Antique Crazy Quilt Lecture & Trunk Show

This weekend is the North Dakota Quilters Showcase in Mandan, ND. I will be presenting a lecture and trunk show on the history of crazy quilts and a personal collection of antique crazy quilts owned by my Mom, Susan Rouleau. It has been about a year since I first presented the lecture to the Capital Quilters guild. But, as always, I am a bit nervous about getting up in front of a crowd and talking. As I dust off the power point presentation and add some new information, I am getting really excited to share the information and quilts with everyone. And it is nice to know my BA in art history is not going to total waste. So if you happen to be in the area come check out the great show!

Antique Crazy Quilts - Floral Quilt

In addition to the Antique crazy quilt posted earlier with the fan motifs, I thought I would share the rest of the antique Crazy Quilt collection. The collection is made up of 1 completed quilt, 2 quilt tops and 4 quilt blocks.
A little on the Quilts History:
The Crazy Quilts were purchased at the estate auction of Elizabeth Bull McCauley of Chadron Nebraska. She was just an incredible pioneering woman. She received her PhD in the late 1950s in education and was a long time teacher and education administrator in Nebraska. She was married 3 times and had no biological children. I believe that the quilts were made by someone in her family or from one of her three husband's families. I do have a few holes in her family tree, I don't know the name of her first husband and the maiden names of her mother.


Not the best photo of this quilt, it is the only finished quilt in the collection and by far the most spectacular. It has an applique floral border with many applique, painted and embroidered motifs.

Detail of the center. One motif that has puzzled me is the three "red dots". I believe they are actually rings and represent the Fraternal organization of the Independent Order of Odd Fellows and the Daughters of Rebekah. Both which use the three linked rings and the crescent moon shape as symbols. I welcome any other thoughts or ideas on what the red dot motif could be......

Motif to note is the applique butterfly in the lower right corner, one of my favorites.

(TIP: if you click on some of the photos you can get a closer view)

Detail of the floral border. The flowers are believed to be hat trimmings and if you look closely at the crazy patchwork you can notice that the border was done in darker shades than the center. Most of the embroidery is done with pearl cotton and are variations on the basic stitches.

Another detail of the border. Every time I look at the quilts something new jumps out or I notice something new. I had the extreme pleasure of presenting a lecture and trunk show on Crazy quilt history and one gal noticed the embellishment on the vase. I had never noticed that she added the embroidery stitches to enhance the pattern in the velvet fabric.

Antique Quilt - Painted Quilt

This quilt is the smallest of the collection. It has a center butterfly/fan motif and many hand painted floral motifs. The silk is in fantastic condition with little to no deterioration or fading. The painting have cracked a bit but still retain their beauty. Details of the painted silk. The quilt has several embroidered motifs. Near the center block is a whimsical frog sitting on a rock, there are several bird and people as well as this cow and calf.
If anyone is good at identifying the different flowers, I would love to hear from you.

This detail contains two of my favorite painted silks, the chick is just wonderful and the pansy at the bottom has such detail and depth.

Antique Crazy Quilts - The individual blocks

More photos of the collection of crazy quilts that were purchased at an estate auction.
The 4 individual blocks:

The Floral Block

The Fan Block

Embroidered Butterfly Block

Abstract Embroidery Block

Antique Crazy Quilts

I mentioned that the current CQ project I am working on is based on a collection of antique crazy quilts. I thought I would share a few photos. The CQ collection was purchased from an estate in Chadron Nebraska and consists of 1 finished CQ, 2 CQ tops and 4 single CQ blocks. One of the tops is signed by a Mable Courtier (may be wrong on the spelling of the last name). This is a photo of one of the quilt tops done with fans, also is a single block that uses a similar fan motif and design layout. Each block is 20"x 20" and the majority of the embroidery is done with pearl cotton.

Detail of the signature:

Here are a few detail photos........