The “Variable Star” pattern was used for the 7-inch pieced blocks that alternate with 7-inch plain blocks. The pieced blocks have examples of a variety of roller-printed fabrics. Around all four edges of the quilt are ten inch red and blue floral print triangles. The initials “S N” are cross-stitched in brown silk on the lining which consists of three lengths of plain-woven cotton. The quilt has a cotton filling and is quilted 6 stitches per inch. No separate binding, the front and lining are turned in and sewn with a running stitch. This quilt is an example of mid-nineteenth century quilting utilizing a variation of the popular star design.
Pieced 8-inch blocks in the “Evening Star” (or “Sawtooth Star”) pattern are set diagonally with 8-inch plain blocks. Blocks are pieced of roller-printed cottons (1830-1860s), woven stripes, and checks. The border (22-inches on the sides, 21-inch bottom) is a geometric roller-printed cotton. Lined with an ivory cotton, filled with cotton, and quilted at 7 stitches per inch. No separate binding, the front and lining are turned in and sewn with a running stitch. Star patterns are popular quilting designs and this mid-19th century example uses a variety of fabrics with both printed and woven designs.
This patriotic quilt in red and green was the inspiration for Edith Magnette’s watercolor (Plate 227) that was part of the Index of American Design project (1935-1942). Edith Magnette rendered over 50 items for the Index , many of them textile-related.
The quilt was originally owned by Mrs. Charles Gramm and made by her grandmother. It was lent to the project by Louise Zotti, and donated by her to the National Museum of American History.
The central eagle motif, surrounded by 8-pointed stars, is typical of patriotic symbols of the mid-19th century. The blocks on the border are in the “Oak Leaf and Reel” pattern, also typical of the period.
A poppy motif dominates this pieced, appliqued and embroidered quilt, probably assembled by Cynthia Hobby (1770-1863) and quilted by her granddaughter Mary Elizabeth Hitchcock Seamans (1839-1881). Twenty-five 15½-inch blocks are framed by a 9-inch border that has appliqued clusters of cherries with leafy stems and is edged with pieced sawtooth bands. Fine quilting, 12 stitches per inch, outlines all the appliqued motifs. Diagonal grid and diagonal line quilting further enhance the blocks and border on this well designed quilt.
This is one of three quilts donated by the same family.
Also known as the “Seamstresses’ Quilt,” this red and green example of mid-19th century quilting was in the George Slothower family of Baltimore County, Maryland. He was a wholesale dry goods merchant and the owner of two cotton mills: the Powhatan and Pocahontas Mills. Apparently at the time this quilt was crafted, resident seamstresses, usually of German or Dutch origin, made the family clothing and most likely this quilt.
The center basket of flowers is framed by floral-and-leaf panels and borders, each accented with red saw-tooth bands. Echo quilting highlights each of the motifs on this appliquéd quilt.
Mary Maphis Copp pieced this cotton quilt in the mid-19th century. The center panel consists of alternating “Nine-patch” and plain white 6" blocks. It is framed by a border of 24 blocks in the“Sunflower” or “Blazing Star” pattern.
The sunflowers are unusual in that they have nineteen petals. The quilting patterns of outline, double-line diagonal grid, and parallel lines enhance the design. There is no separate binding; instead the back was brought to the front and whipstitched. The quilt is a distinctive combination of a simple pattern in the center panel with a more complicated pattern in the border blocks.
Mary C. [Catherine] Maphis was born September 8, 1831, to John H. and Fannie V. Headley Maphis in Woodstock, Va. She married George W. Copp (1825-1899), a farmer, on November 7, 1850. They settled at Fisher’s Hill, a small village near Strasburg, Va. George and Mary had eight children: Frances (1851-1943), John W. (1852-1917), William H. (b. 1854), David E. (1855-1926), Silas A. ( 1856-1926), Barbara R. (b. 1859), George V. (b. 1862), and Benjamin (b. 1872). According to family information, their home was the site of a Civil War battle. It was burned and all their belongings lost.
Fisher’s Hill was part of Maj. Gen. Philip Sheridan’s Shenandoah Valley Campaign September 21-22, 1864. The Confederate Army retreated (casualty estimates of 1,235 to the Union’s 528) and left the Valley open to a “scorched earth” invasion in which dwellings and other buildings were burnt from Staunton to Strasburg, Virginia.
The Copp family eventually relocated to Strasburg. Mary died on February 11, 1886. She is buried in the Strasburg Presbyterian Church Cemetery. The quilt was donated to the National Museum by her granddaughter Mrs. Irene Copp Pifer, the daughter of Mary’s son, John W. Copp.
Olive Bender made this quilt for her son and daughter-in-law as a Christmas gift in the 1940s. Her grandson, David Bender, later donated the quilt. He recalled that his grandmother would work on quilt patches during the warm months, and then, in the winter, quilt on frames she would set up in the dining room of her Ohio farmhouse.
Nine 16”-inch blocks, appliquéd and embroidered in the “Water Lily” pattern, are set in pink and white sashing. The lily buds, leaves, water, lily pad, and flower details are embroidered. Various patterns quilted at 7 stitches per inch and scalloped edges complete the overall quilt design.
Popular in the 1920s to 1940s, the “Water Lily” motif was available in kit form or as a paper pattern. Quilt historian, Cuesta Benberry, traced this pattern to the Rainbow Quilt Block Company owned by William Pinch. His company perfected a printing process that stamped colors on muslin squares indicating the color of embroidery threads needed to complete the motif and gave the company its name, Rainbow. William Pinch (1880-1972), a professional photographer, created as many as 1,000 designs for his company. Advertised in flyers, newsletters and catalogs, the kits and patterns could be purchased by mail or in retail stores making them available to small towns and rural areas.
Olive Mae (nee Fairall) Bender was born February 13, 1892, in Frazeysburg, Ohio. She died April 18, 1971, in East Sparta, Ohio. Her quilt is an example of mid-20th-century quilting and of a design available from the Rainbow Quilt Block Company, one of many companies that promoted quilting from the 1920s on by publishing patterns and providing quilting kits.
Adele Paturel created this fascinating example of crazy patchwork before her marriage to Emile Soher in 1895. The unlined pillow sham has a dark red plush border with an embroidered fan in one corner. Delightful embroidered motifs (many three-dimensional) include a hand with a bead ring; a hot air balloon and basket; an embroidered mailbox (“USM”) surrounded by birds with letters in their beaks; a harp with strings; a bird and nest with eggs; “Flor Cuba Havana” on a box of cigars; a spider on a web inscribed with “climbing up”; a pocket watch and many other designs. Several patches have animal motifs such as a cat inscribed with “who says mice,” a deer, a retriever dog and ducks, a squirrel, a bear (California State Flag motif), and an eagle. Elaborate stitches anchor the various patches.
Adele Paturel crafted this pillow sham dated “1893” to accompany a larger crazy-patch parlor throw also in the Collection (TE.T16996). Her two daughters donated the parlor throw in 1973, and twenty years later this smaller (33” x 33”) companion piece that had been in a frame.
Adele Paturel was born in Santiago, Chile, in 1865. She was brought to San Francisco, California as an infant and lived there until her death in 1954. She married Emile Soher (1863-1910) in 1895. The whimsical motifs and multiple examples of fancy stitching are very typical of the crazy-patch fashion of the late 19th century.
According to family information, Sara Ann Mellon crafted this quilt before her marriage to Robert Dickey in 1864. Nine 16-inch blocks are appliqued with stylized star flowers, oak leaves, and sprigs of berries. The berry stems are accentuated with chain stitch embroidery. It was said that the meandering vine in the border was stitched with a hand-turned sewing machine, all the other stitching is by hand.
Sara Ann Mellon was born February 18, 1841 in Cameron, Marshall County, Virginia (now West Virginia). She married Robert Dickey (1836-1909), a veteran of the 6th West Virginia Infantry. He enlisted in 1861. Severely wounded in the summer of 1864, he was discharged in the fall. He and Sara married December 22, 1864, in Greene County, Pennsylvania. They had three children: George W., Clara, and John H. Sara died in 1927.
Eliza Rosecrans Hussey personalized her pieced wool-and silk-star quilt with symbols of the Masonic Society. The embroidered motifs are interspersed between twenty-five blocks pieced in a variation of the “Feathered Star” pattern. Another silk quilt in the Collection was also made by Eliza, and was embroidered with symbols and inscriptions of the Odd Fellows. Edward Simmons Hussey, her husband, was an active member of both the Masons and the Odd Fellows.
Eliza, born October 14, 1816, in Pennsylvania, went with her family to Indiana as a young child. She married September 17, 1835. Edward Simmons Hussey in Carlisle, Indiana. They lived in various Indiana towns while Edward worked as a merchant, hotel manager, book keeper, and express agent.
By 1860 they had settled in Brazil, Indiana, where Eliza worked as a milliner. There they raised their family of ten children. Eliza, after some years as an invalid, died March 23,1880. Her carefully designed and crafted quilts are a reminder of the importance of benevolent societies such as the Masons and the Odd Fellows in the developing towns and cities in the Midwest in the first half of the nineteenth century.
Elizabeth Coates Wileman made this pieced and appliquéd child's quilt in the mid-nineteenth century while living in Ohio. Sixteen blocks are pieced of red, green, yellow and white printed cottons in a Carpenter's Wheel pattern. These blocks are set diagonally with blue and white printed cotton squares and triangles. Two appliquéd sawtooth edges, one red and one green, complete the 5½-inch border.
Esther Coates, a Quaker, was born in Coatesville, Pennsylvania in 1817. She married Abram G. Wileman in 1844 in Massillon, Ohio, they divorced in 1858. They had two children Flora born in 1850, who died as a young child and Erasmus Darwin born in 1854. The quilt was probably made for Flora. Abram G. Wileman, a physician and war hero, served in the Civil War and was killed in 1863. Esther studied medicine at Penn Medical University in Philadelphia and received her degree in 1855. She practiced medicine in New Jersey. Esther died in 1873 and is buried in the Drumore Friends Cemetery in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania. The quilt was donated to the Museum in 1964 by Dr. Lorin E. Kerr, Jr. the great grandson of Esther.
This quilt, pieced in the “Brick Wall” pattern, is composed of 2¼” x 3” rectangles. The rectangles were pieced in strips and artfully joined so that light and dark colors form diagonal stripes creating a dramatic overall effect. A roller-printed cotton depicting a pastoral scene, was used for the lining. This particular fabric, probably English, includes a man fishing, a woman carrying a hayrake, and an amorous couple in front of a cottage.
Twenty-one different roller printed cottons were used to craft this quilt, a variation of the “Nine-patch” pattern. Seven inch blocks are set diagonally with a 3 ½-inch roller-printed sashing. The side and bottom borders are 25 inches wide. The cotton border fabric is a pillar print with baskets, a popular motif of the period. Two corners are cut out. The lining consists of four lengths of plain-woven white cotton. The filling is cotton. It is quilted 7 stitches per inch. The binding is a 1 inch (finished) straight strip of border fabric seamed to the front, sewn to the lining with running stitches. The assortment of period fabrics contributes to the design of this quilt.
Adaline Lusby made this example of a chintz applique quilt in 1837-1838. The quilt design is composed of floral motifs cut from two different chintz fabrics. The center lattice-work basket features a parrot on the front and another perched on one of the branches in the basket. Flowering cactus and sprays of anemones frame the basket, surrounded by a flowering vine of roses and anemones, and, an outer row of sprays of roses. Strips of plain red cotton cut in points and valleys creates a vibrant border. Quilted floral motifs fill the white spaces.
Adaline Wineberger was born c. 1808 in Washington D.C. In 1837, about the time the quilt was made, Adaline married James Lusby (1803-1866). They had three children; James, Sarah, and Fanny. Adaline died in Washington D.C. on October 18, 1895.
According to a note with the quilt when it was donated by her granddaughter, Adelaide Rado, it was rescued from a packing trunk that had floated in a flooded cellar for several days after a tornado in 1915. “The quilt was hung in the garden to dry but unfortunately left stains which have discolored the under part, rather than the top.” Better the lining than the top! Adaline’s carefully planned-out quilt is a nice example of cut-out chintz quilt design.
In 1940 Eugene Teter donated to the Museum this patriotic quilt made by his great-grandmother in 1861 for his grandfather, a Union soldier from Indiana. Mary Rockhold Teter based her pieced and appliquéd quilt on a design published in the July 1861 issue of Peterson's Magazine , a popular women's periodical published in Philadelphia. She personalized it by quilting the name of her son, George Teter, and the names of Generals Scott and Taylor under whom he served. Also found in the quilting are "Abe "and "Ab Lyncoln," "Genral Lyon," the word "Cat" and the year "1861." There are thirty-four stars appliquéd in the center diamond and the same number appliquéd in the border. They represent the number of states in the Union from July 4, 1861 until July 4, 1863, the Civil War years.
Mary Rockhold was born in Ohio in 1817 and married Thomas E. Teter in 1838. They moved to Indiana in 1846 and had seven children; four daughters died in infancy, three sons attained adulthood. Mary and Thomas were fortunate enough to celebrate their Golden Anniversary in 1888. Mary died in 1897 in Noblesville, Indiana. This "Stars and Stripes" patriotic quilt is a reminder of her devotion to family and country.
"She was of a family of strong, patriotic Revolutionary stock, and inherited a willingness to do and to labor that the country might grow. Her grand-father was Capt. John Rockhold a native of Pennsylvania, who served in the War for Independence. Her father, Joseph Rockhold, moved from Pennsylvania to Ohio in 1800. He was a captain in the War of 1812. This trait of patriotism was one of the strongest in the character of Mrs. Teter. During the late war she showed her great love for the soldier boys in many ways, aiding in every way she could to encourage and help in the country's peril."
This bassinet quilt with a framed center design is made of high-quality plain blue and white cotton feed sack fabrics. Dorothy Overall of Caldwell, Kansas, a contestant in many sewing events in the 1950s and 1960s, pieced and appliquéd this quilt on a Pfaff sewing machine she had won in a contest. In 1959 she won the National Cotton Bag Sewing Contest that included a vacation trip to Hollywood as part of the prize.
According to Dorothy, cotton feed sack fabric was light enough for summer, almost as nice as percale and the colors didn’t fade. Cotton sacks for flour, animal feed and other commodities were produced in many colors and prints. Flour and feed companies found that their sales were often influenced by the popularity of their sacks which were used for clothes and household items.
When this quilt was donated in 1917 it was accompanied by a note: “Quilt pieced by Louise Ward 1854 and quilted by Louise Harrison 1858.” Little further information was given, but they may have been relatives of the donor who was from Iowa.
Red, green, and orange cottons were effectively used to make this mid-19th century quilt. The appliquéd “Love Apple” pattern is framed by a 7-inch border appliquéd with toothed swags and tassels. Outline quilting was used for the flowers, accented by concentric arcs and diagonal lines on the background and quilted at 9 stitches per inch. It is bound with a straight strip of cotton.
The Report on the Progress and Condition of the United States National Museum for the Year Ending June 30, 1917 recorded the quilt as a gift from Dr. Carrie Harrison. “Illustrating household industry in the textile arts . . . a cotton appliqué quilt, pieced and quilted by a relative before 1859 . . . . At different times, she also donated several other items of interest to the textile collection.
Dr. Carrie Harrison, a native of Iowa, was the first curator at the National Herbarium. In that role she traveled internationally in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. According to A Biographical Dictionary of Contemporary Women of the United States and Canada 1914-1915 “[Carrie] At 16 taught a country school; at 17-18 managed a farm; later became interested in botany and with a book, dog and horse as companions made several prize collections of Iowa plants. At the time of the Boxer uprising in China [she] was the means of getting a cablegram through to the American Legation in Peking, which probably saved all the foreign embassies in China. This was called by Andrew D. White the finest piece of diplomacy in 1900.”
A woman of many accomplishments, she was known as a suffragette and botanist who coined the 4-H motto “To Make the Best Better.” The “Love Apple” Quilt is an apt donation by a botanist to enrich a textile collection.
This crazy-patch piano cover or runner was constructed of two rows of 12 ½-inch blocks pieced of silks, satins, velvet, and ribbon. The patches were embellished with embroidered, painted, and beadwork motifs. Among the decorations are painted flowers, a painted frog, printed and painted "Kate Greenaway" figures, and silk ribbon flowers. The blocks are constructed on muslin squares and held in place by embroidered fancy stitches. The lining is a loose-weave cotton, roller-printed with a floral and scroll design. The embroidered initials “E.S.” probably refer to Eva Gibbs Shaw, who made the piano cover.
Eva Gibbs was born in Iowa in 1859. She married William Shaw in 1885. They had two daughters and lived in Washington, D.C.
A stamped inscription of leaves and a bird frame the names: “Eby Byers & Catherine Byers” and the place, “Chambersburg.” Below Chambersburg is noted "1837," in a penned ink inscription ---possibly a later addition? Did Catherine make this quilt?
Catherine Byers, born in 1805, was the daughter of Frederick Byers and Anna Eby of Pennsylvania. Catherine married James Crawford (1799-1872) in 1826. They raised their children and lived on the family homestead in Franklin County, Pennsylvania. Catherine died in 1892. Both came from families who were early settlers of Pennsylvania, some of whom had fought in the Revolutionary War.
Thirty-six pieced blocks, each with a center square of dark blue printed cotton and three appliquéd leaves at each corner create a unique pattern. The central focus is the 9 ¾-inch-block with the inked drawing and inscription. The quilt is framed by a 6-inch border and is quilted at 10 stitches per inch. As no information was included with the quilt, it is difficult to know who made the quilt and the significance of the date.
Lizzie Lisle appliquéd this red and white quilt in about 1870, probably in Cadiz, Iowa before her marriage. Sixteen 14¾ -inch blocks are appliquéd with red conventionalized flowers and four spade-shaped leaves. Each flower has cut-outs forming a cross, revealing the white ground beneath. The center is framed by a 2-inch red band. An 11-inch white border is embellished with a traditional appliqué pattern of swags, bows, and tassels.
This quilt was referred to in a 1949 Woman’s Day magazine as a “Lincoln Drape” quilt. In the period from 1865 to 1875, a popular swag pattern known as “Lincoln Drape” was used to commemorate the death of Abraham Lincoln and can be found on other decorative items such as glassware. The whole piece is quilted 11 to 12 stitches per inch, with diagonal grid and triple diagonal line patterns.
Elizabeth (Lizzie) Lisle, born in Ohio in 1836, was the daughter of John Lisle (1803-1890s) and Elizabeth Johnston (1811-1889). Members of the extended Lisle family were early settlers in Jefferson and Harrison Counties in Ohio, but many also moved westward and settled in Iowa. It was in Jasper County, Iowa, on February 11, 1886, that Lizzie married Eden Randall. Eden was born in Delaware County, Ohio, about 1840 and served in the Civil War (Co. G, 3rd Iowa Volunteer Infantry).
Mustered in June 8, 1861, Eden was taken prisoner on April 6, 1862, in Shiloh, Tennessee. In January 1863 he was part of a prisoner exchange and rejoined his company, only to be severely wounded in the face and mouth on June 12, 1863, at Vicksburg, Tennessee. He recovered in a hospital in Keokuk, Iowa. Elizabeth and Eden had no children. Lizzie is buried in Fairview Township, Jasper County, Iowa. Her grandniece generously donated two of Lizzie Lisle's quilts to the Smithsonian in 1949.