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Five Generations Create Crazy QuiltISv ANN GRIFFITH Oi'Tliv LifeStylcs StaffBlanche Griffith of Sod can'L remember when shewasn't ciLtzv-quiU crazy.The random shapes and fabrics. the varieties of fancy stitchery always have hold a fascination for Blanche. Naturally when Cabin Creek Quilts received a Bicentennial grant to create two sets of six quilts tracing the history of this nation from ils founding to the present day, Blanche was asked to make the pair of crazv quilts representing the Late Victorian Era.Usually Blanche wouldn't have hesitated a moment, but at lhe time her elderly mother wasn't well. Even so. she couldn't quite bring herself to answer such a tempting assignment with a flat No. After all. the first set uf quilts was destined to become a part of the permanent collection of the State Museum at the Science and Culture Center and the second was to go on tour under the auspices of Sunrise.•'1 was trying to get out of making it.” Blanche recalls, so J said. well. I would make it providing I i'fuId make it the way I wanted. They were going to go mil and buy material - that's what they had a mind to do. get real expensive material.' $7 or $8 a yard - and rut it up. Why. hnney. I couldn't have done that. It would have enst a fortune to get all the different kinds and colors you 'd need fnr a crazy quilt.\ lold them that back in the old days when they made crazy quills, they never bought anything. Their neighbors, family, friends, everybody gave Ihem scraps. They agreed right off for me to do it that way, so there was nothing else for me to do but say f’d piece the quilts. But I didn't plan on doing it alone. It turned intn a family project — five generations or us working on it 'The greater portion of the work on the quill was done by Blanche and her daughter, Morlana (Mrs. Dillardi McCormick, but all of the script signatures were wrillen on the fabric by Blanche’s mother. Blanche Waugh, who turned last June during the two-and-a-half months required lo complete the firsl quilt. The matriarch of the family also embroidered several names on Ihe quilt - including her own. Morlana s daughter, Linda (Mrs, Jerry i Dunlap of Alum Creek, worked snnm fancy stitchery, and the great-great granddaughters of Rlannhe Waugh, tee Ann. 8, and i.nnn (Jail. 6. daughters of Mortana's son and daughter-ifr1lt;uv. David and Trudy McCormick, added simple rros,s-.sLilcii motifs to round oul the five generations.'Die quill is composed of 20 blocks, each 14 X 14 inches. 19 of which were '‘set up by Blanche Griffith. Mortnna arranged die pieces on the remaining one. and did a great deal of the embroidery including a selfdesigned combination of slitches in a graceful twining flower pattern that pleased her mother so much ihai wilh the approval of Decna Postlelhwait, the Cabin Creek Quilt advisor on the project, it was decided lo adapt il as the handwork mrilif on the black velvetBlanche, as supervisor of the family collaboration, was determined that the material used fnr each of the quilt lops would have meaning. Accordingly she went about assembling her materials in Ihe old-fashioned way. gathering bits and pieces from as many people as possible.The quilt pieces come from the Rockefellers right dnwn to welfare people,” she says. Sharun Rockefeller was one or the first people 1 called. The tie of Jay's she sent wouldn't do. so I called her back and she sent me another one right straight The tie from Governor Moure had red elephants on it. I couldn’t use anything lhal political, so f asked For another une but Ihev didn't send it. You knuw what I did? f cut a little piece out uf the lining of the lie and worked it in with his wire's piece. Hers was some of that white silk with yellow chrysanthemums she got in Japan.If they hadn't given me a Fourth of July deadline on Ihe quill, if I hail had more time, there would be no two pieces alike in the quilt that's finished. And except fnr some of Ihe governors and their wives, there's not fa piece ol material from a peram [ dun’l know personally. One block is all our family with a piece of my wedding dress, pieces of my husband's silk wedding shirt and his silk Navy kerchief from World War J. My son. Morton - he was named for his father — was in the Navy in Wurld II so lliere's a piece of his kerchief, too. The lace in Lhe block is from my girls’ baby dresses - Mortana and her sister. Ola Montgomery, who works at the University of Missouri. There's even ribbon fmm a dress I wore when I was 13 and 1*11 be 71 my next birthday.Of course, there's no twn squares alike in the first quill, and die second one will be different from the first. The crazy quills Cabin Crock does, they’re ail just about alike. They cut patterns for pieces that will fit on 14-inch blocks. SOW them down and use the same patterns for the next quill. To me that isn’t a real crazy quilt. A crazy quilt is where you use scraps that can t lie used anywhere else and no twn blocks ever conn* nut the same.1 guess crazy quills mean so much to us because we have one that is a family treasure. It was on display in lhe Great Hall during lhe opening of the Science and Culture Center. My great*great grandmother, Sophia White, made it about 150 years ago. It came from her lo my grandmother. Mary Woodburn. then to my , mother, then tu me. I've passed it down lo Mortana — ■ her first name is Blanche just like mine and mymother's.Back when 1 was young and a girl was going lo gel married, we couldn't have showers the way they do today, so we’d start u quill. Everybody in the community would make a block and sign it, then we'd all get together and quilt it. Usually we would choose a regular pattern like a ninc-hlock, hut in a way these Bicentennial crazy quilts are friendship quilts, tno. Al least that's how they seem to me and the five generations of my family that helped make them.The original set of six Cabin Creek Bicentennial
Newspaper Details
Charleston Daily Mail
Charleston, West Virginia, US
Thu, Nov 25, 1976
Page 86
Full Page
Clipped by
Breana C.
NA, 04 Apr 2023
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