Since last year I’ve been urging our American customers to make quilts to commemorate the 250th anniversary of the United States. There are many possible themes for these quilts, which will pass into history and be studied and appreciated 50 and 100+ years from now. (Don’t forget to put a label on your quilts!)
This quarter millennium celebration (250 years) is known as the Semi-Quincentennial. (Half of 500 …get it?) Our state of Colorado was founded in 1876 on the nation’s 100th year, so we are known as the Centennial State. In 1976, the year I graduated from high school, Colorado celebrated its own 100 year birthday, and the USA celebrated its 200 year birthday. (Oops, that means my 50th high school reunion is coming up!)
In 1986 when I was living in New York City, I participated in the centenary celebrations for the Statue of Liberty. It was a big deal….The display included 22,000 aerial fireworks, launched from 30 barges. The largest flotilla of tall ships to assemble in modern history, traveled down the Hudson River. President Reagan and French President Mitterand gave speeches, and John Williams conducted the premier of the Liberty Orchestra playing his composition Liberty Fanfare. It was a four-day party!
Ted Koppel of ABC News Nightline presented the Medal of Liberty to outstanding naturalized Americans, and Chief Justice Warren Burger swore in immigrants to the United States in a naturalization ceremony on Ellis Island.
As I watch American athletes come together peacefully, to compete with other athletes from around the world this week, I cannot help but have hope for humanity, and for our future. The monks on the Walk for Peace arrived in Washington DC, having deeply touched the hearts of so many people along their trek across our nation.
I have made 3 quilts for the Semi-Quin year. Two will be at the Virginia Quilt Museum, and one will be at the New England Quilt Museum, as celebrations unfold around the Fourth of July. My quilt “250 Years of American Wilderness” is the only contemporary quilt in the latter exhibit, curated by Sandra Sider. She also wrote the companion book (featured below) and my quilt is the final piece in this gorgeous commemorative book. (Commemorative American Quilts: Stitching Our Heritage from 1876 to Today) I am so honored to have pieces in these exhibits.
If you have not made your own Semi-Quin quilt to document this landmark year, and to document what is happening now in American life, I urge you to make such a piece. It will become a treasured piece of history for your descendants. And perhaps some day scholars will study your work in a museum or at a history conference. I’ve been to AQSG seminars where serious study is applied to quilts that are 50, 100 and 200+ years old. It is a selfless act to make one of these historic documenting quilts, and it is our way of reaching into the future and touching those who can only wonder how we lived in 2026.
Sharing your passion for fabric…
Luana & Paul
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Travel/Lecture Dates:
Feb 18-21 – QuiltCon – Raleigh NC
Apr 26 – May 1 – Alegre Retreat, Gateway CO
May 16 – New England Quilt Museum, Soul Stories Artist Reception
May 18-26 – Montpellier, France
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