January 3 – 4, 2004
These restored messages come from the Quilt History List, an online forum where quilt historians, collectors, researchers, appraisers, and enthusiasts discussed antique quilts and related textiles. The archive dates from 1996 through approximately 2016 and is being restored gradually. Sign up in the form at the bottom of the page if you want to know when a new page is added. Original spelling, opinions, formatting, and inactive links may remain unchanged.
Primary topics of this QHL Digest:
- Natural Plant Dyes: Pokeweed and Cochineal — Continued exploration of berry- and insect-based historic dyes and how fast the colors hold. (see the article on natural dyes)
- A Kalaga Textile Query — A sequined, padded Burmese/Thai textile piece is identified and discussed.
- Quilts Made From Repurposed KKK Robes — The list opens a careful historical discussion after a member reports quilts sewn from old Klan robe fabric.
- A New England Quilt Museum Visit — A member’s disappointing museum visit prompts a direct response from the museum’s board. (see the article on quilt museums)
Date: January 3, 2004 | From: joy avery <afn49416afn.org>
I think it’s Thom.
> >
Date: January 3, 2004 | From: joy avery <afn49416afn.org>
Hi Teddy,
I hope your new year is off to a grand start! I’m happy to be home. We spent Christmas in Calif with my Mom. It was as cold there as it was here, so not a big change. It felt good to get back to the backyard, raking, cleaning some old potted plants and generally soaking up the sun.
Your KKK information was so amazing. I never thought about those outfits remaining in someone’s trunk. And that “past” is not that far away from us. Every action we make is a model for someone, we do our best to inspire, educate and make the earth a better place, or at least the little space we inhabit.
Peace -Joy
>
Date: January 3, 2004 | From: “Pepper Cory” <pepcorymail.clis.com>
Hello all-I have read, and been told that poke weed, at least by KY coverlet weavers, was indeed used as a dye. Although your setter and the birds got purple, I’ve seen poke weed dye on wool and it’s a lovely mauve-y pink. Have seen it in antique coverlets used with blue and white and brown and cream–very pretty combo. Was told that if the dye wasn’t ‘set’ right, the mauve-y pink would fade. Pepper Cory on the sunny NC coast where it’s the last day of blue-fin tuna season and the boats are coming in with huge fish!
Date: January 3, 2004 | From: “Brenda & Roger Applegate” <rbappleg1@>
I have dyed alum mordanted, home spun wool, with poke berries. They are not very dye fast. Neither is the juice from beets. The color of the poke berries, lasted a little longer than the beets. Even “poke berry” ink faded to a brown color rather than the bright color that you would think. Brenda Applegate ——=_NextPart_000_0014_01C3D219.5F69A400–
Date: January 3, 2004 | From: “Cinda Cawley” <lrcawley@>
I had an experience very similar to the one Teddy described. A couple of years ago I was helping with an inventory of the clothing collection at the Talbot County (MD) Historical Society. In a box containing many articles of men’s clothing from the 1920s we came upon an entire set of KKK regalia: robe, hood, various sashes and banners. I felt sick to my stomach. Neither I nor the two other women working on the project wanted to touch these items. When the shock wore off we documented them and assigned accession numbers; all of us were happy for once to be wearing the ubiquitous white gloves. What most amazed me was that the robe which was embroidered with the Klan insignia had a label from a store in Baltimore. Apparently you could just go downtown and buy the whole obscene outfit on a sunny Saturday afternoon. Cinda on the Eastern Shore
Date: January 3, 2004 | From: Joan Kiplinger <jkip@>
Cinda and all — in some regions during the 1920s and 30s, the KKK was no more than a neighborhood watch committee to make sure all residents were being responsible citizens, weren’t destroying property or keeping loose garbage in their yard or letting grass grow to high, etc. This was the case in New Philadelphia OH and surrounding area. The gowns served as a scare tactic and nothing more; the people inside them were non-violent and if any got out of hand, they, too, were banned. Anybody could join.
Date: January 3, 2004 | From: barbara s <indiana_babs@>
i have to say im happy to hear your feelings. im black and hispanic mixed and racism sickens me. i have read so many quilt books on history and when i get to klan photos, i dont stop to look , or read, i keep flipping.
barbara
Cinda Cawley <lrcawley@> wrote: I had an experience very similar to the one Teddy described. A couple of years ago I was helping with an inventory of the clothing collection at the Talbot County (MD) Historical Society. In a box containing many articles of men’s clothing from the 1920s we came upon an entire set of KKK regalia: robe, hood, various sashes and banners. I felt sick to my stomach. Neither I nor the two other women working on the project wanted to touch these items. When the shock wore off we documented them and assigned accession numbers; all of us were happy for once to be wearing the ubiquitous white gloves. What most amazed me was that the robe which was embroidered with the Klan insignia had a label from a store in Baltimore. Apparently you could just go downtown and buy the whole obscene outfit on a sunny Saturday afternoon. Cinda on the Eastern Shore
Date: January 3, 2004 | From: “Brenda & Roger Applegate” <rbappleg1@>
Please refer to this site for name abbreviations.
http://www.usgennet.org/family/smoot/oldhand/names.html
Brenda Applegate ——=
Date: January 3, 2004 | From: Dana Balsamo <danabalsamo@>
Hi Brenda, Wonderful reference…thank you! Dana
Brenda & Roger Applegate <rbappleg1@> wrote: Please refer to this site for name abbreviations.
http://www.usgennet.org/family/smoot/oldhand/names.html
Brenda Applegate
— You are currently subs
Date: January 4, 2004 | From: “J. G. Row” <JudyGrow@>
Margaret,
Thanks for the name of those textiles. Kalaga. Not one of the people who have brought them in to me to be framed has ever known what they are called either. I’ve seen them with red and blue backgrounds as well as black, and besides the sequins they usually have cabochon stones applied in patterns.
Judy in Ringoes, NJ judygrow@
Date: January 4, 2004 | From: “kerrybrackozemail.com.au”
yes saw these seven or nine amish quilts when we were in nyc about month ago small collection but impressive and enjoyable to look at pineapple and usual amish styles=2E the room is quite dark and they allowed digi photos kerry in sydney
Date: January 4, 2004 | From: “J. G. Row” <JudyGrow@>
I am home from 5 hours of tramping through the Museum of Natural History in NYC — not something you normally would want to do on a Saturday during a school holiday season. Exhausted is hardly descriptive enough for how I felt leaving the museum.
We left the museum from the Central Park West exit, and started walking downtown to the restaurant where we were to relax and have dinner. However, I didn’t have to wait for my reward to come at the restaurant. Almost from the moment we hit the sidewalk I saw a banner about two blocks away that read, “Home Sewn.” All of a sudden my feet didn’t hurt any more and I quickened my pace to get to whatever was being advertised as “Home Sewn.” Ta Dah! The New York Historical Society’s show, “Three Centuries of Stitching History” was open for another hour, and would close at 6:00PM. Plenty of time! DS, DGD, DDIL and her parents were instructed to take a hike ( um, walk) in Central Park while DH accompanied me inside, paid the fee for both of us, and then went up to the 4th floor to look at furniture and paintings, while I browsed the show on the first floor, unhurried and with a new burst of energy.
There were only 5 or 6 quilts, but the first thing you see when entering the show is an 1830-1840 glazed cotton mariner’s compass quilt made by a member of the Hasbrouck or Rich families of New York. There are 13 full compass blocks, set on point, with the requisite number of half and quarter blocks at the edges. The border is the same blue sprigged fabric as the background and the narrow sashing is a warm light brown. Many of the star points were fussy cut from flowered chintzes. It was spectacular, to say the least.
Another quilt worth mentioning is the huge Anna Marie Warner Irish Chain quilt, circa 1822, with broderie perse in the open spaces. The chain squares are indigos on either side of a line of soft reds. The applique is mostly flower forms on single stems, and a couple of Lemoyne Stars, but also 3 or 4 scenes from a very simple toile-like print, the line drawing printed in red with very crude coloring in yellow, blue (and green).
There were a number of end-of-the-19th-century quilts in satins and silks, one made by a male haberdasher — it seems every show nowadays has to include one of them — and a number of contemporary quilts, one commemorating 911. Of course there were other forms of sewing represented, and the displays included early paper patterns for embroidery and the tools of needlework.
The original very famous 1876 painting by Enoch Wood Perry, “The Quilting Party” which shows an elderly lady bent over the quilting frame while her younger companion gets ready to break off her thread with her teeth, was brought out from Margaret Riordan’s private collection. It is suprisingly small and intimate, only about 16″ x 20″. I had previously read descriptions of this painting saying that the young woman was day dreaming, but after reading the descriptive card it is obvious to me that the young lady really is pulling out her thread from the spool and is going to cut it with her teeth.
There were a number of early samplers as well, one from 1820 whose verse made me so angry I am including it here.
Woman As some fair violet loveliest of the glade Sheds its mild fragrance on the lonely shade So Woman born to dignify retreat. Unknown to flourish and unseen be great To give domestic life its sweetest charm With softness polish and with virtue warm with angel kindness should behold distress And meekly pity where she can’t redress. Ruth Titus 1820
Shrinking Violet indeed! . http://www.nyhistory.org/homesewn/index.html
The web site does not show any quilts, but go to get directions and the open hours
In connection with the show there are special public programs.
Admission to the special programs is free with paid admission to the museum.
Saturday 1/24/2004, 1:00PM Family Program: Introduction to Quilting for children 6 and over, accompanied by an adult.
Saturdays, Jan 17, Feb 14, March 13, April 10 at 2:00PM Walking Tour: The Garment Industry in New York.
Wednesday, Feb 18, 6:30 – 8:30 PM Homespun/Home Sewn Unraveling History through Textiles lecture by Dr. Laurel Thatcher Ulrich
Wednesday March 3, 6:30 – 8:00 PM Caring for Your Heirloom Textiles Slide-illustrated lecture by conservator Kate Barker of the Textile Conservation Workshop, follwed by a behind the scenes tour of textile storage in the Society’s Luce Center.
Wednesday, March 23, 6:30 – 8:00 PM New Insights on New York Samplers Slide Illustrated lecyture by Amelia Peck Associate Curator of Decorative Arts at the Metropolitan Museum of Art.
There is a nice 4-fold large brochure with all the programes listed and a brief history of sewing in NY.
Dinner was nice too, at a restaurant called Isabellas, on W. 77th and Columbus Ave.
Judy in Ringoes, NJ judygrow@
Date: January 4, 2004 | From: tracy jamar <tjamaroptonline.net>
It reminds me of some Haitian pieces I’ve worked on, though they were completely covered in sequins.
I can’t see the stitching detail well enough but if there is tambour work it could also come from India, Thailand or in that area.
I don’t see it as American made, perhaps it was done to commemorate an involvement with us.
What nations have the peacock as a national bird?
Tracy Jamar
Date: January 4, 2004 | From: “Pilar Donoso” <quiltpdmi.cl>
We do have farms of Cochinilla in the North of Chile. A friend of mine, Jorge Fredes, who gives dyeing classes at my store have a wonderful registration of cochinilla dyes and they go grom pink to almost burgundy. He went to the farms to get more information.
Pilar Santiago, Chile
Date: January 4, 2004 | From: “Charlotte Bull” <charloumo-net.com>
Thanks for the info re the poke berries. I really wondered. I can accept the pinkish actuality of the dye as it does have a pink purple appearance. By the way, if (I did say IF) I recall correctly, about 50 years ago on the Eastern Shore of Maryland we had poke weeds. Neighbors told us to cut them down before the berries formed, ripened & fermented or the birds would eat them and get drunk! : ) I do feed birds, hundreds on some days, but I did not see any drunks this year!
But I must say that the ripe berries are a splendid color! An almost black purple. I’ve seen some appliqued quilts with little round red berry clusters that sure look like poke weed! Maybe they are red simply because that was the only really good dye! We never know what the creative origins truly are! Each artist, and quilters are artists, may be expressing something they remember and we’ll never really know what it was. I am currently designing a rose applique quilt that most will just say “Oh, another Rose of Sharon!” However, there will be several aspects that make it a very specific rose that is described in a beautiful Christmas song I heard for the first time last month at a concert. It will have meaning to me! But I’ll share that on the Label! And the quilt will have a specific name! But don’t ask me to put in on the eboard as it’s still only in my mind! Along with a dozen others. Now do I need to do a poke berries one also?
Thanks for your sharing of info.
Date: January 4, 2004 | From: “J. G. Row” <JudyGrow@>
Denise,
How awful about the NE Quilt Museum’s cavalier attitude toward your disappointment and waste of precious vacation hours. How likely are you now to donate money to the museum?
But now, tell us how wonderful Deerfield was, and what you saw there. I can imagine how beautifully the houses are decorated for the holidays.
Judy in Ringoes, NJ judygrow@
truly heartbreaking to have had such a bad experience > there last weekend. By way of internet and phone informatiion, the > museum advertised itself as being open on Sundays through December from > noon to 4PM. I checked on December 26th minutes before leaving > Pennsylvania to go to a family gathering near Cape Cod. …… When we > arrived, the museum was closed – without so much as a note on the door! > I wasn’t the only disappointed quilt enthusiast. When I used my cell phone … > I simply got the same message. Open on Sundays > in December….. …………… When I explained the > problem, I didn’t receive any satisfaction but was simply told that she > would bring up my “concerns” (my insistance that you can’t run a museum > that way….) at the “next” meeting. Not even the smallest attempt at > groveling. In fact, she said that they had also closed (UNANNOUNCED) on > the 24th as if a pattern of not being there during announced times would > make it all right.
Date: January 4, 2004 | From: CarylSchuetz@
I have a turn of the 20th century quilt from Mc Cracken County, KY, which I had purchased nmany years ago from the elderly M.D. of the maker. I did receive provenance with the quilt which included her economic status (poor farmer who made 14 quilts, which were never laundered. Her doctor, who had an antique shop, was selling the quilts for the family.) The backing fabric had been dyed with pokeweed berries. The story is that the maker was poor and wanted to have colored backings on her quilts but could not afford to purchase so much more expensive fabric, so she dyed the cotton for her quilt backings using pokeweed berries.
Since none of the quilts had been laundered, I don’t know about the permanence of the dye.
As a child, I used to dye things with pokeweed berries. Caryl
Date: January 4, 2004 | From: “Jocelyn” <jocelynm@>
The > gowns served as a scare tactic and nothing more; the people inside them > were non-violent and if any got out of hand, they, too, were banned. > Anybody could join.
Does ‘anybody’ include those who weren’t white Protestant males? I thought the KKK was only open to them. >
Date: January 4, 2004 | From: Joan Kiplinger <jkip@>
Jocelyn —remember, this was a neighborhood watch group with no other purpose than to keep a clean community,help the needy, cleanup after storms or fires, etc. The surrounding area was strip mining with immigrant Italians doing most of the mining and they had a large membership in this KKK chapter; as my mother would always jokingly say, it was more Black Hand in principle, and much later on compared it to the Peace Corps. I don’t know about blacks as this region was not a likely place for any to have settled; they were more to the WVA border and steelmines. But back to membership, my dad spoke of Hungarians, Germans, Quakers — New Philadelphia was mostly Quaker in outlook — and any other law-abiding male who wanted to join. Women I don’t know about but some did make some of the gowns. It would indicate that the KKK could serve other purposes where the population was white and civic minded, and that communication between national and chapters might have been weak or lax re intent and goals. WWII dissolved this particular order; but by then my parents had moved to Cleveland to find work during the Depression. It was so odd to hear them and my aunts and uncles speak of KKK in a totally different light than what we saw in the newsreels or heard or read. Perhaps there might be someone on this list from Tuscarwas County who is aware of that chapter or any similar.
Date: January 4, 2004 | From: Vivien Sayre <vsayrenesa.com>
Dear Denise,
On behalf of the New England Quilt Museum and as a member of the Board of Directors, I would like to express our apologies for the inconvenience you were caused recently. It is unfortunate that when you spoke with someone at the Museum it gave you little satisfaction. This whole situation should not have happened and we are grateful to you for bringing it to our attention.
We appreciate feedback both good and bad and try very hard to learn from our successes and mistakes. The Museum is a non-profit organization almost totally dependent on those who are willing to volunteer their time, efforts and expertise. Things do not always run smoothly and, unfortunately, you caught us at one of those times. This is by no means meant as an excuse for what happened and the matter will be discussed fully at the next Board meeting. Meanwhile, corrective actions are being put into place to avoid a repetition of your unfortunate experience.
If you wish to contact us privately by mail, please feel free to write to either me or Pat Steuert the Director of the New England Quilt Museum, at 18 Shattuck Street, Lowell, MA 01852. If you wish to communicate with us by email feel free to contact me at the above email address or the Pat Steuert at NEQM at: Patricia Steuert, <DirectorNEQuiltMuseum.org>.
My Best Wishes, Vivien Sayre
Date: January 4, 2004 | From: Gloria Hanrahan <gloriaak.net>
On page 13 of Treasure in the Trunk, Quilts of the Oregon Trail by Mary Bywater Cross there is a picture of a quilt entitled Polk Stalk. It is dated 1845 and was made by Elizabeth Currier Foster.
It states that “the reddish purple berry and purple root were used in medicine. The young green leaves and shoots were edible and used in salads. The roots and berries provided a weak dye that tended to stain rather than dye. The red color also faded to brown.”
Not being familiar with the plant, the quilt looks similar to the currents in other quilts except the are on longer stalks with simple leaves.
Gloria
: Deep South Quilt Study Group Meeting From: Gail Ingram <gingram@> Date:
I want to remind everyone about the Feb 7th meeting of Deep South Quilt Study Group.
Today, I started thinking more seriously about it, and within the week will get information on accomodations to all who have written Peggy Kiersted and me. If anyone is interested who has not sent us their contact information, please let us hear from you so we can keep you updated.
I do not anticipate an appearance by the KKK, a subject recently under discussion on the list, and all considering coming should be aware that I have a rat terrier named for Stonewall Jackson who would route such intruders,( especially if they came in a white truck and pulled a garbage can).
As the time approaches, I’m getting really excited. Also thinking of food (a very suthern gull thing to do, even after the recent holiday feasting), since looking at all those quilts will no doubt whet our appetites.
Everybody’s idea is to keep this informal and spend our time learning about quilts.
Mizriz Cinda Cawley (she of the Eastern Shore, when not traipsing about the countryside looking at quilts) offered this suggstion as a way of introducing ourselves: everyone brings the first quilt she ever bought. Cinda said their study group did that, and it got them off to a good start and introduced everyone in interesting way. As the “thinker-upper” of this particular group, I must insist there be no cheating. That is, no one will bring something tres sophisticated and lovely which she purchased after 20 years of collecting and pass it off as her first buy, when maybe her first purchase was something humbler.
Remember, if you are interested in being a part of all this fun, contact me or Peggy, who volunteered as secretary and girl-about-town. A copy to both of us would be helpful. Peggy’s email is <pkeirstead@>
Happy New Year,
Gail Ingram
Date: January 4, 2004 | From: Gail Ingram <gingram@>
I have posted this query before, but no one responded. Thought I would try once more.
We’ve talked about Whig Roses on this list.
What about Whig’s Defeat quilts?
I realize they resemble in some ways the whole “beauties” (New York Beauty, etc) group, but their construction is distinctive. Theoretically, they should be southern and western constructions, since the Democratic Party (and James Knox Polk, who is the one who defeated the Whigs) support came from those regions.
Any information would be appreciated.
Thanks, Gail
