Images(10)

Quilt, Signature Album

Date1848

OriginAmerica, Pennsylvania, Montgomery County and West Chester County

MediumPlain and printed cottons, ink, and silk or cotton embroidery threads (fiber identification by eye)

DimensionsOH: 113 1/8' x OW: 113 1/2"

Credit LineGift of Anne H. Miller

Object number2023.609.7

DescriptionThis is a large, square album quilt consisting of 60 appliquéd and pieced blocks in plain and printed cottons in colors of red, blue, green, pink, and yellow small prints and one blue chintz. The blocks are set on point and there is no sashing between each block. There is a border of large sawtooth in a small pattern printed red cotton. The pattern in the blocks consists of sunbursts; eight-petal flower face with leaves (2); Robbing Peter to Pay Paul (2); Bear Claw; eight-pointed stars; and various abstract motifs. The center block of three lilies carries the inscription in red embroidery thread: "Sarah Pennepacker/ April The 7th/ 1848" "Chester Co./ West Whiteland/ Township." Other blocks have scribed or stamped signatures: "Jane Pearce" (scribed); "John Bell" (scribed); "Harriet P Pearce" (scribed); Martha T. Bell/ Chester Co. Pa." (stamped); Jane/ Bell/ 184[6 or 8]" (scribed); "Albert C. Wertsner/ Whitpain Township/ Montgomery County/ Penna" (scribed)' "Hannah S Wertsner/ Whitpain Township/ Montgomery Co./ Pennsylvania" (scribed). An inked inscription on the left back corner reads: "SARAH PENNEPACKER/ WEST CHESTER/ sistER to GEORgE WERTSNER/ WILLED to Ruth N. HALLOWELL/ by/ Hester R. WERtSNER Nice/ 1933."
The quilt is finished with a knife edge. It is quilted in 5-7 running stitches per inch in a pattern of outline with parallel lines in the border. The backing consists of three wide panels and one narrower pieced panel.Label TextBy the mid-1840s, quilts made up of individual appliquéd or pieced blocks became fashionable. Called album quilts because their blocks were like pages from a book, they could be worked entirely by one person, but are best known as the product of group efforts, with each maker contributing one or more of the blocks. It was common for the creators of the blocks to personalize their work with signatures, dates, place names, and other inscriptions.

This quilt is stamped or scribed with seven names and includes the place name of Whitpain Township, Montgomery County, Pennsylvania. Additionally, the center block has an embroidered inscription with the name presumably of the owner of the quilt, Sarah Pennepacker, the date, 1848, and the place, West Whiteland Township, Chester County.

The quilt descended in its family of origin where it was always thought to have been created to celebrate a marriage.

Art of the Quilter:
This stunning Pennsylvania album quilt was made by family and friends associated with Sarah Pennepacker, whose name is stitched in the central block. Closest to Sarah's block are her nephew and his wife, Albert G. and Hannah Wertsner. The Peace and Bell families were Sarah's neighbors in West Whiteland Township and later in West Chester.

Sarah was born Sarah Wertsner in Montgomery County. After marrying Benjamin Pennepacker, she moved to a farm in Chester county. She died in 1883 in West Chester, where a local newspaper noted that "she was devoted to her flowers, adn the yard about her house was a delight to the passersby." The placement of her name in the Carolina Lily quilt block may reflect her floral interest.Inscription(s)An inked inscription on the left back corner reads: "SARAH PENNEPACKER/ WEST CHESTER/ sistER to GEORgE WERTSNER/ WILLED to Ruth N. HALLOWELL/ by/ Hester R. WERtSNER Nice/ 1933."Provenance1848, Sarah Wertsner Pennepacker [1791-1883) (Chester County, PA); 1883, passed by descent to Hester Wertsner Nice [1852-1988] (Montgomery County, PA); 1933, passed by descent to Ruth Nice Hallowell (1911-1976); 1976, passed by descent to Howard Thomas Hallowell Jr. [1908-1989] (Montgomery County, PA); 1989, passed by descent to Anne Hallowell Miller [1936-2024] (Salisbury, MD).