Читать книгу Following the Barn Quilt Trail - Suzi Parron - Страница 15

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I HAD BEEN in contact with Lynne Belluscio several times and we had developed a long-distance rapport. On hearing of our mishap, she immediately opened her home to Glen, Gracie, and me. Once again the generosity of spirit that underlies the quilt trail was manifested in welcoming hospitality. Lynne is director of the LeRoy Historical Society, just east of Buffalo, New York, and headed up the barn quilt trail there. I was eager to see what they had accomplished. Lynne is also the curator of the Jell-O museum, and we looked forward to adding a quirky stop to our itinerary.

We arrived at Lynne’s home where we were greeted by Lynne’s Whig Rose barn quilt and an unlocked front door, with a note on the table telling us that Lynne would be back soon. A heavy wooden door in the kitchen led to a one-room log cabin adjoining the house, our headquarters for a couple of days. Glen and I were glad to have our own space, especially since Gracie does not care for other dogs. She is sweet towards humans but seems to think that smallish dogs like Lynne’s two Shelties just might be good for a snack.

The next day, Glen and Gracie began their day in the cabin, while Lynne and I hit the road. The first thing I asked was how to spell and pronounce the name of the town. She replied that as far as the pronunciation goes, it depends on who you ask whether it is LEEroy or LeROI, and it might be one word or two. But, “It’s got to be a capital R.”

The quilt trail was begun in the fall of 2011 in anticipation of the town’s bicentennial, with a goal of twenty-five barn quilts by the June 2012 celebration. Lynne knew she needed key people to get involved, and Shelley Stein was at the top of her list. Shelley had been town supervisor, and her family also owns one of the largest dairy farms in town. Lynne said, “She understands agritourism and pride in family farms.” In one person, Lynne had both of the ingredients that, combined, were key to success.

Monkey Wrench (Churn Dash)

Lynne and I stopped off to see one of the Stein barns, and I was dismayed that it was a modern building that lacked the character of a classic barn. “Some say that it’s an ugly barn,” Lynne said, “but it’s a working farm. I know on some trails they limit it to barns that are a certain number of years old, but we wanted to showcase agriculture in our town.” The philosophy certainly made sense. Lynne went on to explain that the Churn Dash barn quilt occupied the space where a Stein Farms sign once hung. Obviously, these folks were staunch supporters of the quilt trail. The yellow and green in the pattern stand for the green alfalfa fields and yellow corn, with black and white for Holstein cows. We both liked the choice of Churn Dash as it might also represent dairy farming, and when we met Shelley, I was delighted to find that there was a connection to a family quilt as well.

Shelley talked a bit about how she views the barn quilts: “We have such a strong agricultural history here. The old quilts were icons that represented people’s families, the way they were involved in agriculture or what their skill sets were.” Shelley had brought some of her great-grandmother’s quilts to Lynne and told her, “These are my heritage; this is what’s going to go on our barns.” Shelley was concerned that perhaps the men of the Stein family would be reluctant because the quilts were from her family, but they didn’t raise a fuss. Shelley is proud that her status as an eighth-generation North American farmer is wrapped into the local project and the family farm.

Shelley echoed Lynne’s earlier sentiment that even though the barn doesn’t have a long history, it has a place on the quilt trail. “For us it has history because our hands built it. And it’s agriculture today.” Though Lynne used the name Churn Dash for the quilt block, Shelley preferred its other name, Monkey Wrench, because the family designs and builds farm equipment in their shop.

The Stein’s other barn quilt is also one of Shelley’s grandmother’s quilt patterns. Shelley said, “When you look at the colors of the barn quilt, you think, ‘OK, they must be hippies,’ but you can see that we really were very true to the colors of the quilt.” Shelley spread the tattered quilt out on the floor, a riot of bright greens, oranges, yellows, reds, and purples. Lynne said that the fabrics were actually typical of the 1930s when the quilt was made. The pattern is known as Robbing Peter to Pay Paul and also as Nonesuch, and Shelley chose the latter for the barn quilt. The barn where the quilt block hangs has a unique color as well. The barn was yellow when purchased by the family in 1989, and Shelley said it will remain that color, adding just a slight touch to the hippie-like appearance.

Lynne and I left Shelley behind and continued on our tour. As the discussion veered away from barn quilts, I realized that Lynne was, in fact, a scholar with a wide knowledge of history. She shared some tidbits about the area and hit upon a subject that has been the topic of many a barn quilt conversation—Underground Railroad quilts. Several quilt trails include these “signal quilts” in their narratives, and both Donna Sue and I are dismayed each time we encounter them. I didn’t share my view but waited to see what Lynne had to say.

Lynne acknowledged that an Underground Railroad route runs through the area but doubts whether any of the buildings were used as hiding places. “Think about it; you don’t know where you are going or who to trust. This is close to Canada, so it was like a funnel, with a lot of law enforcement. Why would you try to hide in someone’s house? I don’t think so. You would stay outside so that you could hear people coming and would move along as quickly as possible.”

The subject turned to those signal quilts. Legend has it that quilts were hung outdoors along the Underground Railroad and that the quilt patterns were a code that provided information to escaping slaves. One pattern was said to mean “time to gather belongings and prepare for the trip,” while another might signify the direction of safe travel. The stories were widespread, but they just didn’t make sense to me. Quilt patterns are not readily discerned at a distance, especially in the dark. Donna Sue agreed, “Unfortunately, we put a romantic spin on a terrible time in our history. Just imagine crossing the Ohio River in the dark of night. You would barely be able to see where you were walking; how would you possibly find a quilt? It’s interesting lore, but it’s just fake-lore.”

Lynne stated her views emphatically: “The signal quilt story is a lie. Academicians have studied it, and it is bogus. But it’s a romantic notion. It’s like Washington cutting down the cherry tree. It’s so romantic, like King Arthur. People don’t want to believe it isn’t true. A family offered a collection of quilts to the museum that they said were signal quilts. They didn’t like it when I told them they ought to print out the reams of scholarship.” Lynne dismissed the topic and I was glad that an expert had confirmed the view that Donna Sue and I both held strongly.

That evening, Lynne invited Glen and me to a horse-driving competition. Glen asked with a deadpan face, “How exactly do horses drive? Are there special cars?” He reveled in that brief moment during which she considered whether the question might be genuine. Of course the driving was on the part of the humans, who guided the horses as they pulled various sorts of wagons. We strolled the grounds where spectators enjoyed elegant picnics and the women wore extravagant hats, relishing the opportunity to be part of a local event. The categories of competition ran from formally dressed ladies and gentlemen driving grand carriages to commercial vehicles. In this category, the brightly painted Jell-O wagon was entered, driven by Lynne’s daughter, Laura.

Lynne’s wagon commemorates the fact that the product was introduced in LeRoy in 1897. She told us that a carpenter who dabbled in patent medicines trademarked the name; it was not a patent, because there were other gelatin products already being produced. The company that bought the name began an aggressive advertising campaign that made the product hugely popular and profitable. Glen couldn’t resist the brilliantly colored wagon, painted in glossy red and his favorite bright yellow. He posed between the front shafts as if to ready to be harnessed and pull, and I added a somewhat goofy photo to my collection.

I was eager to visit with Carol Frost and her daughter, Marny Cleere. Barn quilts are seldom painted in pastels, as they don’t show up at a distance, but the dark brown of the barn and its position close to the road made for a lovely exception to the rule. When Carol arrived with the Lady of the Lake quilt, the picture was complete.

Nonesuch

Carol Frost and Marny Frost Cleere with Lady of the Lake quilt and barn quilt

Marny said that the quilt belonged to her grandmother, who had left each of her grandchildren a family quilt. It had been pieced in 1867 by Marny’s great-great-grandmother McPherson, using the pink fabric from one of her dresses. The McPherson family was one of many Scottish families who settled the area. “It reminded them of home,” Carol said. The McPhersons were a prominent family; in fact the yellow barn that hosts the Stein family Nonesuch quilt block was a McPherson barn. The barn with the Lady of the Lake pattern is the last one on the complex where it stands.

The McPhersons were prolific diary keepers, and Marny’s father, David, keeps the journals at hand and reads them regularly. Most journal entries are mundane discussions of the farm and weather, success and failure of crops, and the various additions to the homestead, but David chose a few of his favorites to share. Reading the handwritten text of the diary on pages deeply yellowed with age was quite a treat. One of the earliest stories concerns Alexander McPherson, who emigrated from Inverness, Scotland, in 1801 and made his way to the area. A century later, Marny’s great-great-grandfather, John McPherson, tells the story:

On reaching the Genesee River, “They found a good many families who wanted to get across the river but water was too deep at the ford. Grand Father McPherson did not propose to camp there until river went down, so suggested building a raft which they did. After raft was completed Grandfather was the first to use it. When he tried to drive his ox team onto raft one of them refused to venture on the raft, after long coaxing, which was of no avail Grand Father unyoked this ox and put his own shoulder under yoke and with the help of the men at wheels they succeeded in getting onto raft, and were poled across. When the ox saw his mate and cow going from him, he went into the river and swam across, none the worse of his cold bath.”

. . .

Glen and I left the rich history of LeRoy behind and headed east to Schoharie, where quilt trail organizer Ginny Schaum and her husband, Bill, had generously invited us to spend the weekend. Here, the barn quilt community focuses not on history but on more recent events. The area was adversely affected by Hurricanes Irene and Lee in 2011, and a mural project had begun in Middleburgh to revitalize the community and make people feel good about the recovery. More public art was proposed to bring in tourists, and Ginny thought the quilt barn trail similar to the ones she had seen in the Carolinas would fit the bill. “People were overjoyed.” Ginny said.

The ebullient mood was quite evident in Diana Cook’s Garden Party quilt block, which is mounted on a restored former firehouse. I pronounced the block “spectacular” as soon as it came into view. The multiple designs within the block made it look like a cloth quilt and one that would have been fun to create. The block overlooks several garden plots where sunflowers and herbs proliferate.

Diana said that the building has had many incarnations. It was originally a church and then a firehouse, and later an upholstery shop. When Diana looked at the vacant building and saw the big wall between the windows, she thought it was perfect for a mural, and she wanted to move in. “My family thought I was nuts,” she said. “The place was a wreck—needed new everything.” The finished interior includes Diana’s downstairs studio, with living space upstairs and husband Steve’s shop in the basement. Diana showed us one of her quilts, which included half a dozen fabrics of intricate patterns. I could see why the complex barn quilt design appealed to the talented artist.

I admitted to Ginny that I did not know much about Hurricane Irene, the storm that had recently devastated the area, so she filled me in. First priority had been to get people back into their homes. Some had their houses damaged or torn down; some had oil in their basements that mixed with their water. People needed furnaces and hot water heaters and kitchens ripped out, and some buildings were condemned. Ginny said, “I never realized how much I use the local grocery store. When it was gone, I couldn’t get any fresh produce.”

Garden Party

Ginny and Bill live on a mountain so they were not directly affected by the catastrophe, so as soon as they could make it to town, they worked with local churches, delivering food and bottled water to anyone who needed it. “The quilt trail is phase two of the recovery,” Ginny said. “It’s a happy phase to bring people back into the community.” Ginny’s partner in the endeavor, Sharon Aitchison, grew up in the area and was invaluable. As Ginny said, “She just knows this infinite number of people.”

Stitched and painted crazy quilts

I adore crazy quilts, so the opportunity to meet a renowned designer was especially exciting. Betty Pillsbury’s quilt block is an exact replica of one of her sewn creations. Betty explained how she became a crazy quilter. “Adjective on the quilt, not the quilter,” she laughed. Betty taught herself to embroider when she was eight and learned new stitches from magazines. She practiced on jean legs and pillowcases and said, “I bugged my mother for floss and needles.” Betty saw an article about crazy quilts about thirty years ago and has been sewing them ever since, eventually winning numerous awards and teaching the art to others.

The quilt that served as the model for Betty’s painted quilt originated as a line drawing in a book of 1880s Victorian quilts. Betty stitched and embellished the quilt and when a barn quilt was suggested, she wanted to paint the design as well. Betty also helped to create a community crazy quilt, another way to bring together those who were devastated by Irene. She pieced the blocks and residents could come by the library or Betty’s home to add their own flair to the embroidery.

Betty is an herbalist and she took us out back to see her garden. I was fascinated by the mushrooms sprouting from logs lying on the ground. Betty explained that the hardwood logs are drilled and then dowels of sawdust and mushroom spawn inserted, and before long the rewards pop forth. Betty offered me some mushrooms for dinner, but of course I didn’t plan on cooking anytime soon. I thought they were beautiful, though, so I accepted one to show to Glen. Months later, it still rode with us, dried and hard, a reminder of our time in Schoharie.

As Ginny, Sharon, and I approached our next stop, I exclaimed, “Oh, what a cool house!” The green-shuttered Victorian home with intricately designed woodwork grabbed my attention. Ginny was eager to visit the barn, which not only displayed a barn quilt but also housed a couple of historic carriages. After surveying the iconic vehicles, we ventured into the Best House to meet its director, historian Bobbi Ryan.

“It’s like leather and lace,” Bobbi said of the barn quilt. “The paint on the barn is worn, and you feel the history and richness that’s in it. Then you have a piece of something new that ties in. I love this movement.” The house itself was both the home and medical office of Dr. Christopher Best, a physician who practiced medicine from 1877 until just before his death in 1934. His son, Dr. Duncan Best, also had his office in the home where his unmarried sister, Emma, lived. The house was given to the area library, to be kept as a historical and medical museum.

The ornate house was impressive, with wooden fretwork in many of the rooms and original chair rails still in place. Dozens of photos are scattered throughout, from oval-shaped family portraits to local scenes of hops growers in the nearby fields. I looked around at the carved wooden furniture and horsehair cushions and could not imagine that a modern family had lived among it all.

I had seen homes restored and furnished with period pieces, but the collection of personal items here was astounding, and all had been in the house when it was turned over to the library. The family saved everything, from furniture to Victorian-era dresses, capes, and hats. “You could lock yourself in and stay for days and days,” Bobbi said. “They never threw anything away, and I am so thankful for that.”

The collection also includes quilts, hundreds of them. There is no documentation as to the quilters; some may have been produced by the women of the house and some perhaps given as payment for medical services. As we studied a couple of the quilts, Ginny and I agreed that hand quilting is by far our favorite. The blue and white quilt that is reproduced in the quilt block on the property was a fine example.

Dr. Best House Photo by Bobbi Ryan

The house was built to accommodate the Best family. One side of the house served as the medical offices, which could be closed off from the living area. “The doctor could practice on one side of the house and you could be in your jammies on the other,” Bobbi said.

Medical records of everyone who saw the doctor are still intact, including Bobbi’s grandmother, who was delivered by Christopher Best, and her mother, who remembers that it was a bit scary visiting as a child. “If you lived around here, this was your practitioner,” Bobbi said. Christopher Best was no simple country doctor. He stayed abreast of medical journals and was always cutting edge.

A rather unusual artifact was the electrostatic machine, where a patient would sit with a sort of crown on his head and be treated for any number of things. Bobbi said that the machine was used to treat old age, abscessed teeth, gray hair, and alcoholism. The machine could also generate X-rays, and turn-of-the-century images were found on the premises.

The doctors served as their own apothecaries and filled prescriptions in a room off the examining area. A handwritten prescription for Lysol surprised us, as I had always thought it a modern name brand. Dozens of glass bottles lined a shelf, and Bobbi told me that thousands more were stored on the property. “I guess he knew recycling would be big someday,” she smiled.

The kitchen fascinated me the most. A surgical table was situated near the double sink, and a cast-iron stove was used for cooking meals, for sterilization, and also to heat the upstairs through vents above. The tins and bottles that lined the wooden shelves looked nothing like their more modern counterparts but held many of the same staples—spices, cornstarch, coffee, honey, and corn syrup. Except for that table, the kitchen looked very much like the set for a 1920s movie.

As we exited into a hallway, we heard Sharon exclaim, from upstairs, “Wait a minute, this is hair?” Bobbi explained that she must be looking at a hair loom. We needed to get going, but curiosity got the best of me. The woven hair was kind of creepy but a beautifully intricate work of art. We wondered whether the piece was created from just one person’s hair or from that of several people. Ginny mentioned that she had a hair loom as well, so I supposed they were not that unusual.

Bobbi was right in that I could have locked myself in that house and wandered for a full day, but others were waiting for us. With some reluctance and with the promise of a return visit to the Dr. Best House and Medical Exhibit, we continued our tour.

Marge Becker extended a gracious welcome to Ginny, Sharon, and me, and immediately started talking about her choice of quilt block. “I knew it was going to be a sort of forever thing, and I couldn’t change it with the seasons like I do my wreaths,” she said. Faced with the choice of a single season, Marge picked fall. “When the leaves are all turned, not that I am looking forward to cool weather, but that is such a pretty time of year.” Marge had made frequent trips through Amish country to visit her sons in school and had purchased an Autumn Splendor quilt on one of her trips, and the quilt was used as the model for her barn quilt. I admired the green paint on the barn, and Marge said that it was part of a complete renovation that included a new foundation for the structure.

I was surprised to learn that Marge was more than ninety years old, but her age fit with her discussion of the family business, the local phone company. Her father bought the fledgling company and the phone lines for one hundred farms when Marge was six months old. Marge and her family still run the company, one of a handful of independent phone companies in the state. Marge said, “These days it’s changing so fast. We are getting into the wireless and Internet and all of that. We are running fiber to other towns as we speak.” I have to admit that I was amazed that a woman old enough to be my grandmother was intimately familiar with the latest in telecommunications.

Autumn Splendor

Marge is not just part of the company in name but an active participant, as she has been for many years, even more so once she got married and her husband went to work for her father. Marge taught school but worked at the phone company during the summers. She said, “When my husband needed someone to get easements or get someone to stake a pole line or something, I’d get one of the fellas and go out. I miss that. Teaching school, you were inside all of the time, so during the summer, I loved the chance to be outside. Of course that was back when if you were alive and breathing you could teach.” I chuckled a bit at her assessment, having recently left the profession myself.

Marge went on to talk a bit about the events of the flood. “Every business was closed. We didn’t have a place to go to eat and couldn’t get our mail.” Her hilltop home wasn’t damaged, but Marge agreed with Ginny that the tragedy did benefit the community. “If there was anything good that ever came from that flood it was the resilience—everybody came out of the woodwork. Anybody who had grudges with anyone in the community, it just went away. It was the most amazing thing the way that people helped one another and everyone became so close.”

The surrounding community has been good to the family, and Marge has plans to build an athletic center for the use of all its residents. She said, “I have a big bucket list of things for the village. People have been so loyal; you have to give back. If I can just swim in the pool, that will be okay. But it probably won’t happen in my lifetime.” I left Marge behind thinking about what an incredible lifetime it had been so far.

We headed into Middleburgh where we met up with Bill and Glen, who had spent the day cleaning cattails out of Ginny and Bill’s pond and relaxing on the mountain. Glen reported that Gracie had enjoyed running around the property and had fetched decoys in the water. I worried about Gracie’s health, as she was then thirteen years old, so I always liked to know that she had been active. After their time in the water, Glen said with a smile, “We sat on the beach by the pond, sat in the shade under the tree, sat on the porch.” I was glad that he seemed to have enjoyed his day and, once again, was grateful for Ginny and Bill’s hospitality.

Our visit closed with a celebration of the local hardware store’s 125th anniversary. Country music played under a tent where dozens of families were gathered for a cookout. The mood was like a reunion, with kids playing along the fringes and adults talking from one table to the next. I loved hearing familiar songs played so far from home and grinned when I heard the lyrics from the stage: “You’d better leave this long-haired country boy alone.”

When a watermelon-eating contest was announced, the emcee asked whether anyone in the crowd might be willing to take on the local champ. Glen is naturally reserved, but he does have a healthy appetite. I shouted his name, and before long the chant began: “Glen! Glen! Glen! Glen!” He nodded his agreement, and almost immediately, I regretted having urged him to do so. He was wearing his Paddle Georgia 2011 T-shirt, a one-of-a-kind memento of the trip during which we had met. With his shirt turned inside out to minimize staining, Glen chomped and spit and chewed as fast as he could. In the end, he took second prize and donated his small cash winnings to the local quilt trail, in recognition of the warm welcome we had received in New York.