Signature Quilt,
Mid-19th Century   
America
Cotton, batting, and ink
Eugene Field House Museum           

 Descriptive Detail
 “When this you see, remember me” is a phrase often written in nineteenth-century autograph albums, but it also describes the purpose of this quilt. Surrounded by brick-shaped patches and squares of solids and patterns in dark blues, maroons, browns, dull yellows, and bright reds, the white cross in the center of each block displays the name of a friend or family member along with a place and a date. Hand-sewn and pieced in what is often called the Chimney Sweep pattern, the blocks are arranged on point, creating a pattern with a light center in which someone’s name could be written. Since this is a single pattern quilt, it is not only a signature quilt, but a friendship quilt.

Local and National Historical Connections
The signature quilt is the oldest quilt in the Eugene Field House collection. One of the signatures on the quilt dates from 1848. Of all the objects from the nineteenth century, the quilt seems to be the most beloved and the most memory-laden. Quilts wrapped you when you were born and when you died; they were a part of the bridal hope chest; they kept you warm in chilly bedrooms; and they brought friends and family together in the quilting bee. From the elaborate velvet and satin crazy quilts of the upper classes to the remnant quilts of the sharecropper and slave cabin, quilts were an important part of everyday life.

Like the autograph album, signature or album quilts were a nineteenth-century fad in America, beginning about 1840 and lasting into the 1890s.  These quilts were often made to mark a special event or as a gift to someone who was moving away. As the name suggests, signature quilts used the signatures of people as part of the design. Sometimes poems, Bible verses, or dedications were also added. By 1840 a new indelible ink made it easier for people to sign their name on fabric that was then sewn into a quilt. The signatures in this quilt have been signed in ink. Signing your name on cloth can be hard, so sometimes one person with beautiful handwriting would sign all of the names. Album quilts were such cherished mementos that they were well cared for and rarely used.

Not all signature quilts were friendship quilts. Some quilts were fundraisers for various causes, from missionary work to supporting troops during a war. The finished quilt may have been auctioned off or people may have paid a fee, often ten cents, to have their name written on a block in the quilt.

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The Eugene Field Museum
634 S. Broadway,
St. Louis, MO 63102
314.421.4689