Variable Star
Top By: Rybolt, Metta Celeste
Others: MacDowell had it quilted in the 1970s.
Period: 1930-1949
Date: ca. 1940
Location Made: Lapeer, Michigan (MI)
Project Name: Michigan Quilt Project
Contributor: Michigan State University Museum
ID Number: 87.0175
Brackman Number: 2141a
Layout Format: Block pattern
Quilt Size: 72" x 80"
Fabrics: Cotton
Construction: Hand Piecing
Quilting Techniques: Hand quilting
Other Notes: The quiltmakers liked to make tops of pieced blocks set with square plain blocks., Metta Schroll Rybolt became very interested in quilting when she spent time in Detroit with her son's family. According to her daughter-in-law, Vivian Rybolt,
when my mother-in-law stayed with use she spent time with my mother who was very active in quilting...when she went back up to Lapeer she kept quilting...
Marsha MacDowell, who received several quilts from her great-grandmother Rybolt, saw her quiltimaking relative only a few times because Rybolt died when MacDowell was young. However, MacDowell vividly recalls one of her first visits at the age of four to Rybolts's second floor apartment in Lapeer:
I remember only two things about that trip...going up a very steep set of stairs and seeing the quilt frame set up in her living room...the frame seemed to take up a lot of space.
Another quilt, made by Rybolt for MacDowell's birth, holds a special place in the family's collection of quilts. Over the years, the red and white quilt with embroidered pictures was used constantly, and as a result, much of the red embroidery thread was worn away. As a surprise present for MacDowell's 25th birthday, her mother Betty MacDowell, reembroidered all but one of the squares. The last one was left unrepaired, but with a needle and thread stuck in it so that it could be finished by the owner who "would then appreciate how much work went into it."
Many other members of the Rybolt family received quilts from Metta Rybolt as gifts for special occasions.
Related Items/Publications: Michigan Quilts (1987) book, figure 139, page 94.
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