Susan McCord made this outstanding example of the popular mid-19th century red and green floral quilts with a large flower and urn motifs. This particular design is known as the Harrison Rose after William Henry Harrison who was Indiana’s first territorial governor and ninth U.S. President. It is not hard to imagine that McCord’s wonderful flower gardens served as inspiration for her for this quilt.
When I was looking at this quilt as I was writing this post, I was staggered to see the meticulous care McCord had gone to, to assure exacting replication of the placement of elements within each of the urn blocks. What at first seems like near perfection, when examined more closely indeed reveals the traces of a human hand at work, with all sorts of interesting tidbits and twists that come to light. Those anomalies are the design moments that I think make this quilt engaging. Each urn block is not a carbon copy, but I am left wondering how she achieved such astounding replication of placement in each them. Look and you will find perhaps a difference in spacing equalling fractions of an inch, but for the most part the elements are in precisely the same location within each block, with each of the elements gesturing the same way as their neighbouring blocks … a jaunty little tilt to the left for one leaf … cascading blossoms that lean ever so slightly, but oh so symmetrically towards the ground.
Some differences in colour can be noted: the flipping of the placement for the red and green elements in a pair of flowers in one block; the substitution of a pink for a red in blossoms here and there; not enough to distract, but just enough to delight. I noticed there are subtle shade differences in the green of the urns … sun fading, unstable dyes, or different bolts of fabric?
Some of my other favourite moments in the quilt?
The borders that each highlight a different flower. One of the borders has a blossom that mirrors a flower found in the bouquets, but McCord changed the style of leaves for that border blossom. The other flower from the bouquets that is used in a border changes up the design of it’s centre. Notice how she didn’t mind using the same leaf shape on adjacent borders, and how she switched it up with a different leaf shape on the borders opposite those.
That her borders are different widths top to bottom and yet the same on the sides, what’s up with that … fabric she had on hand and wasn’t going to chop off and waste good fabric just to have all the borders the same width? A design choice for the type of flowers being used on each? Trying to get to an exact measurement for the bed it was to go on?
Those very vibrant orange dots on the urns. I swoon for dots! Those smaller dots that are situated right above the blossoms on the left … embroidered? Appliqued? Their diminutive size makes them double swoon worthy!
And finally, that fine binding that forms the most delicate frame around the entire composition. We know from the facts below that it measures less than ½”. Narrow single fold binding for the win … always … regardless if it is cut on the straight of grain or cut on the bias! I love Narrow Single Fold Binding cut on the straight of grain and have been using it for the past 20 years. You can find a tutorial sheet about Narrow Single Fold Bindings here on my blog.
Some other facts about this quilt:
Condition: Good/moderate use
Construction: Hand pieced, hand appliqued, hand embroidered
Borders: Top border 8.25 inches. Bottom border 8 inches. Side borders 6 inches.
Back: Solid/plain white cotton back, hand sewn, four pieces 30.5 in; 31in; 4in; 10in
Batting: Thin cotton batting, some milling debris visible.
Quilting: Hand quilted with white cotton thread at 10 – 12 stitches per inch, some quilting at 6 stitches per inches in brown thread; Urns are quilted with diamonds. The motifs are outline and self-quilted on a ground of diamonds. The borders are also outline quilted with additional quilted leaves. Blanket stitch is used to outline one type of flower
Binding: Separate binding was applied on the bias grain, handsewn with cording, measuring less than ½”
What other things have you noticed about this quilt? I would love to hear your thoughts!
I decided that this year there is someone whose body of work is definitely worthy of shining a huge spotlight on. And so, for this year’s Twelve Quilts of Christmas, we will be celebrating the work of Indiana quilter Susan Noakes McCord. To know me is to know my deep love for her work. McCord was a design genius, a highly proficient needlewoman and an extraordinary quilter. Her quilts are a testament not only to her artistic vision but to her tenacity in seeing that vision through to completion. I am in awe of her and her work. No other word will do. It is complete and utter awe. Her quilts leave me nothing short of breathless.
The majority of antique and vintage quilts that have survived to today are made by anonymous makers. It is exceptionally rare that we have the ability to study a large number of quilts from over a century ago, from a single maker, and especially one as gifted and prolific as McCord. The Henry Ford Museum has 13 of her quilts in their collection and we are so incredibly lucky that so many of her quilts survived. Different family members who had inherited her quilts cherished them and eventually sold them to The Henry Ford Museum: ten in 1972-1973, one in 1992, one in 2004, and one in 2011. I am so grateful they all did. I have shared two of them with you in past Twelve Quilts of Christmas: here in 2022 and here in 2016.
Here’s a little bit of what we know about Susan McCord:
Born in Susannah (Susan) Noakes, on 7th of October 1829 in Indiana, she met school teacher Arvin Green McCord and they wed on the 2nd of August 1849 in Decatur, Indiana. They eventually settled in McCordsville, Indiana, a town settled by one of Green’s relatives, making their home on an 80 acre farm. Susan and Green had 7 children: 5 boys and two girls. She was an ordinary farm wife who kept house, brought up her children, sewed and mended the clothing for her family, knitted accessories, embroidered linen and bedcovers, practiced homeopathic medicine, read her bible through each year, participated in sewing bees, tended the vegetable and flower gardens, took care of the cows and chickens, and participated in community gatherings – and in whatever small slices of time she had, she also made exquisite quilts. Exceptional quilts. The museum writes: “McCord used traditional materials, techniques and patterns—but her considerable skill at manipulating fabric, color and design turned the traditional into something exceptional. McCord’s bed coverings stand as the extraordinary legacy of an otherwise little-known Indiana farmwife.”
Tragically on December 6, 1909 McCord was kicked by a cow she had been milking and lay on the frozen ground for hours before someone found her. She contracted pneumonia and died 6 days later on December 12, 1909. Susan and her husband Green are buried in the Oaklandon Cemetery in Marion County, Indiana.
Left, Susan McCord and family in front of their home in McCordsville, Indiana. Right, Green and Susan McCord
We know that there is at least one more quilt and other work by McCord that has survived, other than thirteen quilts at The Henry Ford. There is a photo in the collections of The Henry Ford, of a McCord relative holding a Drunkard’s Path crib quilt. And there are two other photos of large sheets that McCord extensively embroidered. More testaments to the fact that she was not an idle woman.
The first quilt this year, is Susan McCord’s Triple Irish Chain with Border.
Triple Irish Chain with Border Quilt, McCordville, Indiana, United States, c. 1900, 76” x 67”, Susan Noakes McCord. From the collection of The Henry Ford. Object number: 2011.221.1
The museum writes: “Susan McCord’s Triple Irish Chain demonstrates her considerable skill at manipulating fabric, color and design to turn a traditional quilt pattern into something extraordinary. Choosing carefully from her bag of scraps, McCord sewed thousands of very small fabric squares of varying colors together, resulting in a remarkably balanced, pleasing whole. Then she surrounded it with her unique vine border.”
The precision of her piecing in the quilt is impressive, her great attention to detail evident. And absolutely her color choices are pleasant and harmonious. This traditional design has been expertly executed and it results in a lovely “centre composition”. It is said there are 3, 630 pieces in the quilt, but I don’t think that includes all of the pieces in the borders. We really need to talk about those borders … her trademark vines … the vines that make her work unique and readily identifiable. She was very fond of these borderss and used them on numerous quilts. They undulate and calmly meander around the border, with multitudinous leaves, buds and flowers exploding off of them.
But look closely, because what you will see is that many of those leaves are not ordinary appliqued leaves made of a single piece of fabric. No, many of them are in fact individually string pieced (absolutely no strata here, despite the instructions in the famous book about her quilts), some of them using anywhere from two to six stings to make them. These leaves render me dumbstruck, heart palpitating Every. Single. Time. I. See. Them. They are stunning, simply stunning and unique to Susan McCord.
Not to be totally taken up with the sting leaves, we can’t miss that all four borders are different. And she doesn’t even try to resolve the corners with the vines. Instead one vine heads off this way, another heads off that way. None of that matters. You can tell she was having a marvellous time, playing as she went, using her keen eye to maintain a balanced composition for the whole. Can we just have a group sigh of delight as we look at it!
Some other facts about this quilt:
Condition: Good/moderate use
Hand pieced and hand appliqued
Borders: Sides are 3.75” and top and bottom are 4”
Solid cotton back, hand sewn, three pieces, 2”, 33” 33” (common width for the era was much narrower than today. That 33″ indicates she was using the full width of the fabric in piecing the backs)
Thin Batting, hand quilted with white cotton thread at 10 stitches per inch using floral motifs, single parallel lines and outline quilting in the borders.
Binding: No binding. Handsewn, the back and front have been turned in … what I call a knife edge binding.
So …. What do you think of Susan McCord’s Triple Irish Chain Quilt?
PS: The curation of this collection of antique quilts each year is my gift to you all. Please feel free to share this gift and send this post to your quilting friends far and wide. The more people joining us, the merrier. And please join in the conversation in the comments. I would love to hear from you!
This final quilt embraces the feeling of the season and highlights the theme this year twice, with both the circular design and all those berries! I love circles.
The green and red celebrate the season and that bit of yellow livens this design so wonderfully.
At once bold and delicate, cheery and intent, open and light … well … this quilt is simply a delightful way to end this collection of Circle Quilts by design.
I am so glad you all joined me for this year’s Twelve Quilts of Christmas. It has been a joy to bring these quilts to you this year.
Wishing you and your families a healthy and happy holiday season, and a wonderful New Year!
Rob Peter to Pay Paul, Possibly Pennsylvania, United States, c. 1880, 80.25” x 69.5”, Maker unknown. IQM Object Number: 2009.039.0009.
This quilt has been referred to as having a “constantly surprising” composition. I couldn’t have said it better myself.
Vibrant and engaging, the pattern in this Amish wool quilt is usually done in just 2 colours, but not this one! There is an attempt at patterning, but substitutions have been made in some blocks. Notice the sixth block down in the righthand column, and how similar the values of the two colours are. It is balanced by the very light background of the final block in the fifth column from the left. And note that there is not a lot of the forest green, but the composition of the quilt definitely needs what little there is to provide interest and more variety.
What do you think of this quilt? Do the colours they used surprise given when the quilt was made?
Cross Roads to Bachelor’s Hill, Tennessee? (maybe Kansas), United States, c. 1885, 63” x 78”, Made by Eliza Hensley Johnson. Location unknown (Can you help? Let us know where it is now.) Quilt Index Record Number: 22-18-1290.
This quilt feels so layered and dimensional, almost like you could reach through the grid and wiggle your hand through the holes and touch the background. Value is doing all the hard lifting to create this effect. The design is very similar to the quilt on Day 3, but isn’t it interesting how just a few changes renders it completely different.
The corners have been rounded but the binding is again on the straight of grain. I wonder how they handled the added fullness around those corners?
Can you imagine this quilt with a patterned fabric substituted where the cheddar fabric is? Do you think the quilt would have the same layered/dimensional effect? Would you use a large-scale print or a small-scale print?
A quiltmaker, fabric designer, teacher, and speaker, Mary Elizabeth is also co-author of two best-selling books, “Small Blocks, Stunning Quilts” and “Small Pieces, Spectacular Quilts“. She has been a featured guest on The Quilt Show with Alex Anderson and Ricky Tims. And her work has been shown at international quilt shows and featured in many international quilting publications.
Mary Elizabeth believes in “Quilting With Abandon”, stretching traditional boundaries and creating quilts with a subtle salute to the past. She is enthusiastic about our quilting heritage and the lessons to be learned from the antique quilts she studies and collects. Her recent work examines the interpretation of traditional quilt designs through “gestured appliquéd lines” and the quilting stitch.
