Document text
After unpacking some of the oldest and most unique quilts from the history of the region for inclusion in the National Quilt Index at Michigan State University, Southern Oregon Historical Society coordinators are giving the public a chance to swoop in Thursday and take a gander at the ancient handiwork before the quilts head back into storage. An event set for 5-7 p.m. will give the public a chance to see about four dozen of the quilts on display at the SOHS History Center Building, 106 N. Central Ave., Medford. Admission comes with a suggested donation of $5 per person. Stephanie Butler, SOHS curator of collections, said recent participation in the Oregon Quilter Project Oct. 28, when experts visited the Collections Department & Archives of the SOHS Research Library, presented a perfect opportunity to let the public view some rarely seen artifacts. Some of the quilts date back to the early 1800s, and Butler said the quilts are kept in storage for protection and preservation purposes. As part of the National Quilt Index, quilts that have been contributed to SOHS from around the region for nearly 200 years will soon be accessible worldwide by educators and researchers. “We have well over 100 quilts in our collection and, because of the size of them and the delicacy of the fabric and things like that, we don’t have opportunity to display them very often. The Oregon Quilt Project gave us a reason to get them out because they wanted to study quite a large number of our quilts,” Butler said. The quilts run from the 1820s to the mid-1980s, and each one is like a historic document, or window in time. “They really are quite stunning, and the workmanship on them is incredible. Some of them have 20 stitches per inch. The majority of what we’ve got are handmade quilts, and there’s at least one example of what they call ‘whole cloth,’ where the woman actually wove the fabric herself and then quilted on it,” Butler said. “We’re not going to be able to lay out every single one, but we’ll do what we call a bed turning in the front room of the research room where the quilts will be in small stacks and we’ll pull them back and show different designs during our open house. Because of space constraints, we can’t show the entire collection, but I think we’ll be able to show around 50 patterns.” Butler said it’s not unusual to hear criticism of the collection of SOHS artifacts being largely restricted from public access. “People say, ‘Why can’t we see the collection. If it’s in storage, what good is having it?’ This is a perfect example of why we keep the collection as well preserved and protected as possible. It’s so that we can learn how people lived and how they made things. This project brought together expert quilters from all around the state who came to our facility and really looked at each individual quilt. It’s really incredible how each quilt tells a story.” Reach freelance writer Buffy Pollock at [email protected].