Bear's Paw
Clara Bontrager
1874
Probably made in Holmes County, Ohio, United States
Pieced, Hand Quilting
1997.007.0340

Ask an Amish quiltmaker when Amish women started making quilts, and she will likely answer that Amish women have “always made quilts.” Yet when Amish families began emigrating from Europe to North America in the mid-1700s, they brought neither quilts nor quilting know-how with them. Like other Germanic transplants, they used a bag stuffed with straw as a mattress, a featherbed to provide warmth and perhaps a woven coverlet as a top layer. 

At some point during the mid- to late-1800s Amish began making quilts in great numbers. By this point, Amish had established settlements in Pennsylvania, Ohio, Indiana and Illinois, and quiltmaking practices seemed to have developed independently in these areas. This quilt, our December's Quilt of the Month, is among the earliest known dated Amish quilts. It was made in 1874 by Clara Bontrager in Holmes County, Ohio.