The very first Quilt Engagement Calendar, published by E. P. Duttton & Co., Inc. in 1974 for  the 1975 year, was of all of them, the most revelatory (at least for me). It included images of some very singular and original quilts from the 19th and 20th centuries, many at the time in the hands of some top-flight Manhattan antiques galleries and collectors. I pored over those images admiringly, sometimes longingly, as so many of them spoke to me, for their colors or for the maverick qualities their designs projected. One of these was this wonderful "Houses and Barns" quilt, ca. 1910, from Massachusetts. It was linked in the credit to Phyllis Haders, who would not long after publish her first book about Amish quilts, Sunshine and Shadow: The Amish and Their Quilts.

I still love the way this quilt's maker configured the buildings she (presumably a "she") chose to represent, and how she addressed the edges of each unit to fully engage each of the squares and rectangles. She knew the traditional "Schoolhouse" pattern, similar to the third block down on the far right (the black abode with double red chimney), but elaborated on it with enormous compositional skill from top to bottom throughout the central sections. Brilliant!

I give full credit to this outstanding quilt for inspiring a project that got surprising traction among a group of quilt students for which I was teaching classes in a Fall River, MA church. As soon as I introduced the idea of making a group quilt using some of the historic homes of Somerset, MA (across the Taunton River from Fall River) that weren't all in very good condition at the time – some were already threatened with demolition – they signed on and enlisted additional sets of hands to carry out the realization of what would become "The Somerset Quilt." We vetted homes that would be appropriate for a work whose aim was to bring awareness of the rich 18th and 19th century domestic architecture of a once prosperous merchant and shipping waterfront community. We made drawings based on photographs that I made around town, set to finding the right fabrics for each portrait, and then everyone set to work stitching the interpretations.

Above, a regretfully poor photo showing participants of the Somerset Quilt project at work in 1975, in the final stages of the quilt's making. A folding chair acts as a kind of table across the quilt frame, to put tools and supplies of thread within reach.

The photo below was taken by Sheila Weinberg for The Spectator, the Somerset, MA town's weekly newspaper, that was very supportive of the project and reported numerous times on its development. I'm displaying some of the finished blocks as we moved to completing those units. Putting them all together would be next.

The Somerset Historical Society was, at the time, housed in one of the buildings we chose to include, and its then curator, Jim Bradbury, a longtime and dedicated amateur historian who built the museum and its collections nearly from scratch, provided a substantial amount of background on the houses that found their way into the quilt. Their inclusion may have played a small part in the eventual survival of some of these homes, though it didn't rescue others that are no longer extant. It did help to focus attention on the town's shipping history that at one time was its main economic driver. By the time we made the quilt, Somerset was primarily a bedroom community and it remains so today.

In each of the following sets of images, I've put the original 1975 snapshot photo of each building as it was then, and next to it a shot of the finished patchwork block in the quilt. Below that, a Google Earth view of the same building today. In most cases, the structure has survived. At least one historic farmstead (the Slade farm as I recall) was demolished about the time of the quilt's making, though nearly all were standing at that point. Now, nearly fifty years later, residents of the area continue to maintain these pieces of southeastern New England vernacular architecture, to their credit.

One of Somerset's stateliest homes, located in Somerset Village at the corner of Pierce & Main Streets. At the time of the quilt's making, the histories of the individual houses were sketchy at best, unreliably mixed up with local lore and faulty memories, and sometimes incomplete real estate records. Also, we weren't asking all the right questions back then. From where and from what came the sources of wealth that built some of these homes? Somerset lies upriver from Narragansett Bay and Mt. Hope Bay, so it was part of the network of coastal shipping ports connected to Newport RI and points beyond. The traffic in enslaved people in the 18th and 19th centuries likely reached into communities up brackish tributaries of the Atlantic, like Somerset. The cotton industry also played an important part in building that wealth in this part of the country, and like much else, was inextricably linked to the triangle trade.

The home shown above, at Brayton Avenue and Read Street in Somerset, underwent careful and extensive renovation in the decades following the quilt's making. The large veranda was restored, and an exterior color scheme developed that flatters the building's structural features.

At the time of the quilt's making, the Somerset Historical Society was housed in this building of late 19th century vintage, that had originally served as the town's water department. The historical society subsequently relocated to a former elementary school a stone's throw away, and the building then housed the Somerset Arts Council (1980s) before being turned to other uses. The building was notable for its distinctive Mansard-gambrel hybrid-style roof and upper storey, and overlooks a small waterfront park.

This octagon house, a style popularized in mid-nineteenth century America, once stood on County St. (Rt. 138) in Somerset. It was in clear need of repair when it was selected for inclusion in the quilt, but unfortunately never received the care that it needed. It was ultimately knocked down and replaced by a typical 1990s wood frame home.

Quilts such as this weren't particularly unique around the time of the US Bicentennial commemorations. Many townsfolk in communities across the country put some of their patriotic efforts into quilts that highlighted aspects of their local history, culture and industry. Some projects, like the Hudson River Quilt featured in numerous mid-1970s publications, drew widespread notice. Others, like the Somerset Quilt, served to build pride and ties of commonality within the township, and, like all quilts, to serve as containers of individual and collective memory.