A New Book

I am an unrepentant book collector. I need to buy more bookshelves. I need an extension on my house to put the books in!

I have a new book for my quilting reference library. It is Carrie Hall Blocks and it contains over 800 historical patterns from the Spencer Museum of Art at the University of Kansas. I got it at Amazon 'used' for less than $7 including shipping and it is a brand new book. If you click on the link above and then scroll down for used books you will find another one just as well priced from the same seller 'whypaymorebooks'.


Section One is a full color gallery of over 600 blocks. Section Two has 200 blocks which have been 'patterned' with references to the full sized templates found in section Three.


A treasure trove!


Who was Carrie Hall?

Carrie Alma Hackett was born December 9th 1866 in Caledonia Wisconsin. When she was seven years old her family moved to Smith County Kansas to homestead. Widowed young her second husband was John Hall. She liked to be called Madame Hall and ran a successful dressmaking establishment. By the 1920's the demand for elaborate gowns was less and she started making and selling quilts. Between 1900 and 1935 she collected more than 850 quilt blocks making a sample of each one.

In 1935 she organized and categorized her collection with black and white photographs and published a book The Romance of the Patchwork Quilt In America (still available very reasonably priced) which quickly became the quilt block reference book. In 1938 at the age of 72 she donated her entire collection of blocks to what later became the Spencer Museum at the University of Kansas, to be preserved for posterity.

Four years later at the age of 75 she moved to North Platte Nebraska where she opened a successful doll shop, making and selling character dolls of important historical figures. She lived to the age of 89.

Y'all come back!