Six Generations of Quilters by Sherry A. Byrd
Please join me in welcoming Sherry A. Byrd as today’s guest blogger. She shares with us her family’s extensive quilting history spanning six generations. Thanks Sherry for being a guest!
My name is Sherry A. Byrd. As a child I was introduced to quilt making via my maternal grandmother, who came from a long lineage of quilt makers that were tied in with the Edward “Ned” Titus Family.
In 1852, a planter by the name of Simeon Lake, his wife, Nancy, and their children migrated to Texas from South Carolina, via Arkansas. They traveled over land in four wagons pulled by 10 oxen. They brought with them five slaves, Edward “Ned” Titus, his wife Chlorie (Dunbar) Titus and their three children. The male slaves helped with the outside work and the females did all the cooking and housework. The household chores consisted of cleaning, washing, ironing, sewing, cooking, and quilt making, etc.
Ned and Chlorie had eleven children. One was named Walter. When Walter matured, he chose for his wife… Miss Patsie Reddick. They became the parents of one daughter, Ellen Anna Titus who was born in 1884.
Patsie was considered to be a good housekeeper, cook and mother. She was talented at quilt making. She had all the skills a man was taught to look for in a woman. She taught all these skills to her daughter, Ellen Anna, at a very early age. Ellen Anna wed at the age of 15 to Willie Anderson Durham. Her mother died in 1925 ???. They had eleven offspring of which four were daughters. Their names were Clara born in 1903, Lillie born in 1904, Gladys born in 1906, and Katie Mae born in 1917.
Ellen Anna followed in the footsteps of her mother and trained her female offspring the same skills she had received when she was maturing. Her youngest daughter, Katie Mae Durham-Tatum, says her mother started the training as early as eight years old. This turned out to be a wise decision on her mother’s part, because Katie Mae’s mom died when she was twelve years old. Katie Mae married at the age of 15 and assisted her father to raise her two younger brothers, Alonzo and Harold. She says she was completely on her own and was forced to make covers for her bed, because she couldn’t afford to buy store bought ones. But the fact that she loved quilt making made the chore enjoyable. She considered knowing how to do so as a blessing.
Patsie Reddick and her daughter, Ellen Anna, established a solid foundational legacy of African American M-provisational quilt making that has survived the rigors of time through five and hopefully six generations.
The Titus family lineage has culminated into the creation of a series of reversible story quilts, which Patsie’s great, great granddaughter, Sherry A. Byrd works on passionately, in her spare time.
I, (Sherry) was born and raised in Fairfield, Texas, which is approximately an hours’ drive south of Dallas, Texas and also approximately an hours’ drive west of Waco, Texas. Fairfield is the county seat of Freestone. The town’s centennial year was 1951… the year I was born.
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