That's the thing- so much needs to be checked, IMHO. Was the quilt  
story widespread, or just in one particular area? Among a few slave  
families and/ or related plantations?  A few counties? There probably  
aren't too many old folks with the memories preserved, left in the  
area where the original story came from- has anyone hunted down the  
elderly in that area and tried to get more information from them?  
Maybe it wasn't a universal practice, but that doesn't mean it didn't  
exist somewhere. Hmm, I don't know about "slaves not making quilts".  
Why not? It was a good use of old fabric, shirts, skirts, dresses,  
etc. Almost certainly not the fancy "Baltimore quilts" and album  
quilts,  but this person needs to present his evidence that slaves  
did not make quilts. They sewed. Clothes were made, old clothes were  
repaired. Was there some reason they were not allowed to cut up old  
items of clothing to make a warm bedcovering? Was there a law  
somewhere? I'd be interested in knowing why this person thinks they  
were not allowed to. No such quilts survived? I hope that's not the  
case, in the warm, humid, buggy climate of the south not much in the  
way of fabric or locally made furniture has survived the centuries.  
For a long time the experts said the south had no fine furniture  
makers. It was all from Baltimore, NY, Philadelphia, Boston. But they  
now know that there were such makers, but not much of their work has  
survived the climate and the wars. Williamsburg a few years ago had a  
showing of such furniture, and there are now a few books out about  
the subject. And I have noticed how disposable quilts seem to be. For  
several years on regular trips back and forth to the Outer Banks of  
NC I saw what looked like a very nice old quilt covering a piece of  
farm machinery behind a barn. It faded and faded and then sort of  
tattered away. I thought to myself if granddad had spent months  
making a fine piece of furniture, it would be lovingly handed down in  
the family. But the quilt grandma worked long and hard on ends up  
covering a tiller. Or in a dog house, or in the bed of a pickup  
truck, or torn when covering  a piano the movers are trying to get  
out of the house. Then it's cut up and stuffed behind the washing  
machine so it won't vibrate...

Nancy
former antiques dealer

-------
I was never lost, but I was bewildered once for three days.

--Daniel Boone



On Jan 23, 2007, at 11:48 AM, Henry Wiencek wrote:

> While I agree with Nancy's comment that we have to be careful about
> dismissing things just because there's no documentation, the quilt  
> story
> seems to have been invented recently, out of whole cloth, so to  
> speak.  Take
> a look at the H-SLAVERY discussions for more details on this.  One  
> historian
> remarked that slaves didn't make quilts in the eighteenth-century, a
> "blanket" assertion I'd like to check.
>
> Henry Wiencek
> Charlottesville
>
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