Old Patchwork Quilts and the Women who Made Them

My purpose in writing this book has been twofold: First, to make a record, with the hope that it might prove definitive, of one of the most picturesque of all American folk arts; secondly, to interpret that art in relation to the life of the times during which it most widely flourished. This purpose was itself prompted by the lately renewed interest in patchwork, both old and new--an interest enthusiastically active at the moment and rapidly growing. -- Foreword.