Samantha at the World's Fair in 1893

Samantha and husband Josiah Allen at the 1893 

Columbian Exposition in Chicago. 

Next year we are going to piece a Block-of-the-Month based on women journalists who covered the Civil War and I've been reading about "The Petticoat Press." Marietta Holley was of a younger generation so I am not including her in the group of 12 female newspaper reporters. She wasn't a reporter but a successful feature writer who did humorous pieces, collected into books.

I was pleased to find her book-length account of country bumpkin Samantha, "Josiah Allen's Wife's"  visit to the 1893 World's Fair. For years Merikay Waldvogel and I have been studying the displays at that influential fair and have concluded that although many family tales and newspaper accounts mention a quilt hung there----very few were.

You had to be royalty as Samantha reported.

The most remarked upon textile was attributed to Mary Queen of Scots. See a post here on this elusive artifact: https://barbarabrackman.blogspot.com/2021/10/1893-columbian-exposition-quilts-2-16th.html

The illustrations are by Baron Constantin De Grimm who

did a great job imagining Queen Victoria packing up a few things.

 Like everyone else the Allens were impressed by the new Ferris wheel,

which was the inspiration for a name for these popular name quilts arranged

in wheel fashion....

Quilt dated 1909, Nebraska Project & the Quilt Index

https://quiltindex.org//view/?type=fullrec&kid=29-24-2172

...Perhaps the most significant quilt-related piece of history to come from that fair.

Quilt with many dates, probably from 1907.

Massachusetts project & the Quilt Index.

https://quiltindex.org//view/?type=fullrec&kid=11-37-95

More posts on the 1893 fair:
https://barbarabrackman.blogspot.com/2021/10/1893-columbian-exhibition-1-crazy-quilts.html
https://barbarabrackman.blogspot.com/2021/10/1893-columbian-exposition-quilts-2-16th.html
https://barbarabrackman.blogspot.com/2021/10/1893-worlds-columbian-exposition-3.html
https://barbarabrackman.blogspot.com/2021/10/1893-worlds-columbian-exposition-4.html
https://barbarabrackman.blogspot.com/2021/10/1893-worlds-columbian-exposition-5.html
https://barbarabrackman.blogspot.com/2021/10/1893-worlds-columbian-exposition-6.html
https://barbarabrackman.blogspot.com/2021/10/1893-worlds-columbian-exposition-7.html