Oh, Scrap! Blog Hop Continues

March 19. Hop over to Alison Dale's blog for today's Oh, Scrap! Giveaway of an eBook.
https://alisonsexpressions.com/

Surrounded by Lissa Alexander

I'll announce the winner of yesterday's giveaway here on March 26th.

1859 State Fair record from Pennsylvania

Mrs. E. M. Killough won a diploma for a Scrap Quilt.

Note at the bottom an "Assortment of Fancy Quilts"

from the Pennsylvania Asylum.

Meanwhile here's a little history of scrap quilts from the book's preface.

"Scrap Quilt" seems like such a contemporary term but I found many 19th-century references to the style. An 1858 grammar book defined it: " A scrap quilt has all kinds of pieces."

Scrap Quilt dated 1842. Property of Elizabeth Neffs,

Shenandoah, Virginia

Collection of the Shenandoah Historical Society Museum

For several years in the 1860s Pennsylvania's Greene County fair awarded $2 prizes in four categories:

Best White Quilt
Best Fancy Quilt
Best Scrap Quilt
Best Patch (Applique) Quilt

Scrap quilt dated 1845 from the Pat Nickols collection

at the Mingei Museum

Were scrap quilts considered less valuable than Fancy quilts or Applique? There seems to have been argument---some of it rather heated.

Quilt dated 1874 by Abbie C. ??

 An 1883 farm magazine divided the world into opposite camps.

On one side: those that "dote on bed quilts, spend all their spare time cutting and putting together pieces, beg quantities of calico scraps from the neighbors..." 

Abbie C. S.......

 The other group " denounce pieced quilts and declare that....star and angles make a hideous bed-covering" 

Quilt dated 1881

 The editor advocated a middle ground. Don't bother the neighbors and keep busy but not obsessed.

(Warning for the obsessed: See 1859 fair entry by Pennsylvania Asylum residents above.)

In 1852 Mrs. S. Rankin entered a Rag Bag Quilt in a Maryland fair.

I like the name Scrap Quilt better.

Stair Steps by Lissa Alexander

Here's the rest of the Blog Hop Schedule

March 20 Mellissa Corey
http://www.happyquiltingmelissa.com/

March 21 Carrie Nelson
http://blog.modafabrics.com/

March 22 Sherri McConnell
http://www.aquiltinglife.com/

March 23 Fat Quarter Shop
https://blog.fatquartershop.com/

March 24 Teresa Silva
http://quiltingismybliss.com/index.html/

March 25 Jane Davidson
https://quiltjane.com/blog/

March 26 Martingale Publishing & Winners Announced
http://blog.shopmartingale.com/