Fifty Years With Holden Caulfield

I was still fourteen, a freshman at Kimball High, when my English teacher Mr. Botens had our parents sign permission slips so we could read The Catcher in the Rye.

At this time my favorite books were still The Count of Monte Cristo and The Great White South about Robert Falcon Scott. I had read Jane Eyre, and Les Miserables, and lots of horse stories and dog stories and Edgar Allan Poe.

I had not read contemporary or Modern fiction.

As I read those first paragraphs and heard Holden's voice I was hooked. I did not identify with Holden, but I felt like I knew him. Mr. Botens led us through an understanding of the book. He did not explain some things I was still ignorant about.

Like 'tossed their cookies'. Holden says the taxi cab smelled like someone had 'tossed their cookies.' Only because his next sentence is about vomit was I able to get it. And D.B. prostituting in Hollywood? I did not know about the lure of big, easy money that drew established writers to become screenwriters. How they sold their talent, watched their darlings get sliced and diced into something new, and then bear the shame of having their name associated with the screenplay--or get no credit at all.

At fourteen I got the comedic moments. I introduced myself as Rudolph Schmidt then had to explain the reference. I loved the concept of 'secret slob', someone who is always well groomed but whose razor is never cleaned.

I did not understand how the Caulfield family had been impacted by the horrid death of Allie, I did not know what dying from leukemia meant. The workaholic father, the mother up all night smoking cigarettes, Holden spiraling into depression while idealizing about saving all the innocent and bright children from toppling over the cliff--it was so foreign.

The summer after ninth grade I read everything published by J. D. Salinger. I had the book nearly memorized.

This month our library book club read The Cather in the Rye. Many had read the book in high school, forgotten about it, and on rereading saw the sadness and self-destructive acts and teenage angst.

But the book is more than about teenage angst.

I was deeply moved this reading. My husband talked about PTSD. We talked about parents who couldn't cope so sent kids away to school, and teachers who could only preach conformity and getting one's act together, and the loneliness of falling into a dark place, desperate to connect, to be saved.

I asked people to think about who Holden does like as a way of seeing his innate decency and goodness: the nuns, the classmate who was bullied and killed himself. Even the mother on the train to whom he wove a story about her popular son--he liked her, and thinking she probably knew what her son was like Holden wanted to give her the gift of a fantasy son.

I reminded my fellow readers about the post-war world of conformity, the worship of status and wealth that Holden found phony, and which his peers seemed to accept as normal.

In his article Holden Caulfield at Fifty, Louis Menand wrote that this is a novel spawned of the 1940s, a novel about loss and a world gone wrong. I don't think Salinger could have written the same novel had he never served during World War II.

Each generation has its moment of horror that changes everything. The assassinations of President Kennedy and Martin Luther King. The Viet Nam War. The Challenger explosion. 9-11. Desert Storm. Columbine. Perhaps that is why Holden endures: he gives voice to what young people feel about the world they are inheriting and expected to live in, the messed up values that adults expect them to accept.

The times change. But how our kids feel about what we have done, or not done, remains unaltered. We keep messing up and we expect the next generation to like it--or fix it.

Tonawanda Stories a Hit in 2016

It was a huge surprise to find that my  stories of growing up in Tonawanda, NY were such a hit, drawing hundreds, and sometimes a thousand, readers to my blog. It all started when a post I created to celebrate my Aunt Alice Ennis's birthday 'went viral' weeks after it was posted. I snooped around and found a photo from that post had been shared on a Facebook group "Growing Up in the Town of Tonawanda."

I joined the group and shared some older blog posts I had written about Tonawanda history, which also had a wonderful reception.

My dad wrote a memoir of his childhood and I decided to share it with the Facebook group, and soon new friends were encouraging me with "more, please" comments. In the past few months I have added my own memories.

I have enjoyed reading about other's lives since a child, and still enjoy reading diaries and memoirs and autobiographies. But it amazes and humbles me to hear that people have relived and recalled their own experience through my sharing family stories and photos.

In January I will continue the family saga as our family moved to Detroit in 1963, sharing about my homesickness and Dad's new life. It won't be a Tonawanda Tale but the story of Tonawanda folk adjusting to a new community.

I have been amazed how many Tonawanda folk I have meet over my lifetime. In Philadelphia or Michigan I have discovered so many folk with Tonawanda roots, and my brother has as well. The Tonawanda settlers crossed New York State by land or the Erie Canal, and many continued west across Lake Erie into Canada or Ohio or Michigan. And of course work and career take many of us to places we never dreamt we'd go to.

Some, like my cousin David, have returned to Tonawanda from careers elsewhere. After all, there is no place like home, and home is where our family is.

Have a wonderful holiday season and may your hometown memories be warm and bright.

Stories by Me
The John Kuhn Family: https://theliteratequilter.blogspot.com/2016/07/the-kuhn-family-of-tonawanda-ny.html
The Sheridan Park Volunteer Firemen: https://theliteratequilter.blogspot.com/2016/07/dads-memories-of-sheridan-park.html
The Becker Family: https://theliteratequilter.blogspot.com/2016/11/eugene-gochenour-memoirs-becker-family.html
Happy Birthday, Aunt Alice: https://theliteratequilter.blogspot.com/2016/01/happy-birthday-aunt-alice.html
Halloween Costumes: https://theliteratequilter.blogspot.com/2016/10/halloween-costumes-of-1950s.html
Christmas Past (late 1950s): https://theliteratequilter.blogspot.com/2015/12/christmases-past-1956-and-1957-photos.html
Building and running a 1940s gas station: https://theliteratequilter.blogspot.com/2015/07/the-station-building-and-running-1940s.html
Tom's Brook Massacre: https://theliteratequilter.blogspot.com/2014/04/the-rhodes-family-massacre-at-toms-brook.html

Emma and Al Gochenour
with Mary and Gene

Al and Emma Gochenour with
daughters Alice and Mary

Dad's Memoirs
Part I: https://theliteratequilter.blogspot.com/2016/07/memoirs-of-eugene-gochenour-part-i.html
Part II: https://theliteratequilter.blogspot.com/2016/08/memoirs-of-eugene-gochenour-part-ii.html
Part III: https://theliteratequilter.blogspot.com/2016/08/eugene-gochenour-memoirs-part-iii.html
Partk IV: https://theliteratequilter.blogspot.com/2016/08/eugene-gochenours-memoirs-part-4.html
Scouting: https://theliteratequilter.blogspot.com/2016/09/memories-of-eugene-gochenour-scouting.html
Alger Gochenour: https://theliteratequilter.blogspot.com/2016/11/alger-jordan-gochenour-today-i-share-my.html
Grease and Cars: https://theliteratequilter.blogspot.com/2016/09/eugene-gochenours-memoirs-grease-and.html
Boating Tales: https://theliteratequilter.blogspot.com/2016/10/eugene-gochenours-memoir-boating-tales.html
Floods and Subs: https://theliteratequilter.blogspot.com/2016/10/eugene-gochenours-memoirs-floods-and.html
Lives Cut Short: https://theliteratequilter.blogspot.com/2016/10/eugene-gochenours-memoirs-live-cut-short.html
New York State Theme Parks: https://theliteratequilter.blogspot.com/2016/10/eugene-gochenours-memoirs-new-york.html
Runnning a Coffee Truck: https://theliteratequilter.blogspot.com/2016/10/eugene-gochenours-memoirs-running.html
Pets, Fishing, and Hunting: https://theliteratequilter.blogspot.com/2016/09/eugene-gochenors-memoirs-pets-fishing_10.html
Gene Gets a Girlfriend: https://theliteratequilter.blogspot.com/2016/09/eugene-gochenours-memoirs-gene-gets.html?google_comment_id=z125uvtafzbywjdbi04cfbky4suhz5gyx3w

Aunt Alice and me

My memories
My Old House: https://theliteratequilter.blogspot.com/2016/12/my-old-house.html
Birth and preschool: https://theliteratequilter.blogspot.com/2016/11/my-memories-of-growing-up-in-tonawanda.html
Stories my Mother Told Me: https://theliteratequilter.blogspot.com/2016/12/stories-my-mother-told-me-and-other.html
Trash Picking: https://theliteratequilter.blogspot.com/2013/10/trash-picking.html
Lois Gibbs on my Green Heros Quilt: https://theliteratequilter.blogspot.com/2012/11/my-green-heroes-quilt-lois-gibbs.html
Songs My Mother Sang Me: https://theliteratequilter.blogspot.com/2014/04/songs-my-mother-sang-me-1940s-novelty.html
Houses: https://theliteratequilter.blogspot.com/2014/05/houses.html

Related Books Reviews
Love Canal: https://theliteratequilter.blogspot.com/2016/05/the-history-and-legacy-of-love-canal.html
1901 Pan American Exposition book: https://theliteratequilter.blogspot.com/2016/10/spectacle-and-assassination-at-1901.html
The Sky Unwashed: https://theliteratequilter.blogspot.com/2013/09/mother-russia-and-sky-unwashed-by-irene.html

How To Make Children's Clothes the Modern Singer Way --in 1931

"Modern sewing methods and a modern Singer sewing machine are essentials that combine to make sewing at home recreational and economically valuable."

I found this booklet, How to Make Children's Clothes the Modern Singer Way, at the Royal Oak Flea Market. It was first printed in 1927 by the Singer Sewing Machine Company as Singer Sewing Library booklet No. 3; my copy was printed in 1931.

The 64-page booklet does not include patterns; it offers advice and illustrations of details of sewing garments for children of all ages, from baby layettes to 'dress frocks' for older girls.

"This book is designed to make sewing for children easy, to make the work interesting, and to encourage those who sew for children to appreciate the importance of correct and becoming attire, thus helping in a silent way to build a foundation of good taste and a sense of fitness to the child that will later prove an asset, economically and socially." from the forward by Mary Brooks Picken

The Modern Singer Sewing Machine in 1927-1931

"Authorities disagree on the quantity of garments necessary for a baby's layette, but all agree that beautiful cleanness is absolutely necessary.

"It is best to buy a 10-yard piece of fine nainsook and use this for dresses and slips, and buy a bold or bolts of diaper cloth, if diapers are to be cut and hemmed at home."

Rompers for boys and girls differed little.

The play overalls are suitable for boys or girls. Note that figure 45 has an apron.

Bloomer frocks, short dresses with matching bloomer panties, and Pantie Frocks for girls 8 to 12 years of age, are very familiar to us from movies and print ads of this time.

Combination Suits were meant to be worn under dresses. The seamstress is warned to allow enough fullness and length in the crotch and that the neck be low enough to not show above the slip or dress, and that the arm hole is large enough to not crowd the dress arm. 

The Middie and Bloomer outfit was perfect for gym suits.

Examples of dress frocks for older girls:

Pajamas, lounge wear and beach wear costumes had full pants.

Junior girls should not feel awkward; she can be "just as attractive at fourteen as she was at six or will be at twenty. She can be attractive for the age of fourteen."

Girls should be "encouraged" to "reason and observe and know what is best for herself." She should choose outfits appropriate to her age, temperament and type. "Under no circumstances should the clothes of an older person be shortened for a younger one;" instead the material can be dyed, recut, and remade.

Fabrics should be neutral, never delicate, and becoming, with an even weave and smooth surface. Flannel, serge, gingham, flat crepe, are better than cheviot, dotted Swiss, or satin.

2016 Review: First Time Writers To Watch

Here are the books I read or reviewed in 2016 that were the authors first book. It is one of the perks of reviewing new books that I can discover emerging voices.

FICTION

The Nix by Nathan Hill was one of my favorite books of the year. A floundering man seeks to understand the mother who left him as a child by discovering her past.

Behold the Dreamers by Imbolo Imbue considers the American Dream through immigrants from Cameroon and their employers whose dream is unraveling. Stunning.

The Mortifications by Derek Palacio takes readers on a journey into the human heart through Cuban refugees struggling with their own demons and working out their own salvation.

My Last Continent by Midge Raymond warns about habitat threats to the penguins of Antarctica through a tragic love story.

Lilac Girls by Martha Hall Kelly's Historical Fiction novel concerns the 'rabbits', Polish girls who underwent horrendous 'medical research' at the Ravensbruck concentration camp, and the New York socialite Caroline Ferriday who changes their lives,

The Expense of a View by Polly Buckingham is an award winning collection of stories that probe the despair of people in crisis.

Spaceman of Bohemia by Jaroslav Kalfar is funny, improbable, and emotionally wise. A Czech astronaut sent to explore a strange entity seeks expiation for his father's crimes as a Soviet informer. Review coming in 2017.

Lillian Boxfish Takes a Walk by Kathleen Rooney is a lovely paean to New York City through the eyes of an elderly woman recalling her life and career as the top female advertising writer in the 1930s. Review coming in 2017.

Absalom's Daughters by Suzanne Feldman considers race and identity through two half-sisters, one black and once who can pass as white, as they travel through the Jim Crow South in search of their father.

Lucky Boy by Shanthi Skaran tells the heartbreaking story of an illegal immigrant whose child is fostered by an Indian-American couple who want to adopt him. Review coming in 2017.

Idaho by Emily Ruskovich is a lyrical story of the redemptive power of love through a woman who cares for a husband with early onset Alzheimer's and her obsession over the tragedy of his first family. Review coming in 2017.

All the Winters After by Sere Prince Halverson is an Alaskan story of love and redemption.

The Longest Night by Andria Williams was inspired by the true story of a nuclear reactor accident.

Fobbit by David Abrams is a satirical novel about the absurdities behind the scenes during the Iraq war.

Sirius by Jonathan Crown is an alternatie history starring a spunky Jewish dog who becomes a Hollywood star, and accidentally becomes a spy when Hitler adopts him,

Mr. Eternity by Aaron Thier is a genre-bending novel that jumps through time with Robinson Crusoe, offering a chilling glimpse into an unrecognizable world altered by climate change.

Lay Down Your Weary Tune by W. B. Belcher is the story of confronting one's own demons and the toll paid by fame.

Angels of Detroit by Christopher Herbert is a sprawling novel with unforgettable characters, each obsessed with their own view of Detroit's future.

Nelly Dean: A Return to Wuthering Heights by Alison Case recounts Bronte's story from a new viewpoint.

Black River by S. M. Hulse is the story of a man who has undergone horrendous loss, and is confronted the challenge to forgive. My second reading, for book club, of a book I read in 2014.

NONFICTION

Born a Crime by Trevor Noah is a love letter to Noah's remarkable mother as he tells his story of growing up in Apartheid South Africa as 'a crime', the illegally conceived child of a European father and African mother.

When Breath Becomes Air by Paul Kalathani recounts his life-long search for meaning in context of learning that he is dying of cancer.

Lab Girl is Hope Jahren's memoir addressing her love of nature and struggle as a bipolar female scientist.

Spaceman by Mike Massamino recounts his career as an astronaut with humility and graciousness. A joyful memoir.

The Clancy of Queens is Tara Clancy's humorous and warm memoir of growing up able to leap social classes in a single bound.

Unmentionable by Therese Oneill is a hilarious consideration of the reality of women's lives in the 19th c,

Dog Medicine by Julie Barton is a memoir of her debilitating depression and how her dog Bunker gave her the purpose and love she needed to recover.

Smoke the Donkey by Cate Folsom recounts how a wild donkey helped soldiers heal and the remarkable battle to bring Smoke to America.

The Thunder Before the Storm by Clyde Bellencourt is a raw and unvarnished story of a man's discovering his roots and his fight to protect American Indian traditions.

Fast Into the Night by Debbie Clark Moderow recounts her journey to the Iditarod.

Rumer Godden

Rumer Godden is one of my favorite 'forgotten' authors so I am thrilled that Open Road Media is bringing Godden's books to the reading public in ebook form. Two of Godden's Catholic novels were made available to me through NetGalley.

Five for Sorrow, Ten For Joy explores the role of the Catholic faith in the lives of women in a small, isolated community of nuns. The nuns bring baggage from their past lives, seeking refuge in the love and forgiveness of Jesus. Godden slowly reveals the journey of Sister Marie Lise du Rosaire in a series of backflashes and alternate voices.

Elizabeth Fanshawe has been in a series of prisons. As an orphan she lived with a demanding Aunt. Only 20 at the end of WWII, Lise is caught up in the wild celebrations. Drunk and lost, she is taken home by Patrice, a wealthy, older man. He takes her in, and she believes he loves her; this illusion is another prison since he wants her for his brothel--another prison.

"I was green as a lettuce leaf...I thought he loved me...It didn't occur to me I was a whore."

Lise became Madame Lise Ambard, working in a high class house of ill repute. Scared in a fight, she is reborn as La Balafree and at twenty-three manages the brothel for Patrice. She still is under the illusion that he loves her best.

Lise rescues a drunken waif, Vivi, a fourteen-year-old girl who had been living on the streets for two years. Her Papa had abused her and her sister; the sister secretly gave birth to a baby which they left to die. Lise found Vivi clutching a rosary in her hands. Lise hopes to sent Vivi to school but Patrice is stunned by the girl's beauty and takes her as his new favorite lover, displacing Lise. When Vivi lusts for a local boy, Lise assists her to run away with him. The results are disastrous. Lise's illusions bring her to murder thinking she is saving a former whore, Vivi, from reentering the brothel. She justly serves ten years in prison.

While in prison for murder, Lise meets the Dominicaines of Bethanie nuns whose message of love and forgiveness changes her life. Upon her release at age thirty-seven she enters the convent, intent on becoming a novitiate. When asked if the convent were not another prison with its rules and obedience, Lise replies, "Not prison, freedom. That's the paradox. I believe it will be such freedom as I can't imagine now.'

Lise's past catches up to her, meeting Vivi again. She is impelled to help the irredeemable Vivi, which results in another murder.

Although the novel is about faith and redemption, another aspect of the novel is especially relevant today: The treatment of women by men.

"There were, of course, the irrecuperables, the unrescuable, who seemed to have evil in their skin, as if the devil had sown the seed that made them bad through and through--but many, Lise was certain, were in prison not because of what they had done, but because of what other people, especially men, had done to them, and some of us, like me, thought Lise, were in prison for their illusions."

A fellow newly released prisoner, Lucette, follows Lise and wants to stay where she stays. Lise explains Lucette must have a calling. "It's as if God put out a finger and said, "You, " Lise explains. Lucette retorts, "God hasn't got a finger. He can't have because there isn't a God. If there were he wouldn't have let what happened, happen to me--or you." "That's what I used to think, but that wasn't God; it was us." Lise responds. "Us? Not us, it was them...I see you are going to escape here where there are no men..I don't blame you...I hate men, all of them."

Lise, Vivi, and Lucette were all victims of men who abused them. A side story of Jackie, a girl the Bethanie nuns tried to save, ends in suicide; the girl could not recover from a gang rape. Reading this book I was reminded of The Real La Traviata by Rene Weiss, how as a child Marie Duplessus was forced to trade sexual favors for food, was pimped by her own father, became a mistress and the inspiration behind Hugo's novel Camille and the opera La Traviata.

Lise and Lucette find solace in faith and the religious life, the community of women whose acceptance is transformative. It was prison that sets Lise free. She sees the divine spark in all lives, especially the wicked. Marie Lise is able to use her experience to help other women in prison. She never gives up hope for Vivi's redemption.

The novel has it's flaws. I wish there was more about post-war France and how it impacted the women who take refuge in the brothel, and Lise's role as Madam is given as historical fact but lacks authenticity; I can't imagine her as a procuress of young women. But Lise's story is compelling and the theme is still relevant.

Black Narcissus is Godden's most well known novel, especially because its the film adaptation starring Deborah Kerr.  The novel again concerns a group of women, Anglican nuns, in a closed, isolated community, struggling with personal demons and their commitment to God.

"They saw the great slope of hill and the valley and hills rising across the gulf to the clouds; then they saw what they had missed at first, because they had not looked as high. Across the north the Himalayas were showing with the peak Kanchenjunga straight before them."

The General's Palace at Mopu has been offered to the Sisters. The Brothers had been invited first but only lasted five months before leaving. The Palace had been built by the General's father, a country palace with the finest view in India; he installed his wives in the palace and it became known as the House of Women, from which light and music emanated all night. The current General is Progressive. He turned out the women and hopes the sisters will turn the palace to good--a sanctification. A Holy Man, once famous and rich, sits near the path, his eyes fixated on the god of the mountain, unmoving and detached from the world.

The General's agent Mr Dean warns, 'It's no place for a nunnery." But Sister Clodagh looks at the orchids on the terrace and the eagles flying in the clouds and cries, "It's an inspiration just to stand here. Who could live here and not feel close to God!" Sister Clodagh has been overconfident and authoritative, but Mr. Dean recalls to mind her youthful, unrequited love.

"We call it Kanchenjunga and we believe that God is there. No one can conquer that mountain and they never will. Men can't conquer God, they only go mad for the love of Him. ..You have to be very strong to live close to God or a mountain, or you'll turn a little mad."

Each sister is drawn to worldly joys, gardening or becoming too attached to the children, slowly forgetting their commitments, order seeping away. Beautiful young people enter their doors for education, the young heir scented with Black Narcissus, dressed in silks and jewels, and the wayward beauty Mr. Dean hoists upon them when he tires of her pursuit. Oh, the ever present Mr Dean, so unsuitably dressed, with such a bad reputation, whose very presence arouses memory and inspires jealousy and desire. Especially in Sister Ruth, a troublesome nun who seeks 'self-importance'.

The novel ends in a whirlwind of disorder, with a thrilling Gothic climax.

Open Road Media has acquired twelve Godden titles and I am thrilled to think of her rediscovery. I have been collecting copies of her titles for years...

I especially love her novels set in India and her wonderful portraits of children and the young.

Learn more about the remarkable life and career of Rumer Godden at
http://www.rumergodden.com/index.php

Rumer Godden, 1947 portrait for Vogue magazine
http://www.rumergodden.com/biography.php

World War II Quilts

Sue Reich's extensive research on quilts made during World War II was a labor of love, inspired by her father's service. Drawing from newspaper accounts and articles she presents the history of the war and the home front as seen through the quilts of that era.

The result is a mammoth book with a whopping 335 color photographs, many quilts featured full page and in detail. Accompanying news articles, pattern sources, ephemera, advertising, and photographs illustrate war time history on the home front.

Woman were called upon to do their part in the war effort, not only in factory work but in employing their sewing and needlework skills. With manufacturing geared to war efforts families had to 'make do'; women mended and altered old clothes. Scraps were used to make quilts, which were promoted in newspapers as part of the patriotic 'waste not, want not' lifestyle. Feedsacks were printed with patterns and used for clothes and home furnishings.

Reich identifies the kinds of quilts made during the war: Patriotic quilts in red, white and blue; quilts with iconic Military themes; Red Cross and other organization related donation quilts; fund-raising quilts; and common pattern quilts made during 1920-1950.

The quilts shared in the book include an amazing array of construction: pieced, applique, embroidered, and even hand painted. Furthermore, there are quilts made of various textiles such as Sweetheart Pillows, feedsack, parachute fabric, home furnishing fabrics, pre-printed Military theme linens, and with even quilts Navy and Army Insignia badges.

Quilts presented include those made by well known quilt artists such as Bertha Stenge's OPA (Office of Price Administration) Quilt and her Four Freedom's Quilt. An embroidered Remember Pearl Harbor quilt; includes images of President Roosevelt giving a radio talk and Eleanor Roosevelt, the USS Oklahoma, female service persons, Uncle Sam, and  in the center"X+Y+X=V". Quilts commemorate President Franklin D. Roosevelt, his wife Eleanor, and even FDR's beloved Fala. The Roosevelt Rose quilt by Minnie Pearl Pardee Barrett used a 1938 applique pattern by Ruth Finley. An amazing quilt by Callie Jeffress Fanning Smith, The Eleanor Roosevelt Alum portrayed the First Lady from childhood to the White House through applique, embroidery, and hand painted faces.

The mother of Robert Howe, who was serving in the Coast Guard, made a quilt with embroidered details of  their family history and her son's service. The Bataan Death March Quilt made by Ida Johnson Beattie and a Gold Star Mother's Quilt by Callie Shaeffer with embroidered names perhaps brought solace to the grieving.

Victory quilts featuring "V" were made in applique, embroidery, and pieced blocks.

There are patriotic red, white and blue quilts including many star variations. American symbols on the quilts include the flag, eagles, stars, war related slogans, government agencies, and branches of the military. Airplane quilts in various patterns were popular.

The Music Teacher's Quilt is made of embroidered music and words to thirty American songs, from My Old Kentucky Home, Old Folks at Home and The Quilting Party to Call Out the Navy, America he Beautiful, and A Gold Star Mother's Prayer.

Honor Roll Quilts gave tribute to those called to serve during wartime. The Clinch/Locust Methodist Church created an Honor Roll Banner to represent the 155 men and women from the church who went to war.

Fundraising quilts included embroidered names. Red Cross Quilts with official labels reading "American Red Cross Chapter-Not to be sold" were sent to European victims of war. 

Reich presents an amazing history of the Changi Quilts, including details of the makers. women who were trapped in Singapore and sent to the Changi Jail internment camp. Under inhuman conditions, the women created three quilts for the British, Australian, and Japanese soldiers. Using flour sacks and bed sheets the women appliqued and embroidered personal messages and images from their life present and past.

New quilt patterns were published in newspapers and magazines, and fabrics with war related themes and in American colors were printed. One of my favorites are the Rainbow Block Company Victory quilt, beautiful designs of floral "V" blocks.

The quilting enthusiast and those interested in Women's History will find World War II Quilts a wonderful resource.

Reich has also written World War I Quilts, Quilts Presidential and Patriotic, and Quilt News of Yesteryear, all available at Schiffer Publications. 

I received a free book from the publisher in exchange for a fair and unbiased review.

World War II Quilts 

Sue Reich

Schiffer Publications

$39.95

ISBN 13: 9780764334511

My Favorite Books of 2016: American History

One of my reading themes in 2016 concerned American history. Events from places I have lived and the times I have lived in, presidential history, Native American history, African American history, and the American Revolution continue to be interest areas I am drawn to.The books were galley ebooks, Arcs, or books provided by the publisher. All were my choices to read.

Terror in the City of Champions: Murder, Baseball and the Secret Society that Shocked Depression Era Detroit by Tom Stanton brought to life a city thrilled by its team's sport wins while The Black Legion, a hate group spawned from the KKK, pressed unsuspecting people into membership at gunpoint then sent them out to kill.

The Electrifying Fall of Rainbow City: Spectacle and Assassination at the 1901 World's Fair by Margaret Creighton peels back the tinted postcard memories of the Pan-American Exposition to reveal the seamy side of American society a hundred years ago. 


67 Shots: Kent State and the End of American Innocence by Howard Means was a moving, important, and disturbing book, particularly for my generation.

Of Arms and Artists by Paul Staiti shows how artists of the American Revolution created a national identity.  

The Civil Wars of Julia Ward Howe by Elaine Showalter reveals the complicated life of the woman who penned our national anthem.

Five Days at Memorial: Life and Death in a Storm-Ravaged Hospital by Sheri Fink reveals how the lack of preparation by a for-profit hospital resulted in avoidable deaths.

Just Another Southern Town: Mary Church Terrell and the Struggle for Racial Justice in the Nation's Capital by Joan Quigley is the story of 90 year old Terrell's fight to end segregation in Washington D.C. in 1950. It is the inspiring story of how age has nothing to do with standing up for what is right.

The Parker Sisters: A Border Kidnapping by Lucy Maddox is a historian's study of the Fugitive Slave Law through the kidnapping of two African American teenagers.

Truevine: Two Bothers, a Kidnapping, and a Mother's Quest: A True Story of the Jim Crow South by Beth Macy concerns Albino African Americans enslaved by a circus and their mother's endeavor to protect them.


Massacre at Sand Creek: How Methodists Were Involved in an American Tragedy by Gary Roberts was commissioned by the United Methodist Church. Leaders in this attack on 'friendly' Native American women and children were Methodist. It is a warning of how 'good people' can be led by cultural norms to commit crimes against humanity.

The Apache Wars: The Hunt for Geronimo, The Apache Kid, and the Captive Boy Who Started the Longest War in American History by Paul Andrew Hutton is a dense and comprehensive history, another revelation of treaties broken and genocidal military leaders.

The Thunder Before the Storm: The Autobiography of Clyde Bellecourt is a raw, honest, and moving relating of his journey from juvenile delinquent to the leader of the American Indian Movement.

John Quincy Adams and the Politics of Slavery by David Waldstreicher and Matthew Mason draws from Adams diaries to trace his evolving understanding, personally and legally, of slavery, culminating in his eight year battle to end the Gag Rule that forbade the House from accepting petitions to end slavery.

Bobby Kennedy: The Making of a Liberal Icon by Larry Tye is a fascinating biography focusing on Bobby's evolution from McCarthy staffer to Civil Rights spokesperson.

Herbert Hoover in the White House: The Ordeal of the Presidency by Charles Rappleye is a great study on how the Great Humanitarian, a successful business man, failed as president.

The Gatekeeper:Missy LeHand, FDR, and the Untold Partnership that Defined a Presidency by Kathryn Smith is the first biography of President Roosevelt's constant companion for twenty years in the office and out, the first female 'chief of staff'.

Eleanor and Hick: The Love Affair that Shaped a First Lady by Susan Quinn considers the friendship, and possibly love affair, that supported the First Lady to blossom into leadership.

Valient Ambition: George Washington, Benedict Arnold, and the Fate of the American Revolution by Nathaniel Philbrick shows that our country's founding was pretty messy and the ramifications of leaders obsessed with image, personal power, and monetary success.

Washington's Spys: The Story of America's First Spy Ring by Alexander Rose is the book behind the series Turn, the real story of the Culpepper spy ring.

Love Canal: A Toxic History From Colonial Times to the Present by Richard S. Newman was another upsetting read of how industry used Niagara Falls for profit, leaving a legacy of chemical waste, Activist Lois Gibbs work helped establish the Superfund, which almost immediately was defunded. We are all affected by industrial toxic waste.

A History of New York in 101 Objects by Sam Roberts is a more lighthearted look at our past, considering the things that made New York, and America and the world, what it is today.

Dead Wake by Eric Larson is the moving tale of the Lusitania.

I hope you found something here to put on your 2017 reading list!