Quilt Show/Exhibit

~by Chrissy Alspaugh

The beautifully intricate art of pioneer quilt making will be on display at the Brown County Pioneer Women’s Club’s 26 th annual quilt show/ exhibit at the Brown County History Center, 90 East Gould St.

The exhibit, open from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. June 3 and 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. June 4, will showcase more than 50 quilts. Pioneer club members will be on site to answer questions about the quilts’ histories, pattern names, ages, and more. Vendors with

offerings ranging from quilting and sewing products to pottery and wood crafts also will be available. Exhibit admission is free.

A raffle for one queen-size quilt—“The Cabin of Brown County” by Katrina Rose, Brenda Fowler, and quilted by Julia Crawley—and three craft-related baskets will support the Brown County Historical Society. Raffle tickets will cost $1 each or $5 for six tickets. Winners do not need to be present at the time of the drawing.

“Without events and groups like this, there’s just no way to keep these traditions alive,” said Brenda Main, Brown County Pioneer Women’s Club president. “There are just fewer and fewer grandparents or parents alive who can sit down and teach young people how to crochet, embroider, spin, weave, or quilt.”

The Pioneer Women practice and teach domestic frontier crafts to keep traditions alive through the products they create as well as through their volunteer efforts that raise money to support the historical society. The local club meets weekly for educational workshops and to work on projects to sell in the gift shop to support the history center. New members are always welcome.

Main said the annual quilt show/exhibit draws around 300 quilting and fabric-art enthusiasts.

One unique draw to Nashville’s quilt exhibit, she said, is the pioneer village that attendees can enjoy across the street from the history center. The village takes visitors back to the late 1700s and early 1800s to tour a jail, log cabin with a cooking hearth and straw bed, blacksmith’s shop, loom room, pioneer tool shed, doctor’s office with medical equipment and books, smokehouse, school, garden, and more.

This year’s quilt exhibit is sponsored by Organized Solutions, LLC; Nashville Spice Company; and The Yellow Door Quilt Store. Vendors will include The Yellow Door Quilt Store, The University of Sewing, Quilting Memories, Granny Sue Quilts, Tree City Stitches, Presto Avenue Designs, Sewing the Good Life, Holly Pots Stoneware, Bear Creek Pottery, PWC Boutique, Indiana Quilt Depot, Machine Services, Gary Eickleberry Woodworking, artist Nancy S. Kays, and Panthers Candle Works.

For more information on the quilt exhibit, Pioneer Women’s Club, or Brown County History Center, visit <www.browncountyhistorycenter.org>. •