A crazy quilt made by Anna’s mother-in-law Ethel Whipps Wetzel (1882-1959).

 

0:23:43.9 MT: Okay. This is Margaret Traxler and I'm interviewing Anna Bornholt Wetzel, Mrs. Louis H. Wetzel. And she is the owner of this lovely crazy quilt, which was number 006. And it was her mother-in-law who made the quilt and her mother-in-law's name was Ethel Whipp s Wetzel, Mrs. Henry Wetzel. So now, Anna, tell us a little bit about yourself. What is your nationality background and your birthplace?

0:24:25.0 Anna Bornholdt Wetzel: This is Anna Bornholdt Wetzel. Today is Minnesota, typical, Minnesota, winter, 15 degrees above zero. Yesterday it snowed a lot. I live in an apartment on Main Street and I turned 81 not too long ago, but I still keep busy. My hobby is sewing. What was that question you wanted?

0:25:00.4 MT: Well, I asked you what your interests were. You said that they were sewing and...

0:25:06.4 AW: My interest now is sewing because I'm retired and got tired and retired again. I used to do a lot of church work and a lot of lodge work and quit both of them when it got up to the state level. But now I just read about those things. Enjoy them that way.

0:25:30.4 MT: Now tell us a little bit about your mother-in-law. She was the actual quilter of this quilt. So tell me what her birth date was. And a little bit about her.

0:25:43.3 AW: I can't give the exact date of her birthday, but it was in the late 1890s. She made the quilt when she was 16 or 17 years old, and she sewed by profession. She sewed for other people, everything was sewed by hand.

0:26:05.3 MT: And so that's why this quilt has so many gorgeous pieces of fabric in and out that?

0:26:11.5 AW: Yes, she saved a scrap. She always said, "I snitched a scrap from every dress or suit or coat that I made," and then she appliqued them on to a large piece of blanketing, I think, and later she... done a fancy stitch around each little piece. Most of it is... I would say 1898 to 1915 probably, the materials. Why can I say 1898? Because there are two pieces on this quilt that are dated, one is 1894, the Independent Order of Odd Fellow's convention tag. This convention was held in Montgomery, Minnesota. Another date on the quilt is 1898, and this was the Annual Ball at St. Thomas, Minnesota.

0:27:17.4 MT: And St. Thomas is just a little place in the road?

0:27:22.1 AW: That's right, and most of the towns were little places in the road at that time, and most of them were on a crossroad or near a lake or the river because travel was a lot on the river. My mother-in-law was married to a justice of peace in Le Center, Henry Wetzel of Le Sueur County. And so she had plenty of contact with people in town, in fact, she lived most of her life in the town. She loved town life. She sewed for others, she did it for a living, and she often said she made everything, from children's clothes and coats and stockings and caps, to men's suits and trousers and vests, and she loved to make wedding dresses.

0:28:13.4 MT: Oh.

0:28:14.6 AW: The early 1900 wedding dresses, I have several pictures of them, they are just gorgeous, and of course, they had a hat to go with the dress, she made this also.

0:28:24.7 MT: When do you think she first started sewing?

0:28:28.6 AW: Oh, her mother sewed as well so I think she must have started as a pretty little girl. If she could... When she was married... Before she was married, she was sewing for a living so I think she started very young.

0:28:41.5 MT: And do you know when she started making quilts?

0:28:43.9 AW: Well, in that day and age, if you wanted to keep warm in the winter time, you made your quilts, [chuckle] so I imagine she made quilts when she was probably 10, 11 years old and just kept on making quilts.

0:28:56.1 MT: Now, I see this lovely, crazy quilt. Do you have other quilts made by her?

0:29:01.5 AW: Yes, I have the other quilts, each one of my grandchildren has one of Grandma's quilts, I gave them to them for Christmas, they... She used her quilts, she didn't keep them in the cedar chest, she used them and therefore, the corners of them needed repair, so I repaired the corners the best I could and gave each one of my three children one for Christmas, and this was in about... Oh, 1970 probably.

0:29:32.4 MT: And what kind of quilts were they? Could you tell me anything about the name of the pattern?

0:29:38.1 AW: Well, those quilts I don't know exactly anymore which one that went to which child, but she made Rail Fence, that took long, narrow pieces. She made the Log Cabin, that took short, wide pieces. She made Sunflower, that took printed material. She made the Orange Peel, which I think was the most beautiful of all.

0:30:00.9 MT: What colors were in that quilt?

0:30:02.8 AW: Orange, and it was like if you take an orange and peel it open...

0:30:07.1 MT: Yes.

0:30:08.2 AW: And it was set together with a pale blue.

0:30:11.3 MT: Oh, pretty.

0:30:12.7 AW: Then she made a Tumbling Block. The last few years of her life she figured out how to make a tumbling block quilt. I hadn't... I can't figure it out myself but she made them, and they were beautiful. And then, of course, she made the traditional nine patch and the Texas Star, she liked to make that, but the Texas Star is made with shades. The one she made was in shades of pink, but that was rotten material by the yard and she cut the pieces out. She made her own patterns by the way.

0:30:45.7 MT: Oh, she did.

0:30:46.5 AW: Yeah, she always made her own patterns and then she would swap them with some of the neighbors.

0:30:53.4 MT: And what were some of her favorite colors or did she use all colors?

0:30:57.9 AW: She used all colors, I don't think she had a favorite color. If she did, it was pink, but I don't remember her ever speaking that she made quilts especially of pink.

0:31:09.5 MT: And now your grandchildren are the owners of all the rest of these quilts?

0:31:13.5 AW: Yes. I gave the oldest quilts to each one of my children got one. I do have several tops that she finished just before she died, and we were beginning to move around a lot in our life, and so she just made the tops and she didn't finish the quilts, so I have six or eight of those on hand right now.

0:31:33.3 MT: And what... And you have them here?

0:31:36.4 AW: Yes, I have them here in my cedar chest.

0:31:39.3 MT: Would be fun to see those.

0:31:41.2 AW: I'll show them to you when we're finished with this.

0:31:43.2 MT: Okay... And did her family support her in her interest in quilting, did she...

0:31:52.1 AW: Oh yes.

0:31:52.8 MT: Did anybody ever help her with her quilting?

0:31:54.6 AW: Yes, she would have... They had what they called quilting bees, and they would move all the furniture out of the living room, and probably... Oh, I'd say 10 women would show up, pot luck that each one would bring some kind of food, and they bring their own needles, and their own scissors and thimble. And some that couldn't quilt very good, but they like to be there, they done the work in the kitchen [chuckle] because Ethel was a championship quilter and she was a little fussy about her quilts. She wanted the quilting stitches small enough so you could hardly see them, not big enough to catch your toe in. [chuckle] So like I say, some of the women were wise to that so they spent their time in the kitchen, but they were there.

0:32:44.5 MT: Do you have any stories about quilt making? Did she ever tell you any stories about the times they had together or why they chose certain patterns?

0:32:57.2 AW: No, I don't think so, but she did often say that as soon as they knew that there was gonna be a wedding the girls got together and the mothers and made a quilt right away. So it'd be ready.

0:33:12.7 MT: And that was one of the reasons why they made quilts. And did they have other reasons that they made quilts?

0:33:23.4 AW: No, I don't think so. She never spoke of of them on display. She always spoke of them on beds.

0:33:30.6 MT: And she made them for people.

0:33:32.6 AW: Yes. She didn't sell them. She gave them away.

0:33:36.1 MT: Oh yes. Oh, that was a real labor of love then wasn't it?

0:33:39.5 AW: Yes, it was.

0:33:40.1 MT: And what were the main nationalities of the people in your family? And in her family?

0:33:47.7 AW: Both families were German descent. My mother's side were... Came up the Cannon river from Ohio and settled at Kilkenny at the bend of the river. And my father's side, they came up the Le Sueur through Le Sueur up the Minnesota River and embarked at Le Sueur and then came on through what they called at that time, the great woods or the big woods. And they settled between Greenleaf Lake and Lake Volney.

0:34:34.0 MT: Oh.

0:34:34.5 AW: And now Ethel Wetzel, my mother-in-law her family, the Whipps family were German and French, but I don't know how they managed to travel to this area. I never heard her say, but her husband, she said came from a big family. I think she said there were nine boys and one girl in the family and they were farmers, but her husband was born with a crippling disease of his legs. So he couldn't farm. And he went to school a little more than most people did at that time. And then he became justice of peace of the, Le Sueur county.

0:35:20.4 MT: And you... When you told me a little bit about where she got her materials. Did she ever reuse any materials, do you think or did she buy all new or get them from her dress making?

0:35:33.6 AW: Most of her materials came from dress making, but when she started living, after I was married and she started living with me, her husband died and she moved in with me. And then she sewed by with materials that were called feed sacks. That's all we had was feed sacks, and they came in different prints and she made all my children their little underwear and the girl, her little dresses and petticoats out of feed sacks, the boys, their shirts, and their little shorts she made out of feed sacks.

0:36:08.6 MT: Did she ever talk about her younger life with your children when she lived with you?

0:36:13.7 AW: Yes. She always told them that they had it easy. They didn't know what hard life was. Of course they figured they were working too hard, but that's typical children.

[laughter]

0:36:24.8 MT: And do you remember any of the stories that she told them about her life?

0:36:29.0 AW: Well, she liked to tell stories of fun. She loved fun. And she would tell about sleigh rides and picnics at the end of school term or on 4th of July picnics. She liked to tell about... She said at one time she joined the lodge when she was 16. And from then on, she sang in the lodge and she sang for different meetings. And sometimes for weddings, she was very musically talented.

0:37:04.6 MT: And where did she get the batting that she put inside of the quilt. What could she use inside of the quilt?

0:37:13.5 AW: If she was making quilts for other people, they had to furnish the batting. Because it was hard to get ahold of, but she always had sheep and made batting of her own.

0:37:24.3 MT: Oh it is wool.

0:37:24.6 AW: And she carded it, made wool. Yes, she only made the cotton batting in later life, I would say probably 1920s she started using cotton and she often said that she used in the middle of the quilt, she used blanket and she got this at Faribault. She got blankets where they had flaws in or they were not quite straight. She used this for the inside of quilts.

0:37:56.6 MT: And what kind of quilting frame did she use?

0:38:01.1 AW: Just a homemade frame. I would say it was two by... 1 x 2 inches. And as long took up the whole room. I know that. [chuckle]

0:38:13.2 MT: And what time of the day did she do most of her quilting?

0:38:17.4 AW: I would say in the evenings 'course they ... if they had to get together, it had to be during the day because the ladies came at after they had their morning chores done and the children were off to school, but they had to be home again to prepare the evening meal and catch the kids when they came home from school. So, but her own personally personal work she'd done in the evenings.

0:38:40.4 MT: Did she ever sign any of her quilts?

0:38:43.2 AW: No, she didn't.

0:38:44.0 GM: She didn't. And did she ever date any of them?

0:38:45.7 AW: This is the only one I know of that's dated.

0:38:48.1 MT: And that's because of the ribbons that she used.

0:38:48.9 AW: 'Cause of the ribbons.

0:38:50.1 MT: Isn't that good that she did this?

0:38:52.6 AW: Yes.

0:38:53.0 MT: If that gives us an idea how old this quilt is. Did she ever tell you how to care for her quilts? For the quilts that she gave you?

0:39:04.2 AW: No, she didn't tell me how to care, but she was right there to keep an eye on me.

0:39:09.4 MT: Yes, that's true.

0:39:10.3 AW: And so I guess that was telling me. My mother made quilts too, but she made what you called serviceable quilts. And I wish I would've paid more attention to how she made them, she did not use a quilting frame.

0:39:26.3 MT: Oh.

0:39:27.2 AW: She sewed the quilts together all the way around, completely sewed it tight. Then she turned it inside out. In order to turn it inside out where the two pieces of material met in the middle of the quilt, she had cut a slit. And now she laid the bat on the floor, put the quilt on top, and then she rolled it from the corners. It took four people, and we would roll it real tight. And when we got done, we had the quilt turned right side out.

0:40:04.2 MT: Oh.

0:40:04.6 AW: But I tried it and it don't work for me.

0:40:06.8 MT: Oh. Oh, that sounds interesting.

0:40:12.3 AW: By the way my mother was a seamstress, too.

0:40:15.3 MT: Oh.

0:40:15.8 AW: But, she didn't have as much time to sew because there were eight of us children, one passed away in infancy. And I think my mother often felt that it was her fault, this little fellow at two years of age. They were getting ready to plant potatoes and they were cutting the potatoes. And this little fellow picked the eyes out of the potatoes, and ate them, and it formed a poison and he died during the night.

0:40:39.5 MT: Oh, Oh.

0:40:41.4 AW: So it was kind of sad for that little fellow, because like she said, he was a little rascal.

0:40:47.4 MT: Oh. That's too bad.

0:40:51.8 AW: But she did make quilts for other people, she sewed for other people, and she was also a midwife. So she was kept busy.

0:41:00.4 MT: Oh my.

0:41:00.5 AW: With her children.

0:41:00.8 MT: Yes.

0:41:02.0 AW: And her other work, we had the only telephone for miles around. So therefore there was always somebody coming telephoning for the doctor, or telephoning in to see if the stores were gonna be open, or how much snow it was between Le Center and Montgomery and whether they could make it. By the way they traveled on the railroad track, the road was closed.

0:41:24.9 MT: Oh.

0:41:25.1 AW: So, but the train went through. So you just had to keep track of when the train was coming.

[chuckle]

0:41:29.4 AW: And you traveled that way.

0:41:31.4 MT: I see. And then what did they use for a vehicle?

0:41:35.1 AW: Wintertime was a sleigh or a cutter.

0:41:37.5 MT: And with a horse, huh?

0:41:38.5 AW: And with horses. Yes. And in the summer it was a buggy. It could be a single seat buggy or it... We had a what you call a platform buggy, and then you could put the eggs and things in the back. Or then there was the regular family buggy with a fringe on top.

0:41:54.1 MT: Oh. And what color was that?

0:41:56.2 AW: Fringe was red.

0:41:57.9 MT: Oh.

0:41:58.0 AW: That I remember, had lights on the sides. And we thought we were pretty important when we went to church with that buggy, with the fringe on top.

0:42:05.3 MT: I bet you did. And they wrote a song about that, did they?

0:42:07.4 AW: Yeah.

[chuckle]

0:42:08.3 MT: Did you ever do any quilting yourself?

0:42:16.0 AW: I have quilted myself, but if my mother-in-law was alive, she would say somebody's gonna catch their toe in it.

0:42:22.7 MT: Oh, [chuckle]

0:42:22.9 AW: Because I can't make little stitches.

0:42:24.5 MT: I see.

0:42:25.2 AW: I've tried quilting on the machine, but somehow I can't stay on the line, it don't turn out that. So I tie my quilt, I make a lot of quilts about... I make single quilts, I make them for the mentally retarded hospitals and I make about 50 or 52 quilts a year.

0:42:43.3 MT: Oh.

0:42:44.6 AW: But now, that I live in the apartment, I don't have much room to set up my quilt frame. So I've gone down to making lap robes. And when I got a dozen made why then I call up the nursing home and they come and get them. Because I don't have room for storage, but I do love to make them.

0:43:05.5 MT: Now did your mother-in-law have any favorite patterns that she did over and over or did she always use a new pattern each time she made a quilt?

0:43:13.8 AW: Well, the nine patch was what you'd call the standard quilt. And these others, if people requested them, then she made them. But the nine patch was her standard quilt, she was always cutting blocks for a nine patch quilt.

0:43:30.6 MT: Did she ever do any embroidered quilts of course this one is embroidered.

0:43:34.7 AW: Yes.

0:43:34.9 MT: Right here very well isn't it?

0:43:35.9 AW: And very.

0:43:36.3 MT: It's crazy.

0:43:36.7 AW: I think my daughter was here one day and her friend who is a sewing teacher and they counted 19 different kinds of stitches on this quilt.

0:43:45.8 MT: Oh, that's interesting.

0:43:46.9 AW: But I wouldn't attempt to name them.

0:43:52.2 MT: So where do you think she got her ideas for her quilts? Did she... You said that she made up her own patterns.

0:44:00.9 AW: Yes she did.

0:44:01.0 MT: But she must have had inspiration or did she?

0:44:02.4 AW: Well, I don't know. [chuckle] She never said much about it. She would be sitting there at the table and all at once she'd say "I gotta have pencil and paper" I'd go and get it for her, and then she'd be drawing.

0:44:15.3 MT: Oh.

0:44:15.6 AW: So I guess the idea came to her and she may maybe didn't finish the pattern for months, but the idea was there and she'd draw a little sketch of it, and then she'd keep enlarging it till she got it the way she wanted it.

0:44:28.3 MT: Did she ever enter any of her quilts in a competition?

0:44:31.6 AW: No.

0:44:31.8 MT: Like at the fair or any.

0:44:33.0 AW: No, she didn't.

0:44:33.7 MT: She didn't.

0:44:34.2 AW: She always told me she didn't think she was good enough.

0:44:37.1 MT: Oh.

0:44:37.3 AW: But she had some beauties.

0:44:38.7 MT: Yes, she did. Well, let's take a little break here. I think we're getting pretty close to the end of our tape. Unless you can think of something else you'd like to say.

0:44:49.8 AW: No, I don't think so.

0:44:51.3 MT: You think we've hit on everything, and I'd like to see those quilt tops that you have.

0:44:55.3 AW: Certainly.

0:44:56.2 MT: And, we can maybe talk about them in a little while.

0:45:00.3 AW: All right.

0:45:01.8 MT: Okay. Now we're back. And, we looked at the quilts in the cedar chest and there were two nine patch quilts in there. Quilt tops that were very interesting. Now, would you like to tell me what you told me in there, the red, where did the red come from?

0:45:16.8 AW: One quilt is a nine patch and the patches are set together with strips on the side, and a little red square where it joins into the next block. We didn't have any red material at the time, and all at once I thought, "Well, why not cut up my Santa Claus suit?" I taught school and I always had a Santa Claus suit. So now I cut up the Santa Claus suit to make the squares in my quilt.

0:45:42.6 MT: And that's very, very fun. And one of them is mainly yellows and the other one is more primary colors.

0:45:49.3 AW: That's right.

0:45:49.9 MT: And, they're very, very beautiful. And they were all hand pieced.

0:45:53.5 AW: Yes.

0:45:53.9 MT: The blocks were set together by hand and she must have been a good...

0:46:00.8 AW: She loved to sew by hand. In fact, she done all her sewing by hand until she moved in with me. I had the sewing machine, then she started... But she did not care to sew with the sewing machine.

0:46:11.0 MT: Now tell me about the area here. Tell me about what you said about the woods, how far the woods went?

0:46:18.8 AW: Well, the woods started... The great woods started at Kilkenny, and it ended at Le Sueur. In other words, it was bounded by the Cannon river and the Le Sueur river, or the Minnesota River. And all in between was hardwoods - oak and maple and elm...

[continues on other side of tape]

0:00:00.0 Margaret Traxler (MT): Anna is going to tell us a little more about the Big Woods.

0:00:05.7 Anna Wetzel (AW): As I said the Big Woods goes from Kilkenny to Le Sueur, how far south? I just wasn't sure. The get togethers in between that area were at farm houses or at the country schools. And these were get togethers like sleigh rides and box socials and country dancing. That's the way the young people spent their time. And in the summer, it was picnics, mostly picnics and church conventions or church revivals. All these little towns had their own church. That's how come they got started. And each one of these churches would have something going on during the summer. So the young people would have things to go to.

0:00:53.2 MT: Mm-hmm, And then you said something about the road, the name of the road.

0:00:58.7 AW: And the road that connected these little towns all the way along and the towns, a lot of the towns are no longer there, such as Cannonville, and Cordova is just a spot now. Cleveland is a little larger.

0:01:13.4 MT: Cordova used to have a church.

0:01:15.4 AW: Cordova had a church and a post office.

0:01:16.9 MT: We had a quilt at the quilt show from a group of... Made by a group of ladies from the church in Cordova. Did you know that? Did you know this...

0:01:27.9 AW: I think I heard someone tell about it, but I don't remember the quilt.

0:01:30.4 MT: And what was the name of that church? Do you remember the name of that church?

0:01:33.3 AW: I think it was the evangelical church. It was quite a... It was the only protestant church close by, so all went to it.

0:01:41.7 MT: And what was the name of the road?

0:01:44.9 AW: The Dodd road. It was called the Dodd road. And it was, well, I suppose today they call it cow path. It was just a narrow road about the width of a wagon buggy. And they'd swing out when they met somebody. Later on, it became a little wider. And then the spots that were wet, they made what they called a corduroy road. And they took logs, large logs and sunk them in the wet spots, put them crossways and they would drive on those. It was real bumpy, but it served the purpose.

0:02:20.6 MT: Right. Keep you from sinking in. Okay. Now what other... And the settlements, oh, you talked about teaching school.

0:02:30.1 AW: Yes. I was raised in a rural area, and therefore I went to the country school. And I was one of the first ones that attended high school and graduated from high school from that school. And there was only an average of 20 to 25 children in school at the same time, all eight grades and little folks in the spring when the weather was nice. Many of the big boys only came in the winter time because they were needed at home for farm work. I, myself went into teaching. I enjoyed it very much. It was like coming home to me. And I taught in  different settlement areas like Cordova, Kilkenny, Lexington. So it kept... Then I taught a school, what they called the Bohemian settlement. This was quite a thing because the children came to school and they couldn't speak a word of English. It was fascinating to get those children, so that if by any chance they moved away and went to another school, they had already learned English and had passed the grade as well.

0:03:43.2 MT: Oh my, how long did it take the kids to learn English?

0:03:47.2 AW: Well, some of them never actually could speak it fluently. They'd always slide back into their Bohemian or there were German settlements too and. But the children tried. And what was so hard was because the children had to speak English in school, but when they went home, then their parents spoke Bohemian or German, which made it very hard for the children.

0:04:12.7 MT: And you said something about being in the problem areas. Do you wanna talk about that?

0:04:20.0 AW: Yes. When you had a rural school, you had everything. It wasn't special schools like they have now for fast learners and slow learners, and those that are handicapped maybe by speech, or are handicapped in walking and so forth or sitting, and you got everything those days, and you had to cope with it. I know I taught around the Kilkenny area and we had, I had children that were, had been expelled from Waterville and from Kilkenny, because they were a little bit rowdy. But I said, you can't let four and or five children from one family not go to school. I said, bring them to me. I only got nine students. I'll take them. So I took them and they graduated from school from eighth grade, one went on to high school, but the others didn't, but one became a truck driver and one became a carpenter, built many houses. And one started to become a lawyer and then quit. But they wouldn't have had this chance if I hadn't have been willing to take them.

0:05:30.2 MT: That's wonderful. It sounds like you were a very good, good teacher.

0:05:34.3 AW: I love teaching. I taught everything. Even when I wasn't teaching school, I would teach Sunday school or Bible school. One time I taught, I had a group of children that wanted to learn English and I took them during the summer and we had a little summer class, so that they would be ready for school when school started. I enjoyed it.

0:05:56.5 MT: Well, thank you very much, Anna. Can you think of anything else you'd like to share with us? Stories about...

0:06:05.2 AW: No, I don't think so. I think that's about all I can say for now.

0:06:10.4 MT: Okay. Thank you very much.

0:06:11.6 AW: And thank you for asking me.

0:06:13.0 MT: Okay.

0:06:13.8 AW: Bye now.

0:06:14.8 MT: Goodbye.