Tuesday, January 28, 2014

Nancy Butler Memorial Quilt

Hello all! I stopped writing this blog for a while, but now it is back! In the last few months I have been to and planned more real life funerals that I have been to in my entire life. Things were just a bit too morbid for me.

This beautiful quilt is in the collections of the Smithsonian. It is from 1842 Jamestown, New York and measures 80 in x 81 in.

From the Smithsonian's description:
Nancy Ward Butler made this quilt to commemorate the death of her granddaughter in 1842. Named for her grandmother, Nancy Adelaide Butler was born May 22 1840. She was the daughter of Calvin Butler (1818-1857), the quilt maker's son, and Mary A. Storey (1822-1909) whom he married in 1839. Nancy A. Butler died in February 1842 in Jamestown, N.Y. of scarlatina or scarlet fever, a serious and often fatal childhood disease at the time.