Quilt Documentation Projects 1980-1989: Exploring the Roots of a National Phenomenon

University of Nebraska - Lincoln DigitalCommons@University of Nebraska - Lincoln Public Access Theses and Dissertations from Education and Human Sciences, College of the College of Education and Human Sciences (CEHS) 7-2010 Quilt Documentation Projects 1980-1989: Exploring the Roots of a National Phenomenon Christine Humphrey University of Nebraska at Lincoln, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.unl.edu/cehsdiss Part of the Education Commons Humphrey, Christine, "Quilt Documentation Projects 1980-1989: Exploring the Roots of a National Phenomenon" (2010). Public Access Theses and Dissertations from the College of Education and Human Sciences. 84. https://digitalcommons.unl.edu/cehsdiss/84 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the Education and Human Sciences, College of (CEHS) at DigitalCommons@University of Nebraska - Lincoln. It has been accepted for inclusion in Public Access Theses and Dissertations from the College of Education and Human Sciences by an authorized administrator of DigitalCommons@University of Nebraska - Lincoln. QUILT DOCUMENTATION PROJECTS 1980-1989: EXPLORING THE ROOTS OF A NATIONAL PHENOMENON by Christine Humphrey A THESIS Presented to the Faculty of The Graduate College at the University of Nebraska In Partial Fulfillment of Requirements For the Degree of Master of Arts Major: Textiles, Clothing, & Design Under the Supervision of Professor Patricia Crews Lincoln, Nebraska July, 2010 QUILT DOCUMENTATION PROJECTS 1980-1989: EXPLORING THE ROOTS OF A NATIONAL PHENOMENON Christine Elizabeth Humphrey, M.A. University of Nebraska, 2010 Adviser: Patricia Crews The documenting of thousands of quilts by small groups throughout the United States was one of the most notable parts of the 1980s surge of interest in quilt history. The purpose of this study was to examine the phenomenon of quilt documentation projects of the 1980s and to gain a better understanding of the social and cultural factors that influenced the organizers and the participants. Inspired by the success of the Kentucky Quilt Project, Inc. in 1983, organizers in thirty-five other states initiated or completed statewide documentation projects by 1989. This study examined five of those statewide projects—the Kentucky Quilt Project, Inc., the Texas Sesquicentennial Quilt Association’s Texas Quilt Search, the North Carolina Quilt Project, the Nebraska Quilt Project, and the Kansas Quilt Project. Utilizing archival materials (project proposals, grant proposals and reports, training materials, and correspondence) for each project and media coverage (local, state, and national), this study investigated the goals, objectives, and motivations of the project organizers and the project participants. In order to gain insights into the motivations of the participants in the projects, the content of media coverage prior to documentation days was compared to the media coverage after documentation days. In addition correspondence between the general public and project organizers was examined. The findings of the study point to a convergence of cultural influences in the 1970s and 1980s that created a climate for the statewide quilt documentation projects. Specifically, the project organizers responded to the success of the Kentucky Quilt Project, the increased interest in family, state and national heritage, the increased interest in ethnic and women’s history, and the quilt revival of the 1970s. Participants responded to the opportunity to share and record their individual family histories in a permanent archive, the opportunity to celebrate their own accomplishments or those of their female ancestors, and to the nationwide revival of interest in quilts and quiltmaking traditions. iii Copyright © 2010 by Christine Humphrey All rights reserved iv CONTENTS INTRODUCTION Background 1 Purpose 3 Significance 5 Sources 6 Organization of Thesis 9 Scope and Limitations 10 CHAPTER 1: LITERATURE REVIEW The U.S. Centennial and the First Quilt Revival 13 Works Progress Administration and the Search for an American Folk Art 15 The Seventies 17 The Eighties 19 The Quilt Revival of the 1970s and 1980s 20 The Quilt Documentation Movement 23 Quilt Scholarship and Quilt Documentation Projects 1980-2009 26 Participation in the Quilt Documentation Projects 35 Summary 38 CHAPTER 2: KENTUCKY QUILT PROJECT, INC. Bruce Mann’s Proposal 42 Launching the Kentucky Quilt Project 45 Newspaper Publicity and Coverage 52 Responses to the Kentucky Quilt Project 62 Passing the Torch 66 Summary 67 CHAPTER 3: TEXAS QUILT SEARCH The Texas Sesquicentennial 72 Two Quilt Documentation Projects 73 Newspaper Publicity and Coverage for the Texas Quilt Search 81 The Exhibition: “Lone Stars: A Legacy of Quilts” 89 Summary 91 CHAPTER 4: NORTH CAROLINA QUILT PROJECT The North Carolina Quilt Project 93 Motivations for Initiating the North Carolina Quilt Project 97 Newspaper and Broadcast Coverage 101 Motivations and Reactions of Participants 105 Summary 108 v CHAPTER 5: NEBRASKA QUILT PROJECT Motivations and Goals of the Nebraska Quilt Project 111 Organization and Composition of the NQP Committee 115 Newspaper Coverage and Participant Motivations 121 Summary 126 CHAPTER 6: KANSAS QUILT PROJECT Development of the Kansas Quilt Project 130 Motivations for Initiating the KsQP and Project Goals 138 Newspaper Publicity and Coverage Prior to Quilt Days 136 Participant Motivations and Responses 144 Summary 146 CHAPTER 7: SUMMARY AND CONCLUSIONS 148 Avenues for Future Research 158 APPENDICES Appendix A: Quilt Documentation Projects Organized by State 163 Appendix B: Affiliations of the Quilt Documentation Projects 167 Appendix C: Number of Quilts Documented and Number of Quilt Documentation Days 170 NOTES 173 SELECTED BIBLIOGRAPHY 193 vi ILLUSTRATIONS Table 1: Kentucky Quilt Project, Inc. Documentation Days 48 Table 2: Texas Heritage Quilt Society Project Documentation Days 74 Table 3: Texas Quilt Project Documentation Days 79 Table 4: North Carolina Quilt Project Documentation Days 96 Table 5: Nebraska Quilt Project List of Goals and Objectives 113 Table 6: Nebraska Quilt Project Documentation Days 119 Table 7: Kansas Quilt Project Documentation Days 135 Table 8: Goals and Objectives of the KsQP 140 Figure 1: Publicity for the KyQP Round-Up Day 59 Figure 2: Kentucky Quilt Project Documentation Days 59 Figure 3: Publicity for Quilt Day at the Louisville Museum of History and Science 62 INTRODUCTION Even today, we are in the midst of one of several quilting revivals in America. When many traditional crafts seem to be dying, interest in quilting itself has been a recurrent phenomenon… --Lorre Weidlich and Susan Roach (1974)1 Writing in 1974, Lorre Weidlich, a folklorist with an interest in quilts, was making note of a quilt revival that had started during 1960s America when handmade crafts and products experienced a resurgence of interest. Even with the widespread interest in quilts and quiltmaking encouraged by the Whitney Museum of Art’s exhibit in 1971, “Abstract Design in American Quilts,” and the explosion of quilt-related publications, Weidlich was not writing at the height of the quilt revival. While the 1970s were certainly a significant period for quilts signaled by the formation of the American Museum of Quilts and Related Arts (now the San Jose Museum of Quilts and Textiles) in 19772, the 1980s experienced another wave of quilt enthusiasm, centered on the academic study and documentation of quilts. Legitimized by the new, highly popular fields of material culture study, cultural history, and women’s history, quilt scholarship changed in significant ways. In 1980 the American Quilt Study Group, the first membership organization dedicated to the serious study of quilts and quilt history, was organized and remains the primary avenue for peer-reviewed publication today. In 1981 The Rocky Mountain Quilt Museum in Golden, Colorado, opened as the second museum in the nation dedicated to the fiber arts. A significant part of the 1980s surge in quilt history was the documenting of thousands of quilts by small groups throughout the United States. Between 1980 and 1989, a total of thirty-six statewide quilt documentation projects were either completed or 2 in progress.3 Arkansas, South Carolina, Virginia, and Washington, D.C. completed a regional project, sometimes in addition to a statewide project, and Pennsylvania had begun an intensive county-by-county documentation effort that continued well into the 1990s.4 Although some projects included the documentation of public collections of quilts and large private collections, the majority of quilts documented by state projects were still owned by the makers or descendants of the makers. The quilt documentation projects did not end in 1989. By the end of the twentieth century, almost every state in the United States and multiple other nations including Great Britain, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand had conducted some form of quilt documentation project. In fact, Australia conducted its first quilt documentation program in 1982.5 The overwhelming response from quilters and quilt enthusiasts within the United States surprised many of the project coordinators and the interest in documenting quilts and in the resulting publications seems to continue unabated almost thirty years later, as exemplified by the continued publication of books cataloguing the findings of statewide quilt documentation projects.6 The current estimate of quilts documented through these projects is over 177,000.7 Unlike the projects

Load more