FLOUR SACKS AND A HISTORIC MILL

1924 Garrard Mill Paper Bag

At one time, many grist mills were located in rural settled areas where they milled grains. This provided fresh grains in the form of flour, feed, and  meal.  Local farmers brought their grain harvest to the mill and paid for the milling by giving the miller a portion of his harvest. The grist mill miller turned around and sold his share to area folks and  commercial establishments.

The 1901 Garrard Mill in Lancaster, Kentucky,  marked their grain bags with their logo (see above photo). They  also packed their flour in cotton cloth bags of various colored patterns -- women used this cloth to sew clothes or make quilts.

1901 Garrard Mill, Lancaster, Kentucky

The  Garrard Mill established delivery routes, much like the milk-man routes, which delivered the products of the mill. Grains were delivered in the logo printed large paper bags and flour in the patterned cotton cloth sacks.  Women would request certain patterns of the cotton cloth sacks for home projects they were working on. A common name for these cotton sacks was 'flour sacks." There was a ledger kept by the Garrard Mill with the customer's name and the type of patterns they needed. If the right patterns came along they would be delivered  to the customer .

Just perhaps some of the strip quilts that we see today have pieces of flour sack material in them?

Garrard Grist Mill was built in 1901 and was sold at auction in the latter part of the twentieth century. It is now in private hands and no longer mills for the area.


The Garrard Mill is listed on the National Register of Historic Places


Resources:
Margaret Simson, Garrard Historical Society
Southern Folk Art and Antiques -- Photo -- Garrard Mill Bag

CONTEMPORARY CRAZY QUILT BLOCKS -- ROUND ROBIN STYLE

CRAZY BLOCK MADE INTO A PILLOW

As I stepped into the Berea Appalachian Fireside Gallery this past August, I was met with a small exhibit of contemporary crazy quilt blocks. The blocks were artistic, diverse, colorful, and had particularly fine needlework. There was a sign near the quilt blocks that introduced the exhibit as "Out On The Line IV." The artists of the blocks were women from a group called The Berea Depot Quilters.

BLOCK MADE INTO A DISPLAY PIECE

The sign's information also stated that the blocks were made using the round robin method. I was totally unfamiliar with round robin. I contacted the quilt group and talked to Carol Ann White about the the method. Basically it is a few quilters working on crazy quilt blocks. 

A BLOCK IN THE MAKING

Above is an example of a block that is just beginning to be worked on. You can say it is pretty much in its raw state. As you can see the block has ten crazy quilt pieces. This means that ten quilters will be involved with working on this particular  block. Each crazy quilt piece of the ten pieces of each block will be assigned to one quilter who will add her unique needlework during the round robin. 


Each quilter will have a block of ten crazy pieces to be passed around simultaneously to all ten quilters  -- each quilter getting only one of the blocks at a time.


As each quilter has the block for a month it will take ten months for each of the  quilter's blocks to be finished. Each of the ten blocks will contain a collage of all the persons involved with this particular round robin. 


Hope this explanation is understandable -- please send me a comment with any questions about how to do this round robin.

LION DETAIL ON A FINISHED BLOCK

The lion block above displays some of the work accomplished on one of the blocks. Below are some of the individual blocks that were in the exhibit.

CRAZY QUILT STYLE ON A FINISHED BLOCK

WEB AND SPIDER SURROUNDED BY OTHER DESIGNS

MIX OF VIBRANT COLORS AMONGST THE CRAZY QUILT PIECES

A DELICATE ICE CREAM CONE SURROUNDED BY LACE

GARDEN VARIETY OF CRAZY PIECES 

BEE, BUTTERFLY AND FLOWER PIECES

LACE, 2009 DATE, AND A PORCUPINE

I felt the quilt blocks were both eye-catching and striking -- certainly a reflection of the quilter's love of their craft.


The quilters involved were: Rita Barlow, Pat Jennings. Linda Murdoch, Deannee Oliver, Barbara Taylor, Sarah Vaughn, Ginnifer Watts, Carol Ann White, and Jo Ann White.

QUILTS, UNDERGROUND RAILROAD, FOLKLORE -- Sunday Simplicities

NORTHERN UNDERGROUND RAILROAD CONNECTIONS, 1830-1865

CLICK TO ENLARGE

(wikipedia)

The Underground Railroad was a secret movement that consisted of a set of constantly changing trails and paths which southern slaves used to escape to freedom. In southern states, the African American slaves were pretty much on their own until they reached the northern anti-slave states. There they were assisted mainly by African Americans as well as some white abolitionists and Quakers to assimilate into the culture. Many slaves continued on to anti-slavery Canada to live. It was first and foremost a movement lead by African Americans.

The Underground Railroad is recorded as the largest Freedom Movement in North America. Its main thrust was between the years of 1840 and 1865. And, because of this distinction, there has been a certain amount of folklore spun from it.

Outdoors at the historic Rogers House near Richmond, Kentucky is a large artistic signboard*, recently erected, displaying a sampler of quilt squares. The significance of the sign is to reflect upon the folklore of quilts being used as code signals for the Underground Railroad.

Legend has it that African American slaves would hang the quilts on clothes lines, over fences, or over windowsills as if airing out the quilts -- while all the time they were really giving codes, via the quilt pattern,to escaping slaves traveling the nearby road. Each quilt pattern was delivering a communication code to the escapees on the run.

At least that is what recent accounts by a North Carolina woman tell us.No written documentation exists to validate this -- scholars and historians doubt the story. But, in the popular culture mode, the folk story has caught on and has received attention in some folklore circles.

Let us identify the quilt squares on the signboard and then look at the folklore codes associated with them.

In the above section of the signboard, reading left to right and top to bottom, are the following codes for the quilt squares:

FLYING GEESE -- time to go North.

MONKEY WRENCH -- pack up and get ready to leave

JACOBS LADDER -- an Underground Railroad symbol

SHOO-FLY -- nickname for Harriet Tubman

Again, reading left to right, top row to bottom row, the quilt squares below denote the folk Underground Railroad codes:

CARPENTERS WHEEL - fugitives to follow west to northwest

DRUNKARDS PATH - take a meandering path

BEAR PAW - bear paw in the woods would lead to fresh clothes and food.

LOG CABIN - run away slave nearby looking for passage to Canada.

First and foremost the Underground Railroad was a secret, loosely organized movement. About 1840 it seemed to gain momentum. They did use various codes, such as a lit lantern, to signal such things as, "this is a safe house."

It is estimated that as high as 100,000 slaves escaped the south between 1800 and 1865. These were mostly men and mostly from adjacent southern states of the north, such as Virginia and Kentucky.

The Library of Congress has made available on-line photographs and narratives of former slaves compiled by the Federal Writers Project during the Depression. I thought that the former slaves should have a face so I will close this post with some of the Federal Writers photographs. Although the folks in the photos are no longer young, as the photos were taken between 1936 and 1938, it provides the feeling of the inhumanness of slavery.

ANNIE LITTLE of Texas

Photo taken at age 81

Former slave until the age of about nine.

DAPHNE WILLIAMS of Texas

Photo taken at the age of about 100 years old

Former slave until about the age of 28 years old.

BELOW PHOTO

GUS JOHNSON of Alabama

Photo taken at age of 90

Former slave until the age of 18 years of age.

Click on the above photos for enlargement

RESOURCES

Analysis of the Underground Railroad quilt folklore

History and Geogrphy of the Underground RailRoad

Owen Sound's Black History -- Canadian history of the Underground Railroad.

* The signboard is a project of the Kentucky Quilt Trail Project of Madison County. The group is most well-known for its quilt squares that have been placed on barns, outbuildings, and businesses around Madison County. To date they have placed 56 quilt squares in the county. All the blocks are the result of many, many hours of labor by volunteers. Designs and colors for the quilt patterns are drafted by Don Hart and each pattern is hand-painted by the volunteers at community locations. Placing the squares on structures is accomplished by donated labor and equipment by local utility companies.