Quilt date-inscribed 1837 by Clarissa Moore Holman Collection of Old Sturbridge Village See a great photo of it here: https://www.facebook.com/oldsturbridgevillage/photos/a.59967144978.20497.8124924978/10152525806349979/?type=3&theater Froncie Quinn has done a pattern for Clarissa's quilt. Here's her description: "Clarissa's scrap quilt (107" x 105") will inspire you in many ways. It is unusual because of its New England based " T" -shaped construction and enchanting because of the charming stenciled designs sprinkled throughout the quilt. Created when Clarissa was just 17, it is a veritable showcase of the fabrics and motifs of the time period." The date is stenciled. Clarissa D Moore was born in Tolland, Connecticut on July 13, 1819. She married John Holman (1819-1896) of Eastford, Connecticut, on October 28, 1847. They had one child. She lived with Ida and Henry Baker Buell in Eastford in her later years. When their daughter Edith Clarissa was born in 1898 she gave the Buells her star quilt. Clarissa Holman died on January 16, 1912 and is buried in the North Ashford Cemetery in Windham County. I thought I recognized the red fabric in Clarissa's alternate blocks and you may too. Here is a wholecloth quilt in a similar print featuring eagles. A strip quilt alternating eagle print with a pillar print perhaps. From the Massachusetts Project & the Quilt Index. The eagle print was popular enough that several quilts and pieces of the yardage have survived in a few colorways. Above: a red ground with green and brown figures. Note the upside down cornucopia and the serpentine stripe of florals between the eagles. Same print with a chocolate brown ground. The most noticeable figure is the American eagle in an oval wreath with a pinked edge. You can't miss the eagle. Two colors in a nine patch from the Pat L. Nickols Collection at the Mingei Museum. The eagles are missing in Clarissa's quilt where there are only pinked edges to be seen. See the pinked edge in the lower left corner of this photo. Did she cut out all the eagles? Did she have leftovers from another project? Or was her red print an alternate design without the American eagle? The last answer is probable. It would make sense that a European mill might print an eagle for the U.S. market and alter the design for the rest of the world. Here's another version of the eagle print. Same eagle but the brown ground print has a different image where the cornucopia is on the red ground print. If you look closely at the photos of Clarissa's quilt, however, you see in the block above and to the left of her signature block an oval shape at the top. It's not an eagle's wing. so we have to guess that Clarissa had a different print. Once you start seeing a print you keep seeing it. Now I notice this strip quilt in the collection of the International Quilt Study Center and Museum (#2005.012.0001) features a print close to Clarissa's in the chintz strips. No eagle to be seen. Below another in the IQSC collection: #1997.007.0632 No eagles. This is probably the same print Clarissa cut up. Both the eagles and the no-eagles print must have been quite popular. Has there been a repro print of the eagle chintz? A black & white shot from the collections of Historic New England. I think I've solved the puzzle of the missing eagles. Several similar prints. I'll go on to some new obsession. See the pattern for the star quilt with stencils from Hoopla Patterns: http://www.hooplapatterns.com/shop/c/p/Clarissa-D-Moore-Quilt-pattern-x20241196.htm Update on the Reproduction Prints Wendy & Cyndi remembered two reproductions: Nancy Gere did a repro of the eagle print in her Old Glories: 13 Original Colonies. Moda did one called Georgetown (not by me) A couple of years ago they saw a show of Rhode Island quilts at the New England Quilt Museum that featured a display of the old fabric and new with a whole cloth quilt and this label. I found it at Cyndi's Busy Thimble shop blog http://busythimble.blogspot.com/