by Quilt Alliance | Mar 19, 2014 | On this Day in History Quilts series
On this day in 1966, Texas Western (now called University of Texas at El Paso) becomes the first college basketball team to win the “Final Four” with an all-black starting lineup. Until that moment, at the height of the civil-rights era, no major-college team had ever started five black players in an NCAA championship game. This satin quilt, titled “Basketball Star Quilt,” was made in 1999 by Rae Belgarde of Brockton, Montana. The quilt is now part of the Michigan State University Museum collection and was included in an exhibition, “To Honor and Comfort: Native Quilting Traditions,” that traveled to several U.S. states and Canada from 1999-2004. View this quilt on The Quilt Index to find out! Read more about its history, design and construction. Be sure to use the zoom tool for a detailed view or click the “See full record” link to see a larger image and all the data entered about that quilt. Source: http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/texas-western-defeats-kentucky-in-ncaa-finals Posted by Amy E. Milne Executive Director, Quilt Alliance…
by Quilt Alliance | Mar 18, 2014 | On this Day in History Quilts series
On this day in 1766, the British Parliament repeals the Stamp Act, the controversial law that forced colonists in America to buy a British stamp for all official documents they obtained. The stamp had an image of a Tudor rose with the word “America” and the French phrase “Honi soit qui mal y pense” (“Shame to him who thinks evil of it.”) Hulda DeFogerty of Connecticut made this Postage Stamp quilt for her nephew Irving D. Skeel’s marriage to Mary O’Connell in Oswego, New York in 1880. The quilt is now part of the permanent collection of the New England Quilt Museum. View this quilt on The Quilt Index to find out! Read more about its history, design and construction. Be sure to use the zoom tool for a detailed view or click the “See full record” link to see a larger image and all the data entered about that quilt. Source: http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/parliament-repeals-the-stamp-act Posted by Amy E. Milne Executive Director, Quilt Alliance…
by Quilt Alliance | Mar 17, 2014 | On this Day in History Quilts series
On this day in 461 A.D., Saint Patrick, who was a Christian missionary, bishop and apostle of Ireland, died in Saul, Downpatrick, Ireland. Patrick was said to have baptized hundreds of people in one day and to have used a three-leaf clover to describe the Holy Trinity. The first St. Patrick’s Day parade took place in New York City in 1762, when Irish soldiers serving in the English military marched through the city. Mary Carey Mungiven hand pieced and hand quilted this red and white Irish Chain Variation quilt in County Clair, Ireland probably after 1875. The record states that Mungiven was an immigrant and ran a boarding house for railroad builders in Ohio. The owner, who received the quilt as a gift, documented it during the Rhode Island Quilt Documentation Project in 1992. View this quilt on The Quilt Index to find out! Read more about its history, design and construction. Be sure to use the zoom tool for a detailed view or click the “See full record” link to see a larger image and all the data entered about that quilt. Source: http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/saint-patrick-dies Posted by Amy E. Milne Executive Director, Quilt Alliance…
by Quilt Alliance | Mar 14, 2014 | On this Day in History Quilts series
On this day in 1988, Larry Shaw, a physicist at the San Francisco Exploratorium, led the first observance of Pi Day with staff and public marching around one of its circular spaces, then consuming fruit pies. The now annual celebration commemorating the mathematical constant π (pi) is observed on March 14 (or 3/14 in the U.S.) since 3, 1, and 4 are the three most significant digits of π in the decimal form. Frances Boltz Woodward, made this Mathematical Star quilt around 1840 in Virginia. The hand pieced, appliqued and quilted piece is now in the permanent collection of the DAR Museum. View this quilt on The Quilt Index to find out! Read more about its history, design and construction. Be sure to use the zoom tool for a detailed view or click the “See full record” link to see a larger image and all the data entered about that quilt. Source: http://www.exploratorium.edu/pi/ Posted by Amy E. Milne Executive Director, Quilt Alliance…
by Quilt Alliance | Mar 13, 2014 | On this Day in History Quilts series
On this day in 1869, the Arkansas General Assembly passed a law that made the Ku Klux Klan (KKK) illegal. Throughout the Reconstruction period after the Civil War, the KKK, a white supremacist organization, used violence and intimidation in an attempt to reverse suffrage rights of African Americans and protest the disfranchisement of ex-Confederate Democrats. This signature quilt in the Shoo Fly pattern was made as a fundraiser for the KKK in Chicora, Michigan around 1926. The person who donated the quilt to Michigan State University Museum is the grandson of the person who won the quilt. He tells this family history of the quilt: “To get your name stitched onto a block you paid 10 cents. An individual would stitch the names on a given block for instance, my Aunt Grace Raveway did the block for our family. Grace was 16 years old at the time and was quite embarrassed to participate in the project, but she had the best script in the family and best sewing abilities, so she was chosen.” View this quilt on The Quilt Index to find out! Read more about its history, design and construction. Be sure to use the zoom tool for a detailed view or click the “See full record” link to see a larger image and all the data entered about that quilt. Source: http://www.encyclopediaofarkansas.net/encyclopedia/entry-detail.aspx?entryID=2293 Posted by Amy E. Milne Executive Director, Quilt Alliance…
by Quilt Alliance | Mar 11, 2014 | On this Day in History Quilts series
On this day in 1903, Lawrence Welk, musician, bandleader and host of his own “Champagne Music” variety television show, was born near Strasburg, North Dakota to immigrant parents from Alsace-Lorraine. Welk worked on the family farm until age 21, paying off the cost of a professional accordion. In his early career Welk led big bands in North and South Dakota and earned a degree in music from MacPhail School of Music in Minneapolis. At age 48 Welk settled in Los Angeles and started producing the Lawrence Welk Show for a local television station. The show was picked up by ABC in 1955 who ran it until 1971, and Welk arranged private syndication that took it through 1982. This 75” x 86” quilt, titled “Champagne Breakfast” was made by Ann Kowalski of Shepherd, Michigan around 1982. The artist wrote: “The bowtie is a traditional pattern, but the colors and arrangement are the invention of the maker. The colors are light in the middle to give the feeling of the lightness of champagne; darker, passionate colors on edge. The quilt was designed on my daughters 28th birthday. She sketched out the colors and design while awaiting a breakfast in which champagne was part of the menu.” The quilt was documented as part of the Michigan Quilt Project. View this quilt on The Quilt Index to find out! Read more about its history, design and construction. Be sure to use the zoom tool for a detailed view or click the “See full record” link to see a larger image and all the data entered about that quilt. Source: http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/lawrence-welk-is-born http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lawrence_Welk Posted by Amy E. Milne Executive Director, Quilt Alliance…
