Paper Presentations
Susan Price Miller
The Circuit Rider's Quilt: Romance and Reality
In 1919, the Art Institute of Chicago accessioned an appliquéd album quilt which had been donated by Emma Blanxius Hodge, called the “Circuit Rider's Quilt.” Accompanying information described it as having been presented to George C. Warvel, an Ohio minister. An article published in 1923 portrayed Warvel as an iconic circuit rider of the frontier, and this romanticized story was repeated in print media throughout the twentieth century. The disparity between the romance and the reality of the quilt's story serves as an illustration of the powerful influence of the Colonial Revival movement in twentieth-century America, the roles of collectors and magazine writers in perpetuating popular stories, and the important contributions possible through partnerships between committed quilt researchers and museum curators.
Susan Price Miller graduated from DePauw University with a BA in history. She is an independent researcher having written three previous papers published in Uncoverings on Iowa related quilt subjects. With 25 years of quiltmaking experience, she contributes projects as well as historical features to American Patchwork & Quilting Magazine. In 2002, Susan was project director and writer for Century of Quilts published by Better Homes & Gardens in recognition of the 100 year history of Meredith Corporation. She now spends spring and fall in Pella, Iowa; and summer and winter in Syracuse, New York.
Sue Cummings
Irene Post: Quilt Artist and Neighbor of Bertha Stenge
Public attention to quiltmaking in Chicago during the 1930s-1950s usually focuses on the contributions of award-winning quiltmaker, designer, and artist Bertha Stenge. Irene Post, a previously undocumented quiltmaker, lived in Chicago from 1922-1951 and made more than thirty quilts in both traditional and original designs. A search of public records outlined the basic facts of Post's life, and interviews with family and friends provided important details. However, her collection of clippings, patterns, and other quilt ephemera survive as the only documentation of Post's participation in the emerging scene of mid-twentieth-century quiltmaking. Irene Post was not only an associate of Bertha Stenge, but an accomplished quilt artist in her own right.
Sue Cummings is a professor emeritus at Wright State University in Dayton, Ohio. She received a B.A. in chemistry from Northwestern University and M.S. and Ph.D. degrees from the Ohio State University. She joined Wright State where she pursued her scientific career before retiring as full professor and head of the department. In addition, Cummings has a strong interest in Ohio history, local historic preservation and antiques. She has been collecting and researching Ohio quilts for over 35 years. Cummings is the author of Album Quilts of Ohio's Miami Valley, in which she documents Ohio presentation quilts with eagle motifs. A longtime member of AQSG, Cummings has done presentations on Ohio quilts to several Miami Valley historical societies, and given invited lectures at the Troy-Hayner Cultural Venter and the Ohio Historical Decorative Arts Association.
Marin Hanson
Modern, Yet Anti-Modern: Two Sides of Late-Nineteenth and Early-Twentieth Century Quiltmaking as Represented in the Collections of the International Quilt Study Center
Two seemingly contradictory trends dominated late nineteenth and early twentieth-century quiltmaking: anti-modernism, as seen in the Aesthetic Movement/Colonial Revival, and modern technological advancements such as the sewing machine, dye synthesis, and new transportation and communication methods. A comprehensive analysis of the quilts from 1870-1945 in the collections of the International Quilt Study Center helps to illustrate these two sides of the era's quiltmaking practices. On one hand, many quilts reflect the influence of past styles and exotic, foreign cultures (anti-modern), others demonstrate the widespread adoption of new technologies and materials (modern). Most interestingly, both modern and anti-modern characteristics often appear in the same quilt, creating a fascinating amalgamation of two divergent, but related influences.
Marin F. Hanson, Curator of Exhibitions at the International Quilt Study Center & Museum, holds undergraduate degrees from Grinnell College and Northern Illinois University and earned her M.A. with a double major in Textile History (Quilt Studies emphasis) and Museum Studies from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. She recently co-curated the Museum's exhibitions "Quilts in Common" and "Nancy Crow: Cloth, Culture & Context" and is co-author of their accompanying catalog. Ms. Hanson is the lead editor of the upcoming volume, American Quilts in the Modern Age: 1870-1940, the first in an eventual multi-volume catalog of the Center's entire quilt collection (University of Nebraska Press, 2009).
Aimee E. Newell
More than Warmth: Gift Quilts by Aging Women in Antebellum America
Gift-giving is an important component of social relations. American women have given quilts as gifts for generations, yet surprisingly little research has been done on this aspect of women's material culture. An examination of quilts given as gifts by mature women between 1820 and 1860 demonstrates how these women gifted quilts to maintain family connections, express personal opinions, and pass on feminine traditions and values. Instead of just serving as functional bed coverings, gift quilts represent an extension of the giver's identity, intended to be passed down as a reminder of those who had gone before and as an inspiration for the future.
Aimee E. Newell is Curator of Collections at the National Heritage Museum in Lexington, Massachusetts. She is the former Curator of Textiles and Fine Arts at Old Sturbridge Village, as well as the former Curator of Collections at the Nantucket Historical Association. She received her B.A. in American Studies from Amherst College and her M.A. in History from Northeastern University. She is currently pursuing her Ph.D. in History at the University of Massachusetts Amherst. She is a contributing author to the Massachusetts Quilt Documentation Project book, Massachusetts Quilts: Our Commonwealth (coming in 2009), Piecework Magazine, Sampler and Antique Needlework Quarterly, Blanket Statements, and The Proceedings of the Dublin Seminar for New England Folklife. She is an Associate Fellow at the International Quilt Study Center in Lincoln, Nebraska.
Arlesa Shephard
Quilts for McKinley: Women's Involvement in Politics
Women in the nineteenth century had little political voice. In order to display their political affiliations and opinions, they frequently sewed them into quilts. Toward the end of the century, in 1896, the people elected William McKinley as president. During this election, women commemorated him as a politician not only during his presidential election, but throughout his career. The number and variety of quilts created over McKinley's political career provide evidence of women's evolving political freedom of expression.
Alresa Shephard is currently a doctoral student at the University of Missouri in Textile and Apparel Management. While an undergraduate at Ashland University she gained a passion for historic clothing and textiles through her internship experience at the Kent State University Museum in Kent, Ohio. She went on to receieve her MA from the University of Akron with an emphasis on historic costume and textiles. She has volunteered and worked with several collections including the William McKinley Presidential Library and Museum in Canton, Ohio, the textile and apparel collection at the University of Akron, the Boone County Historical Society in Columbia, Missouri, and the Missouri Historic Costume and Textile Collection at the University of Missouri.
Lorie Chase
Quilts in Transition: A Study of Strafford County, New Hampshire Probate Inventories
In the mid-eighteenth century quilts were rare and valuable possessions. One hundered years later, quilts were popular, affordable, and present in many households. From the headwater hills to the tidewaters of coastal New Hampshire, how did that transition come about? Richly detailed estate inventories recorded from 1773 to 1849 in Strafford County yield the data. Ownership frequency and distribution of quilts and related bedsteads, bedding, bedcovers and furnishings extend over four generations of households. Investigations of wealth, gender, rurality, availability of materials and societal changes occurring in the region offer insight. As ownership of coverlids and bedhangings declined, popularity of quilts soared between 1800 and 1825, before American printed cottons became available in the region. Choices of bedcovers were already growing as spreads and comforters came into use.
Loretta B. Chase holds a BA in Decorative Art from the University of California, and an MS from the University of New Hampshire. She works as River Coordinator for restoration of the Cocheco River. She joined AQSG in 1981 and first co-authored a paper in Uncoverings 2004. She has presented a paper at the Dublin Seminar and contributed articles to Blanket Statements. For fifteen years she lived in an eighteenth century classic center-chimney cape in rural Madbury, NH where she became curious about how the early quilts she found locally had been used on beds. She and her husband slept in the “best room” under wool comforters that she made.