quilts, entering them in community fairs where thousands of visitors admired them. Extant fair records challenge quilt historians because of incompleteness, recording inconsistencies, imposed categories, time-lag responses, changing definitions, and gender reporting. However, analysis of three sets of Ohio records (Ohio State Fair, Wayne and Summit County Fairs) from 1850-1900 suggest fair records may help us sort out quiltmaking myths/realities and understand overall trends/changes at grassroots levels.

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Quilts at Nineteenth Century State and County Fairs: An Ohio Study  »

By: Pat Long

In my study of the notebooks of the Sisters Aid Society of the Richland Church of the Brethren between 1914-1937, I was interested to learn about the role of quiltmaking as a source of revenue for philanthropic activities in the church and community. During this period of time a total of 53 women were listed as members of the organization. Between the years 1927-1937, it was recorded that 114 quilts were quilted.

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Quiltmaking in the Richland, Pennsylvania Church of the Brethren, 1914-1937  »

By: Pat L. Nickols

Quilts that indicate the use of cotton sacks or bags were studied in the time period from the late 1800’s to the late 1960’s. These sacks were used throughout the country to hold grain, feed for animals and various household staples. Both plain sacks with printing showing their contents and paper labeled sacks printed with patterns similar to dress goods were included in this study.

In addition to gathering information from quilts (21),

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The Use of Cotton Sacks in Quiltmaking  »

By: Margaret Rolfe

In an Australia-wide survey of quilts from 1788 until 1945, it was found that while quilts were made in Australia, most were not quilted (that is they were not textile sandwiches made up of a top, filling, and backing which are stitched together). Styles of quiltmaking in Australia largely followed traditions from Britain: quilts pieced by the English method in which shapes are stitched over papers; quilts made by the log cabin method;

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Quilting: Its Absence in Australia  »

By: Lynn A. Bonfield

Using quotes from approximately thirty diaries, I will make an analysis of quilting in rural and urban homes before the sewing machine entered the market in the 1850’s and 60’s. This is an expansion of my 1981 article although I will include only dairies and will discuss only quilting quotes rather than the complete field of sewing.

In reading diaries from 1780 to 1860, I have noted all quotes relating to quilting,

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Diaries of New England Quilters Before 1860  »

By: Laurel Horton

In the late nineteenth century tens of thousands of southern families moved into textile mill villages, making the transition from farming economy to wage labor. Mill village life encouraged the continuation of some rural activities and adaptations of others. Mill women continued to make quilts but adapted them to the demands of mill work and to the availability of mill cloth. Research for this paper is based on interview and photographic material gathered by the South Carolina Quilt History Project between 1983-1985;

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The Textile Industry and South Carolina Quilts  »

By: Joyce B. Peaden

Quilts donated by the Relief Society of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints in the United States and Canada were sent to Church members (and to others) in every war ravaged country of Europe, and to Syria, Greece, Japan, and Korea as well, in the wake of World War II, and in the subsequent Korean War.

A major drive was conducted by the Relief Society in December,

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Donated Quilts Warmed Wartorn Europe  »

By: Joseph Stonuey and Patricia Cox Crews

The purpose of this study was to summarize and analyze selected portions of the data documenting quilts and the quiltmaking tradition in Nebraska, collected by the trained para-professionals associated with the Nebraska Quilt History Project, and supported by the National Endowment for the Arts, (1987). Focusing on quilts made and/or brought into Nebraska prior to 1940, the parameters examined included: quilt pattern, date, type of construction,

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The Nebraska Quilt History Project: Interpretations of Selected Parameters  »

By: Erma H. Kirkpatrick

In 1853 the Alamance Cotton Factory on Big Alamance Creek in Alamance County, North Carolina, became the first cotton mill south of the Potomac River to produce commercially dyed cotton plaids. This cloth, modeled after the imported wool tartans, was widely distributed as “Alamance Plaids”. Interrupted by the Civil War, production resumed after the end of the war in this factory and others in the area. By the late 1880’s Alamance plaids were a glut on the market and at that time were used as a backing for quilts and,

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A Study of “Alamance Plaids” and Their Use in North Carolina Quilts  »

By: Bets Ramsey

Interviews with thirty elderly black women from Tennessee, Alabama, and Georgia reveal some of the practices associated with the making of quilts from the post-Civil War period to the present. For the most part, in this region the process was learned in the homes of Anglo-Americans and passed down to later generations within the Negro family. The so-called West African influence is not evident. While most quilts were made for everyday use from dress scraps and salvaged material,

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The Land of Cotton: Quiltmaking by African-American Women in Three Southern States  »