Features over one hundred quilts created from Nebraska's territorial period to the 1980s, with descriptions of the patterns, materials, and techniques and biographical sketches of the quiltmakers

Features nineteenth-century floral applique quilts, a description of each quilt's historical and botanical influences, and an explanation of women's interest in botany and flower garden designs as reflected in their quilts.

Pulitzer Prize–winning historian Laurel Thatcher Ulrich has remarked, “Much of the social history of early America has been lost to us precisely because women were expected to use needles rather than pens.” This book, part of the multivolume series of the International Quilt Study Center collections, recovers a swath of that lost history and shows us some of America’s treasured material culture as it was pieced and stitched into place. American Quilts in the Modern Age, 1870–1940 examines the period’s quilts from both an artistic and a historical perspective. From pieced block to Crazy style to Colonial Revival examples, as well as one-of-a-kind creations, the full array of style and design appears in this book covering seven decades of quiltmaking. The contributing authors provide critical information regarding the modern and anti-modern tensions that persisted throughout this era of America’s coming of age, from the Civil War to World War II. They also address the textile technology and cultural context of the times in which the quilts were created, with an eye to the role that industrialization and modernization played in the evolution of techniques, materials, and designs. With full-color photographs of over 587 quilts, American Quilts in the Modern Age, 1870-1940 offers a new visual and tactile understanding of American culture and society, bridging the transition from traditional folk culture to the age of mass production and consumption.

Introduction : American quilts in the industrial age, 1760-1870 / Carolyn Ducey, Christine Humphrey, and Patricia Cox Crews -- Early spreads / Lynne Z. Bassett and Linda Baumgarten -- Whole cloth quilts -- Lynne Z. Bassett, Linda Baumgarten, and Christine Humphrey -- Chintz appliqué quilts / Carolyn Ducey -- Pieced quilts / Janice E. Frisch and Xenia Cord, Patricia Cox Crews, Carolyn Ducey, Jonathan Gregory, Virginia Gunn, and Christine Humphrey -- Appliqué quilts / Virginia Gunn, Carolyn Ducey, and Jonathan Gregory