The Ship Quilt and Mrs. Danner

Sailing ships blocks were popular in friendship quilts.  I have two quilts in my collection with sailboats; the Banner Progressive Club quilt and the newly named Sugar Creek Township quilt.

According to Block Base the earliest pattern for a ship block was in Mrs. Danner's quilt books. I found them easily online. Mrs. Danner's Fourth Quilt book has the Ship Quilt on the cover.  There are no instructions, you had to send 50c for the pattern. I considered making the scalloped edge but thought better of it.  Maybe next time.

Mrs. Danner's Quilt Books

 

Unlike Aunt Martha or Nancy Page, Mrs. Danner was a real person.  Scioto Imhoff Danner (1891-1974) was a quiltmaker who began her career by selling quilts and demonstrating techniques in department stores.  She started selling her patterns in the 1930s and her business model was extremely successful; in 1934 during the depression Danner had 24 women worked for her.

The quilt books were catalogues for the patterns with advice on choosing a colour scheme and sewing tips.  The first three books were printed in the 1930s, then books 4 and 5 were added in the 1950s.

As a resource for pattern names, the catalogues are not the most reliable source.  Mrs. Danner would see a neighbour's quilt, copy it, then christen it without reference to already established names:

I shall call this Mrs. Anderson's Quilt.  It has always been called that because our neighbor, Mrs. Anderson, made it when I was a little girl.

Mrs. Steiger kept after me about the name for this quilt and continually referred to it as "that very pretty new one that ought to have a pretty name," so I called it Alice's Quilt for her.

 An Easy Applique Hickory Leaf - I am naming this quilt just that.  It is easy and would be improved by having all blocks appliqued instead of half of them plain.  And it should have more applique on the border.  It has a historical name but that is too involved for my space.  I suggest you make it in two different shades of one color or two contrasting colors.  Pattern 35 cents.

Some of her historical narrative also seems a little imaginative:

The Mayflower Quilt - The first four quilts in this catalog are each over 100 years old.  This is one of the prettiest quilts I ever saw and Mrs. Ericson whose hobby is historical quilts, found a picture just like it listed as a pattern that came over on the Mayflower in 1620.

But I can't go past Myrtle's Diamond Honeycomb.  It was made by a correspondent in Australia, and Mrs. Danner was most impressed with the Australia quiltmakers:

My Australian friend Myrtle Smith of Melborne (sp.) made this quilt ... The Australians are marvelous needle women.  They take sewing seriously.  Needle-workers have clubrooms, publish a monthly bulletin, and have teachers who give lessons on different kinds of embroidery, quilting, etc. certain days - afternoon or morning.  There is a schedule that they follow.  My friend, Mrs. Smith lends them her lovely home each year for a quilt show and they make money for charity on that, besides the pleasure they have.

You can find out more about Mrs. Danner at the following websites:

http://quilthistorytidbits--oldnewlydiscovered.yolasite.com/scioto-imhoff-danner.php

http://womensworkquilts.blogspot.com/2018/09/entrepreneurs-scioto-imhoff-danner.html

Twin Darts ~ a 1940s Quilt Block

This week's block is Twin Darts.

The block's maker is Cora Stewart.  I haven't found out too much about her; she lived in Armstrong County, Pennsylvania like the other block makers, her maiden name was Snyder and her husband John worked on the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad. Cora was one of eleven children but she had no children of her own; I imagine she made a fuss of her nieces and nephews.

This quilt from Armstrong County is not revealing any great secrets.  I have however discovered it was made later than I thought. One of the women on the quilt didn't get married until 1943 so it is one of the younger quilts in my collection.  I have found that one of the makers lived in Sugar Creek Township, which I think has a nicer sound than Armstrong County.  The women are the usual mix of mother and daughters, married sisters, friends and neighbours.  The recipient is possibly "Mother" of the centre block but I don't yet know who Mother is.

Anyway, back to Cora's block.  Twin Darts pattern was published in the Farm Journal magazines which includes The Farmer's Wife. There is a nice example in The Quilt Index, made in Nebraska in 1940.

Achziger, Marie Zeiler. Twin Darts. 1940. From University of Nebraska - Lincoln, Nebraska Quilt Project (Lincoln Quilters Guild). Published in The Quilt Index, http://www.quiltindex.org/basicdisplay.php?kid=57-90-7A3. Accessed: 12/14/2019


Most of the images I have seen are with two colours only, Cora used three so I did as well. I drafted the pattern with EQ7.

Some of the Farm Journal patterns were reprinted in a 1970s book called 'Modern Quilting' by Rachel Martens. I might have to get hold of a copy; but I still have trouble accepting that 1970 was almost fifty years ago.

That can't be right!

Can it?

Aunt Martha's Hexagon Wreath - With a Swear Word or Two

"Aunt Martha" quilt kits first appeared in 1930.  The pre-cut kits did not stay in the market for long but Aunt Martha's pattern books and catalogues had a long print run from 1931 all the way to 1977.  You can find out more about Aunt Martha from Wilene Smith's research.

I now have pdf copies of a few of the Aunt Martha books.  The following one was one of the later books, printed in 1960.

One of the patterns is for a Hexagon Wreath, and I thought that a single block would make a nice sample quilt. This is the entire set of instructions; no You Tube tutorials or group forums, but how hard can it be?

I used English paper piecing to make sixteen hexagon flowers and sixteen leaves.  All I had to do was arrange them in a wreath and sew them together.  But I couldn't for the life of me make them fit together. They would only join into a six sided wreath, not an eight sided one.  After an hour of frustration I took a closer look at the pattern.

In the hand drawn picture, the hexagons aren't quite hexagons.  The hexagon flower at the top has the points facing towards the centre, but so do the ones on the side.  It is an optical illusion.  Great work Aunt Martha!

I unstitched the green leaves, placed them under the hexagons and stretched the wreath a bit.  Then some hand quilting and a binding.  I am glad I only had to make one!