Calling All Quilts
This article describes the work of alumna Ruth Haislip Roberson in the North Carolina Quilt Project. This and other articles may be found in the University Archives.
Citation for this article is: Morton, Linda J. "Calling All Quilts," ECU Magazine, Winter 86/87, Volume 1, No. 1.
When Ruth Haislip Robersion '53 of Durham first started teaching the art of quilting, she founded herself discussing the history of the craft as much as the how-to's of construction.
"My students and I were just as interested in the human aspects of quilting as in the stitching," Roberson says. "We wanted to know why and how women had made quilts over the years, their reasons, backgrounds and motivations.
"Why would women spend so much time and effort stitching little pieces of cloth into one big piece?"
Finding the answers to these questions have involved this home economics major in a project even more consuming than quilting itself.As director of the North Carolina Quilt Project, Roberson is attempting to document all quilts made in North Carolina prior to 1976.
The process of documenting involves recording the owner and maker of the quilt, its history (why it was made, when, for whom, how the owner gained ownership, etc.), and it's construction (what fabrics, dyes and batting or filler were used, its size, pattern, colors,etc.).
In addition to having numbered labels stitched onto each quilt, black and white photographs and color slides are made.
"We're going to use a computer to catalogue all the information gathered this past year," Roberson says. "That's when the real fun begins-organizing the slides, photographs and three sheets of information on each quilt."
Records will be stored at the North Carolina Museum of History in Raleigh and will be made available to the public.
"Documented quilts will be traceable for future generations," says Roberson."If my great-grandchildren find one of my quilts in a trunk, they'll be able to find out when and why i made it."
The information will be used in writing a book on the history of quiltmaking in North Carolina and for an exhibit planned for fall of 1988 at the museum of history.
Documentation began on Nov. 2, 1985, and ended on Dec. 6, 1986. "We had hoped for 100 quilts at each of the 50 documentation days scheduled," says Martha Battle '73, a member of the project's board of directors and registrar at the museum of history. "We ended up having 75 documentation days during which we registered about 10,000 quilts. We've really been amazed."
Approximately 20 other states are engaged in quilt documentation projectd, but North Carolina's is the largest, according to Roberson. Representatives from Virginia and Kansas have consulted the North Carolina project for advice on how to conduct a documentation effort.
"It's turned into an immense project and a very successful one, "Roberson says. "No matter how many grants we received or volunteers we recruited, if no one had brought in a quilt, the project would have died.
When we think about how many lives and families are represented at each documentation day, how many years and hours of work we've seen evidenced, it's incredible," she adds.
The idea for a statewide quilt documentation grew out of a 1978 exhibit at the Ackland Art Museum. The exhibit was based on research by three students from the University of Chapel Hill and represented the first serious quilt documentation effort in the country.
"The North Carolina Quilt Project is an extension of what was done at Ackland," Roberson says.
Interest in quilting was also cultivated by the North Carolina Quilt Symposium, an annual gathering of quiltmakers, and events sponsored by the National Humanities Center at Research Triangle Park. "These events included exhibits of quilts chosen to reflect the range and variety of quiltmaking in the state and were accompanied by talks about quilts and quiltmaking."
In 1983 the Forsyth County Piecers and Quilters Guild gave Roberson a grant to investigate the possibility of conducting a documentation project.After consulting representatives from a similar project in Kentucky, she formed a steering committee composed of five quiltmakers from across North Carolina.They spent the next year gathering ideas and deciding how to organize.
"We divided the state into seven regions," Roberson says. "Each area had a coordinator who organized the documentation days in her region.The coordinators were the backbone of the project."
Grants from the Folklife and Visual Arts section of the North Carolina Arts Council funded the project during its first year, along with contributions from the North Carolina Quilt Symposium, several of the state's quilting guilds, and individuals.
"The North Carolina Arts Council wanted to support the project with out question because it focuses on people - the producers - as well as on the art form," says Karen Baldwin, Folklife panel member, director of ECU's Folklord Archives, and English professor. "That's what is really important about this project; it views the quilters as part of the process."
This year the project is being supported by a $30,500 grant from the Folk Arts Section of the National Endowment for the Arts.Because the grant has to be matched dollar for dollar, Roberson was forced to learn about fund raising.
"It's not my favorite thing to do, but because I feel so strongly about the value of our work, I'm doing it," she says. "We received a tremendous boost from the Z. Smith Reynolds Foundation which awarded a grant of $10,000 to help with that match."
Information gathered during the documenting phase of the project will also be used in a women's exhibit which is being developed for the museum of history's new building that will be completed in 1990. "We're learning about lots of women with fascinating histories,' says Battle. "The project is also creating awareness, awakening the public to the fact that quilts are very precious and need to be preserved."
One woman came in with two quilts that she hadn't seen in 40 years," Roberson says."They were made in the early 1800s and had been stored in a trunk for most of her life. Seeing the notice in the newspaper of the documentation day compelled her to bring them out."
One man from eastern North Carolina was uncertain about the documentation process but came prepared to give three quilts made by his grandmother. "He was willing to give us the quilts so his grandmother could be recognized," Roberson says. "She was a woman with little education and few opportunities, but she had made beautiful quilts all of her life.
"Needless to say, he was relieved to find out we didn't intend to keep the quilts," she says.
According to Battle, the popularity of quilting following economic trends as well as fashion. "We see very fine quilts from the pre-Civil War period when many women had time to make decorative and special occasion quilts," she says. "After the 1850s we see less of these kinds of elaborate, ornate quilts."
During the Industrial Revolution, machine-made blankets and spreads were signs of wealth and modern tastes, making quilts less popular. The art was revived during the Depression and during the folk-art celebrations of the bicentennial in the mid-70s.
Once the information is catalogued in the computer, Roberson expects to see generalities and patterns emerge in specific geographic areas."We're seeing that a lot of feedsacks were used," she says. "In eastern North Carolina we've seen quilts which used tobacco cloth for the batting or filling. The farmer used the cloth to cover his plant beds. When it was too worn to use again, the wife washed it and used it in a quilt."
Blankets were used for filling in many quilts from the Piedmont area, where textiles are made. "It was probably cheaper to get seconds from the factory where one worked than to buy cotton batting," Robersonsays.
Quilts have always been important to Roberson. "I grew up sleeping under quilts," she says. "Ours were made to be used. When i moved away, I missed them and really began to recognize their value. When i saw the Ackland exhibit, they were like huge pictures hanging on the wall. Seeing then from a distance, I felt an even greater sense of wonder and appreciation for quilts and those who made them."
Roberson has been quilting since 1976 and began teaching the craft in 1978 at the Duke University Craft Center. From 1980 until 1984 she wrote a monthly column about quilting for the News & Observer, a Raleigh newspaper. She learned how to document quilts in 1981 during an Earthwatch workshop in Alabama with folklorist Jane Sapp.
Although quilting and documenting can easily consume far more than usual 40 hours of a work-week, Roberson also works part time as an editorial assistant for the Duke Mathematical Journal.She is married to Russell Roberson, a Duke University physics professor, and they have three children, all of whom sew.
Cotten Quilt
Sallie Southall Cotten (1846-1929), namesake of Cotten Residence Hall, was a suffragette and a writer. Like many of her 19th century contemporaries, she also found a creative outlet in quilting.A crazy quilt (one with no pattern) Cotten made in 1891 was donated to ECU in 1965 by her daughters and is on permanent display in Cotten Hall. Typical of these Victorian masterpieces, the quilt is made from scraps of fine fabrics pieced together with ornate embroidery.
A unique feature of the quilt is a poem Cotten embroidered on the maroon velvet backing.
Cotten was active in the Greenville Women's Club and the North Carolina Federation of Women's Clubs. She supported the ratification of the 19th Amendment and greater involvement of women in government.
She was the author of numerous articles and poems, as well as the books, The History of the North Carolina Federation of Women's Clubs, 1901-25, and The White Doe: The Fate of Virginia Dare.
Cotten had eight children and was married for 62 years. Although born in Virginia, her married years were spent at Cottendale Plantation on the Tar River.
She graduated from the University of North Carolina at Greensboro which also named a residence hall in her honor. The Sallie Southall Cotten, a ship launched from Wilmington in 1943, served in World War II, years after Cotten's death in 1929.
