House Yields Century-Old Treasure

By Paula Carpenter

 

Our home was built in the 1950’s, and when we bought it about 15 years ago, we knew that at some point we would need to make improvements. Recently we decided that it was finally time to do some remodeling, which included tearing out existing cabinets above our washer and dryer. The top cabinet was hard to reach and as my husband, Jim, started to rip it out, he saw something that was pushed all the way to the back. First, he pulled out several neatly folded pillowcases. As I shook them out, I realized that they were hand embroidered. There were yellow creases where they had been folded, but the embroidery tops were perfect. As I was looking at the pillowcases, Jim reached to the very back of the cabinet and pulled out two stacks of quilt blocks. The blocks of material were tied together with twine and many of the pieces of material were separated by newspaper cut the same size. Although the paper pages have yellowed with age, the quilt blocks are in perfect condition. Raising each piece of material and paper, I found that many of the papers were dated 1917.