1923: Quilts A Century Ago

 

Quilt in blue & white solids from eBay dealer GB-Best in Pennsylvania

While 2023 is slipping away we should go back 100 years and see what quilters

were doing in 1923. It was the Jazz Age, five years after the end of World War I

and quilts were being made from the available fabrics.

Blue and white was popular---these two would be hard

to date if they weren't labeled.

Here's another blue & white, a rather dyslexic Drunkard's Path.

The blues and the whites are primarily prints.

A very fashionable fabric choice from about 1890 on.

I'd have dated this top as 1900-1920

But Rachel H. Souders Van Nostrand (1843-1924) dated it 1923.

She married George W. Van Nostrand in 1860 in Sandyville, Tuscarawas County, Ohio.

She's buried in Pocatello, Idaho, which may be where she stitched this quilt in her 80s.

Here's another Drunkard's Path variation I'd have guessed was earlier.

Pieced of a double pink print and white.

And a claret red print with white striped shirting.

Not 1900-1920 but 1923

According to the file at the Rhode Island project

& the Quilt Index this one is dated 1923 and initialed J.K.

Black on white mourning prints in a small nine patch

dated on the red backing 1923 with Morris Moore's name.

It would seem that in 1923 quilt style was the same as it had been for the last 25 years or so.

I'll have to estimate a date of 1890-1925 on this popular fabric combination---the blues, grays and claret reds.

Some late blooming appliques:

Dated 1923 in the quilting

Crazy quilts dated 1923

Ladies of the Old Dow School, Michigan

Michigan project & the Quilt Index

The world war had been over for several years but the economic world had not recovered. Germany's economy was in a dire situation and they'd lost their dye patents as reparations. The Allies who'd been awarded those patents were experimenting with new technology but hadn't made any significant advances that trickled down to the dry goods department yet.

Wisconsin project

New ideas were percolating.

Rosanna Cookerly Rogers made a "Colonial Rose" in pastels and dated it 1923. Her source may have been Martha Washington Patchwork which published the pattern in the teens.

Many Colonial Rose quilts were made from kits of cotton sateeen, which

was not too colorfast.

Old-fashioned patchwork; new-fashion pastel pink.

F.M.W. 1923, Arizona Project

Old fashioned fabric; new-fashion applique friendship pattern that

would become quite popular in the 1930s.

A faded crib quilt---those new pastels don't appear to be too reliable yet.

E.A.W. Jr.

7-10-23

I don't know much about kits but it looks similar to this larger kit quilt.

Could it be as old as 1923?

1923 friendship quilt 

Kansas Project & the Quilt Index

A hundred years ago quilt design was in transition as was quilting's popularity.

Ten years later in 1933 there'd be an explosion of interest in the craft as

new, reliable fabrics in plains and prints inspired new ideas.