Memoir

My Family’s and Hometown’s Legacies are Stitched Together

My mother’s quilt is an exact map of our hometown

My mother, Gloria Jean Berry Mueller, made this dress for our hometown’s sesquicentennial. Photo courtesy of Kay Patterson

When my sister Tracey died in April, we didn’t need to cater a dinner. Practically every family in the village brought food to the town hall, where we reminisced by the giant quilt my mother made.

You know you’re from a small town when you can make an exact map of the place into a quilt:

I took this picture during the potluck dinner that followed my sister’s burial. My mother made this quilt, which hangs in the town hall, in 1994. Photo by Michelle Teheux

Nearly everyone at the dinner could point to their home or their former home. My mother’s name was Gloria Jean Berry Mueller, and the Berry family has lived in Concord, Ill. for generations.

In 1994, Concord celebrated its sesquicentennial, and Mom had the idea to mark the occasion by making a quilt that would be a scale map of the town. Many others helped with the project, but my mother made it happen.

Concord had a population of 200 back then, and is only 170 now. I left in 1984; I don’t know exactly who the other 29 people who left are.

My mom had a passion for quilting.