 Scraps of Fabric, Sewing & Quilting History | |
Harriet Powers: A Freed Slave Tells Stories Through Quilting~ Harriet Powers' life and the making of her story quilts ~Visualize a woman, born into slavery in 1837 and married at eighteen. We can only imagine her childhood, as there are no records of what it was like. She probably grew up as a plantation slave and likely learned to sew as a child. Her life as a slave must have been better than that of many for years later she loved to talk of "her ole Miss and her life before the war." p18 Although the Civil War freed the slaves it brought great hardship to slaves just as it did to all southerners. The shortages of food and clothing affected everyone and the future was uncertain. During the years from her marriage to sometime after the war Harriet gave birth to nine children. The Powers family lived in Georgia and most certainly the widespread poverty after the war deeply affected them. It must have been a difficult time for them. We do know that in the 1880s the family was able to get a small plot of land to farm. 
We have no records of quilts that Harriet Powers made before 1886, likely she made some basic quilts of squares stuffed with cotton as batting and used for warmth. Perhaps she made other fancier quilts as well. But we do know she had completed her first appliquéd story quilt by 1886 and exhibited it at the Clarke County Cotton Fair. This quilt was made up of pictures based on stories from the Bible. It was at this fair that Jennie Smith first saw Harriet's quilt and fell in love with it. Smith was an art teacher and knew she had found a piece of folk art that must be preserved. She immediately offered to buy the quilt but Harriet was not ready to let go of the quilt that she had put so much of herself into. Sadly for the Powers family hard financial times a few years later forced Harriet to sell the quilt to Jennie for just five dollars. Yet it was a fortunate occurrence for future generations as a in 1895 Jennie had the quilt exhibited in the Colored Building at the Cotton States Exposition in Atlanta, Georgia. Soon after seeing Harriet's quilt at this fair the faculty wives of Atlanta University commissioned her to make another one, this for a member of their board of trustees. On completion this second quilt was a bit different than the first, mixing Biblical stories with celestial events. Harriet's Bible Quilt now resides at the Smithsonian in Washington D.C. and is shown twice each month as a part of the "Behind the Scenes" tour. The second quilt resides at the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston, Massachusetts. ~ the stories shown in Harriet Powers' two Bible quilts ~
After seeing the first Bible quilt Jennie Smith wrote, "I regret exceedingly that it is impossible to describe the gorgeous coloring of the work." p18 It is hard to imagine such colors on the now faded quilt. In the graphic on the left I have made a picture with scrapbook papers showing how I imagine one block of the quilt might have looked based on what we know of it's original colors. As few black women were taught to write in Harriet's time we are grateful to Jennie for writing out much of what Harriet told her about the stories in the quilts. Following are some quotes that give us a flavor of Harriet's personality and her quilted stories. I'll start with the quilt block that I reproduced in paper on the right. Harriet told Jennie that it tells the story of Cain going to the land of Nod to get a wife. The picture includes two bears, an elephant, a lion, a leopard, an elk and what she called the 'kangaroo hog". p11 The extra large tooth on the rather friendly looking lion is especially appealing. In the top right block in the quilt shown on the pictured book cover Harriet described it as, "Job praying for his enemies. Job's crosses. Job's coffin." p25 Regarding the very center block Harriet said, "The people were frighten and thought that the end of time had come. God's hand staid the stars. The varmits rushed out of their beds." p27 Harriet told Jennie that the bottom center block contains a picture Betts the independent hog that ran 500 miles from Georgia to Virginia. p29 © 2003 Judy Anne Johnson Breneman (Do not reproduce this article without permission from the author.) Reference: Stitching Stars: The Story Quilts of Harriet Powers, by Mary E Lyons Sites About Harriet Powers: Southern Quilters: Harriet Powersincluding a of Harriet Powers and one of her quilts African American Story Bible Quilts by Harriet Powers (1837-1911) including a of Harriet Powers and one of her quilts Stitching Stars: The Story Quilts of Harriet Powers information about the book by Mary E Lyons Tributes via Quilts - 1837**HARRIET POWERS**1911 a quilt made in honor of Harriet Powers including the artist's telling about the details on her quilt | |