It was with surprisingly little road dust that a handmade quilt arrived in Burlington as part of a traveling tribute to this nation’s 250th anniversary.
Christened “We the People,” this 80-by-80-inch tapestry had been crafted by a local quilting guild called the Alamance Piecemakers to commemorate the semiquincentennial of the Declaration of Independence.
The front of the quilt, which can currently be viewed in the foyer of Burlington’s city hall, features an American eagle within a patchwork of red-white-and-blue tessellations. The back, which isn’t readily visible, bears the signatures of the guild members who helped with the quilt.
It was nevertheless the quilt’s rambles since its creation that Kathy Lyday, the Piecemakers’ president, found particularly noteworthy when she described this project to Burlington’s city council.
Lyday recalled that the previous six months had seen the quilt on display at the Mebane Arts Center, the Graham Public Library, the Textile Heritage Museum at Glencoe Mill Village, and Elon’s town hall.
“It’s here for the month of July,” she went on to add during a city council meeting on Tuesday. “It then moves to the Captain White House in Graham for two months and then to Alamance Community College. In November, it moves to the Belk Library at Elon University. Then, in December, it moves to its permanent home at the Alamance County Historical Museum.”
