My paternal grandmother, Monnie Childress, at a quilting bee around 1960. She’s second from right. My aunt Nelwyn gave me what she believes may be this quilt. I’ll eventually take a photo and add it here. As a child, I don’t remember my grandmother quilting, but she had a stack of vintage quilts that had been made by her and relatives. By the time I came along, she was crocheting afghans. There was a big basket of crocheted squares behind a chair in her living room, that she’d eventually put together.
Anonymous women quilting bee c. 1900
These women look like they’re having a grand time. Wonder what they chatted about while working on this quilt. Wonder what the quilt looks like, what colors those fabrics are. Wonder who took the photograph. Was it staged? Did these women want to have a photograph taken of them working on a quilt?
Here’s an image of the cabinet card the close up comes from, the two-box telephone on the wall places it around 1900.