0 QUILTING IN THE 1910s & 1930s

The evolution of craft patterns in The Farmer's Wife magazine is quite interesting. The 1920s saw almost exclusively crochet patterns until the very late 1920s. In the 1930s, many of you will not be surprised to know that quilting became much more popular, and the magazine published at least four separate quilt pattern booklets during that time. What did surprise me though, was the quilting patterns that were published in the 1910s. The first set of pictures below are of patterns published in 1913, all in black and white. At the bottom of this post are patterns printed in color in 1934. Sometime in the future, I will post some pages from the 1930s Farmer's Wife quilt booklets.

The following letter was printed in the 1913 issue:

My young daughter was not strong and the doctor prescribed sleeping in the fresh air, so she had her cot moved out on the porch and when it began to get cool and a quilt became necessary my inspiration came. We had plenty of nice, sweet hay, and I knew that hay was warm, so, why not a comforter of hay? I had never seen one, but I experimented, and this is the way I did it: I got enough dark blue flannelette for the covering, cutting it a little wider than the cot it was to cover. First I sewed across one end, down one side and then across the other end; then quilted across from side to side making the distances about twenty inches. Through the open side the hay was then packed in smoothly and evenly, and the remaining side sewed up. My daughter declared that this quilt was warmer than two or three blankets, and lighter. When the hay became limp, the quilt was hung out in the sun, and it soon became as crisp as if fresh. After the hay became worn and thin from constant use. I took it all out and refilled the quilt with fresh hay. With such a filling at hand there is no excuse for the farmer's wife to go without plenty of good light covering. Mrs. R.

Detail: QUILTING IN THE 1910s & 1930s

0 YES, I AM KNITTING; by A Farm Wife; May 1918

Yes, I am knitting sweaters. No, I do not neglect my housework or any other duty. Also I am practicing conservation down to the very crumbs and I am doing work that I never tired to do before. For my knitting I use time that would otherwise be wasted as far as my hands are concerned tho I have never found much time to waste--the days have never had enough hours. I knit in my car, at lectures and at club meetings, in odd moments of waiting when ordinarily I would pick up a bit of light reading or when nerves and body demand that I sit still and relax. Do you think I am ostentatious, to carry my knitting about publicly? You many think so if you like, but just the same my sweaters seem to me to grow rather magically. And you say that a knitting machine can do the work better and more quickly than a hundred women can? Probably true--undoubtedly true. But a knitting machine takes capital to set up. The knitting that I and my countless sisters are doing takes no capital to start, is redeeming thousands of otherwise wasted hours and is winning back to usefulness many women who are physically unable to render other service or who have for years regarded themselves as exempt from the common lot of toil.

Detail: YES, I AM KNITTING; by A Farm Wife; May 1918