00:00:00Meg Cox (MC): This is Meg Cox and Im conducting an interview with Alex
Anderson for Quilters S.O.S. Save Our Stories a project of The Alliance for
American Quilts. It is now 10:42 A.M on Saturday November 5th and were
conducting this interview on the convention floor at Quilt Festival. Now as
usual, youve brought a touchstone quilt, you brought a special quilt, so why
dont you tell us why you picked this one?
Alex Anderson (AA): Why did I choose this quilt to bring today? I consider
myself a traditional quiltmaker, although Im going into new venues, which is
very, very exciting but typically Ive been known as the Star Lady, and
00:01:00handquilter. So this particular quilt was made entirely by me, I didnt even
have a celebrity stunt sewer do the binding [laughs.] and it has machine pieced
stars, hand appliqud and handquilted.
MC: What do you think someone seeing this quilt would think about you as a quilter?
AA: What would I think if somebody were viewing this quilt, of me as a
quiltmaker? Im pretty simpleminded [laughs.] I mean its a classic pattern,
but it has a contemporary twist to it. You would know that this pattern A Rose
of Sharon was not made one hundred years ago. You would know that it has been
made probably around the turn of the century and I also love that it has hand
dyes in it. [announcement on loudspeaker.]
00:02:00
MC: What do you do with this quilt? What is your plan for this quilt?
AA: What do I do with this quilt? Most of my quilts are working quilts. This
particular quilt was created for my book Beautifully Quilted by Alex Anderson
and it was a book that was written to talk about how much I love designing
quilting motifs. I studied under a women named Lucy Hilty who is no longer with
us, but she was a driving heart beat for us in the San Francisco Bay area
[California.] She was a Mennonite woman who didnt care much about creating
the quilt top, she cared about creating the quilting designs and Im not sure
00:03:00if that was my tenth book, but it was kind of in there, I knew that I had to
document the lessons that Lucy taught me. For me, when the quilt is quilted,
thats when the true soul is, Im going to say a wrong word, breathed into,
the quilt. Is that correct English, Meg?
MC: Im not sure, but it sounds great to me.
AA: Okay [laughs.] The quilting to me is where it is happening, especially when
youre sitting at the quilt frame; this magic.
MC: Alex, can you tell me your first quilt memory?
AA: My first quilt memory, I can tell you what it is, but I dont remember it.
My first quilt memory was brought to my attention about ten years ago. There was
a women who lived next door to my mom and dad and her name is Mrs. Kelly and
Mrs. Kelly was a multi-talented woman and when I met up with her, you know years
00:04:00later, when I was a little girl, I would come over and sit under her quilt
frame. For eighth grade graduation in high school, she gave me a silver thimble.
Who would have ever guessed? I met up with her later and she called me on the
phone and she said, shes a lawyer in the Monterey Bay area [California.] and
she said, Youre famous! and I said, And youre smart! [laughs.]
MC: [laughs.] What age did you actually start quiltmaking?
AA: Quiltmaking was started in seventy-eight. I was a student at San Francisco
State University [California.] My degree was in generic art with kind of heavy
design influence. One month prior to graduation, I found out I was a unit short.
I had just done a paper on quilting at American Folk Tradition for a
childrens class I was in. So I went to my counselor and I said, If I do a
00:05:00quilt, in this one month, will you give me the unit that I need to graduate?
and she said, Yes. So I called my grandmother, who had started a hand
pieced grandmas flower garden in the 1930s and she was thrilled to send it
off to me. I went and got cotton batting with seeds in it, I got Laura Ashley
upholstery fabric for the backing, and this giganto quilt that I was going to do
in one month, ended up being the size of a bathmat. Grandma was profoundly
disappointed, but despite all odds, a quiltmaker was born.
MC: Thats wonderful. What about the second one? Did that take a while to get through?
AA: The second quilt? No, because I was, she asked what about my second quilt. I
was supposed to be a weaver for life, but I found my home at the quilt frame
00:06:00that my dad made for me from stolen lumber from the neighbors yard [laughs.]
and every night I would just come and quilt, quilt, quilt. The second quilt was
actually a quilt, an Amish quilt that I made in Lucy Hiltys class, where I
learned how to draw feathers and cables and all those beautiful motifs that we
still love today.
MC: Are there other quiltmakers in your family other than your grandmother?
AA: Are there other quiltmakers in my family? Interestingly enough, I kind of
think it skips generations, but I know on both sides, the grandmothers dabbled
in quilting, not seriously, but after both grandparents had passed away, both
sides, we found my grandmothers frame from one side in the attic of the other
grandmother. We gave it to a museum in Sister Bay, Wisconsin. Im kind of sad
I didnt hang on to those four sticks but I suppose its better that its
00:07:00where it really belongs, its in Dorr County [Wisconsin.]
MC: Thats wonderful. When did you start teaching?
AA: So when did I start teaching quiltmaking, about thirty seconds after I
started making quilts, because you see I just discovered it [laughs.] I went to
a church group and I taught, I dont even know what, and then I was keeping
one step ahead of what the students wanted, and if somebody wants to teach
quiltmaking, I say, Its great, find a group of people who want to
learn, and just share your knowledge.
MC: So what was the class?
AA: So what was the class that I taught? I havent a clue [laughs.]
MC: But then you went from that onto television? Can you talk about that?
AA: So theres a giant leap between when I started quiltmaking to when I went
and got on television. There was a lot of teaching that went on. I was, I taught
00:08:00at Cotton Patch, Lafayette, California and Empty Spools store in Alamo,
California, and I had the opportunity to put other, my quilts, in other
peoples books. The first quilt that I had published was in Quilts, Quilts,
Quilts by Diana McClun and Laura Nownes and it was a star quilt on black
background, solid fabrics. That was a light bulb moment for me, because at the
time in the San Francisco Bay area [California.] there was a war between art
quilters and traditional quilters and it was really ugly. I wanted to be with
the cool guys, that were the art quilters, but I kept finding myself drawn to
the traditional medium and Diana saw that quilt of mine, this simple saw-toothed
star quilt, and said, Can we have it for our first book? and that was a
light bulb moment for me because I realized it doesnt matter whether youre
00:09:00traditional, whether youre art, or you dont even know where you fit in,
all thats important is that you are a quilter. I was kind of a generic
quilter, teaching stars and how to draw the motifs and all that, and I was down
at a show, Road to California put on by Caroline Reese in Southern California,
and I was approached by Stephanie Kleinman who worked for Weller-Grossman
Productions and she came into my class, and she wanted to know if Id be
interested in hosting a television show. And I said, I cant talk right
now, Im teaching a class, lets meet at lunch, so we couldnt find a
private place until we scored a bus bench, kind of like Forrest Gump [laughs.]
and we had ourselves a conversation. I really was not interested in being on
television; I just wanted to be able to be a professional quilter. So I said,
00:10:00Let me think about this, and I flew home that night, and John was in the
kitchen fixing something that might look like a dinner, and my kids were
watching television, at the time my son was probably early high school, my
daughter junior high, pre-junior high, and I walked in the house, and I said,
Youre not going to believe this, somebody wants me to do a television
show. Its the firt time my kids ever cared what I did for a living, all
of the sudden quilting was becoming important, and I remember walking through
the family room to the kitchen, and I looked at my husband John, and I said,
I dont want to do this, and he looked at me and he said, Ive
never seen you back away from anything. Ive seen you make twenty quilts for a
book, for books, in three months. Ive seen you meet every single
00:11:00challenge, and he said, When youre an old lady, in the old peoples
home, sitting on the front porch trying to teach the lady next to you how to
quilt, youre going to be very sorry that you missed this opportunity. So
it was through my husbands encouragement that I went forwards.
MC: Thats wonderful.
AA: And Meg that makes me want to weep right now [laughs.] Kidding.
MC: Weve got the Kleenex, dont worry.
AA: Yeah [laughs.]
MC: Can you, well switch channels then, can you tell me about an amusing
experience that occurred during your quilting or teaching of quilting?
AA: An amusing experience thats happened during my quilting. What isnt
great about this industry, I cant, I will just say whats so amusing is
that this is the universes joke, that Ive been able to write all these
books and have a TV show because I graduated with C- from Livermore High School [California.]
00:12:00
MC: Oh.
AA: Thats the joke [laughs.]
MC: What do you find pleasing about making quilts?
AA: What do I find pleasing about making quilts? I knew youd ask a question
kind of like that, so Im going to preface it differently, then you can re-ask
it if I dont answer it. I have found that in quiltmaking, there are certain
things that really have made a difference to me along the way. In the beginning
it was when I had my first sewing room, and we took the bed out, and it was all
mine that was really a wonderful moment. I remember when I got my first Bernina,
I mean we didnt have money, we didnt have money at all, I borrowed the
money from my dad. I remember when I was first published in Dianas book, and
Lauras book, and the journey has continued to amaze me. I remember when I
00:13:00could go into a quilt shop and not have to worry if I could feed my family and
be able to spend twenty-five dollars on fabric, but now the thing that is so
pleasing to me about quilting are the people. And thats why I love what
youre doing here with S.O.S. [Save Our Stories.] because we are an incredible
community and I dont think theres anything else quite like it on the
planet, so to me its the people now.
MC: Would you talk a little bit about techniques. Now you are, the queen of
handquilting, but can you talk a little bit about your journey in terms of
technique and material?
AA: Okay as far as my journey of technique, I did start out as a traditional
quiltmaker. Love the handquilting, fell into the star lady, and that was
actually because in Diana and Lauras book, Quilts, Quilts, Quilts that
wasnt really included in the sampler. My journey has been taken, has taken a
really abrupt turn lately, and its very interesting to watch because I
00:14:00dont know where Im going, but I know Im doing something a little bit
different. And at this point, my journey is taking me away from teaching and
putting me back into the student role. Right now on my frame at home I have a
silk Dupioni silk, thats very arty, kind of like my quilt for the
Alzheimers movement for Ami Simms, its full-size and yet its
handquilted so its kind of like taking the old, and integrating the new to
it. I think thats one of the things we love about quilting, is that its
not a journey that has an end. The more I know, the less I know, and I think
thats what continues to make this so exciting.
MC: How has technology influenced your quilting?
AA: How has technology influenced my quilting? A lot, a lot. Ive learned
things in the last five years that I didnt know my brain could even process
00:15:00and I think technology, the thing is the internet. We are now connecting
quilters worldwide. Ive had the delicious pleasure of being in Africa this
past year and meeting with a guild of which it was the first generation of
quilters. I had the opportunity to go to Costa Rica and meet with the first
generation of quilters and the internet I think is taking our community and just
reaching it so far out there, and yet its making out community smaller, and
smaller, and smaller. I also think digital photography is something else
thats really important. I was trying to put together something, and I went
back to try and find college pictures of me, and they just simply didnt exist
because we didnt, I didnt have the money to process the film. Now with
digital photography, you have people here from all over the world, snapping away
00:16:00their hearts content, and then they can go to wherever they live and share
these pictures either in person, or on the internet, so I think digital
photography is a big deal.
MC: So you mentioned that silk Dupioni, so would you say that the materials and
the techniques that youre using are different now?
AA: I mentioned that Im working with soup [laughs.] strike that from the
record please, silk Dupioni and do I think that globally techniques and all that
are changing? Oh definitely. I look here, this is on video, or on audio, but
across the way Im looking at a quilt that is just covered with crystals you
know, and its changing at a very rapid speed. I think the rules have all been
broken or open and theres not the way that those of you who perhaps started
quilting thirty years ago, if you didnt do it the way that teacher said, you
might end up in jail [laughs.] Ill join you there.
00:17:00
MC: Yeah. Would you describe your studio now, your place where you do your quilting?
AA: I love my studio where Im working now. My first studio, I even have a
hard time saying that because it sounds so important, and its just my
playground, my first studio was an extra bedroom with a bed in it, a guest room,
and it was after taking a class from Nancy Crow, I came home to my husband and I
said, You know, youre right, this needs to be, stay the guest bedroom,
Im going to move into the living room and claim that as my own, and the
bed was out the next day, so that was my first studio. The second studio, it was
in Pinole, California, we purchased a second house, moved, and it was downstairs
and it was quite large. It was long and skinny, but it was large. But then we
had to move to Livermore, California, where I was raised, and the real-estate
was a little bit more expensive, and so my studio became the largest extra
00:18:00bedroom, the kitchen, and the laundry room. My first book was written in the
laundry room. I thought we needed to move, but my dad said, Look, youve
got some space right behind the house here, you could add on. So I went and
visited other quiltmakers studios, Yvonne Porcella, Freddy Moran, to name
some of the people you might be familiar with, and I made a list of the things
that I wanted. Then I went to an architect and I said, It had to be under 500
square feet, because at 500 square feet, we had to pay more taxes. So my studio
is 498 square feet, and its pushed to the back of the house, through my
daughters bedroom, which is now my office. Im so glad I had other people
look at the plans, it is the place where you will find me even if Im painting
00:19:00my fingernails. I love that spot.
MC: Thats great. With everything that you do, are you, do you find it hard to
balance your schedule? Do you find, we all have trouble finding enough time for
quilting, but is that especially difficult for you?
AA: With everything I do, do I have time to balance my quilting time? Yes its
very, very difficult but I do quilt. My mom calls the back, my studio, my
studio, not my sewing room, the factory, because shell come back there and
see me sewing but in the end, when the day is over, and Im done writing
articles for the magazine or working on the website, or traveling, being here
with you, and my friends, my friends and family, I find that at four oclock
in the afternoon, thats where you might just find me, sitting at the quilt
frame. Ive just nw put another quilt on the frame, its been a long time,
00:20:00and I have vowed that I will always have a quilt on the frame, because thats
where I get centered. Ive got to have that to go to and its been a long
time since Ive made that promise to myself.
MC: Thats great. What about machine quilting? Do you do much of that?
AA: Machine quilting, yes Ive learned to machine quilt and I think its
really exciting that theres something that you dont know how to do, I
think its important to learn to do it because I feel as quiltmakers we have a
tool belt, and every technique and tip that you learn, can go into that tool
belt and you can pull it out when you need it. So yes, I really like machine
quilting, but I will tell you this, I also know I have x-amount of time, back to
the time thing, and if I can pay somebody to do something better than I, I will
do that, and I will give them credit too. For instance, I, we have the things we
love and the things we dont like, I really dont like binding quilts, so I
00:21:00bind my checkbook, its a matter
MC: Except for this quilt
AA: Well this one I did it all. As a matter of surrounding yourself with the
people that love to do that things you hate, then you love to do the things they
hate, and thats how we all get along, right?
MC: Tell me this; did you ever use quilting to get through a difficult time in
your life?
AA: Did I ever use quilting to get through a difficult time in my life? Ill
bet thats when Carol started crying, yeah.
MC: Most people.
AA: Thats a very good question. For me, it was very difficult on 9/11. I was
separated from my children and my husband. I was in Dorr County, Wisconsin with
my mom and dad. I was to fly home and host a quilt show at Quilting in the
Garden at Alden Lane, in Livermore, California, an outdoor quilt show and we
packed up a pickup truck and drove cross country. The pickup truck had jump
00:22:00seats in the back, so this was kind of amazing to do this with your
eighty-year-old parents and I was horrified being separated from my children and
John. When I got home, all the quilters started making quilts, and if you can
remember, Houston [Texas.] International Quilt Festival was, you know what, a
month and a half later and there was an aisle that went all the way down the
length of the convention center with quilts on both sides with people responding
to this horrific situation that had happened in the United States. I went to my
sewing machine and I was paralyzed.
MC: Really?
AA: I couldnt sew. All I could do was pick up and do red work. I couldnt,
so I think for me, the opposite happens, and that was an extremely interesting
00:23:00situation, when I could come to quilt festival and market and see what people
had done, and I retreated.
MC: How long did it take before you sort of thawed out?
AA: Probably, how long did it take before I could get back in the groove,
probably about six months? I will also say too, that after I had each child,
well lets start with Joey whos my oldest, I lost my creativity for a year
and I have warned other pregnant women that you could do, this might happen to
you, and dont freak out because youll get your groove back on. So when my
daughter than was born, I gave myself permission to not be creative for a year.
Im opposite of the pack [laughs.]
MC: What do you think makes a great quilt?
AA: What do I think makes a great quilt? Wow. I dont think I can define that
because a great quilt might be the best of show, it might be something that
00:24:00documents something, or it might be Katies quilt, a young women who is my
daughters best friend, or one of her very good friends, and two years ago
Katie came to me, age twenty-six, and said, I want to make a t-shirt
quilt. Or no, first it was, Will you make me a t-shirt quilt? No. So,
we had a quilt day at my house, where my daughter and Katie made t-shirt quilts
from their college, St. Marys, and at the very end, I looked at Katie and I
said, So whats your next quilt going to be? and she goes, Well,
Ive decided its going to be a Rail Fence, [laughs.] and that t-shirt
quilt is the most important quilt. What was really great, I have a little bit of
goose bumps going on here, Fourth of July, this last Fourth of July, shes
00:25:00been quilting a year and a half, and she comes up to me and she goes, Guess
what? and I said, What? she said, I taught the lady who lives above
me how to quilt. That t-shirt quilt is a great quilt.
MC: I totally agree, but what makes a quilt appropriate for museum would you say?
AA: Oh what makes a quilt appropriate for museum? You know, I dont know. I do
know that Im really impressed that Yvonne Porcella got the San Jose [Texas.]
Quilt and Textile Museum to accept her work, because you know a hundred years
from now, who knows where these quilts are going to be. I do know that probably
my quilts are not appropriate for museums [laughs.] but you know its probably
the masters, the masters and their quilts.
MC: So among quilters out there in any kind of genre or style, whose work are
you drawn to in particular?
AA: Okay so whose work am I drawn to in particular? I dont think I have a
00:26:00clear answer on that, I really dont think I have a clear answer on that
because I like the diversity is just incredible and I love everything from the
antique quilts, I love the new things, I love, I just kind of love them all.
MC: Whose work has influenced you, whether it is a quilter or another type of artist?
AA: Whose, what quilter has influenced me? One of the great things about being a
professional quilt teacher and traveling is that everywhere you go, you are
influenced by whats going on in that area, and then youre the lucky one
that gets to sprinkle that fairy dust in another area, but I do have a story.
About four or five years ago, Jean Wells, who owns the Stitching Post in
00:27:00Sisters, Oregon, and who I consider a very good friend, called and asked me to
teach, she has retreats that are not during the outdoor quilt show. And I said,
You know Jean, why dont we co-teach a class together? I cant believe
Im telling this story. She had just started a whole thing with opening your
creativity, design, color and all that, and I had just discovered a couple of
cool techniques. So she said, Lets co-teach a class together, and so I
flew up there, she put me up in a wonderful facility and we co-taught for two or
three days. What was happening during that magical three day class was that she
was profoundly influencing a new direction I was going to take. So that was kind
of a light bulb moment and the best part was that I got paid after for teaching [laughs.]
00:28:00
MC: Why is quiltmaking important to your life?
AA: Why is quiltmaking important to my life? When I discovered quiltmaking,
Im an artistic person, Im not an A+ artistic person, but my parents are
artistic in their own way, my father is a woodworker, my mother lives a very
artistic lifestyle meaning she could come in and arrange my furniture or hang
the pictures, she can, she lives beautifully. I dabbled in all the textiles, in
fact we even found a picture of me sewing at my grandmothers knee at about
age five, stitching. At the other grandmothers knee at probably the same
summer, knitting, knitting didnt stick, but stitching did. I started sewing
in about fifth grade, my eight grade graduation present with Mrs. Kellys
silver thimble was a sewing machine, but when, then I learned bobbin lace in
00:29:00college, I learned crochet, all the wonderful different avenues of art. But when
I sat down at that quilt frame and completed that first quilt, graduated, and
then sat down again, its like yesterday, I found my home and it was just as
clear as could be; thats where I belonged.
MC: Can you try to analyze that or tease that out at all about what is it about
that, that lasted when the others didnt?
AA: What is it about quiltmaking that made it stick? I really dont know
whats made it stick. I do know that you can control it, and unlike
woodworking which Ive done, Ive actually made my childrens cradle and
it ended up in a Fine Woodworking annual catalog, you can make a mistke and you
cant pull it and squish it and get it back together, theres forgiveness in
00:30:00quilting. Also, when you create a quilt, in your mind you have an idea of what
its going to look like or the direction youre going to go, but like
children, they take on their own life. So its kind of an interesting evolving
journey that just continues, continues, continues and I want to reiterate that I
am taking classes now. I am a student and so even in thirty-three years I think
thats how long Ive been quilting, I realize theres a whole genre out
there of things I want to learn.
MC: Now you are nationally and internationally known, but do you feel that your
quilts at all are representative of your region or come out of your community in
some way?
AA: Im internationally and nationally known, and do I feel that my quilts
are, could be regionally identified?
MC: Yeah, or reflect your community in some way?
AA: Or reflect my community? Thats a tough question because in the San
Francisco Bay Area [California.] theres a lot of stuff going on and so I
00:31:00guess I kind of, my quilts do have a look to them, but in our area we have been
very, very lucky because weve had Roberta Horton, Mary Mashuta, Diana McClun,
Freddy Moran, Judy Matheson, Gay Perry, and I dont want to skip anybody but
we are in a really wonderful area of the United States to be in, so Im not
even sure you could tact anything.
MC: What do you think is the importance of quilts in American life?
AA: What do I think the importance of quilts is in the American life? Well I do
think that its one of the crafts that is uniquely identified with us. I own
quilts that were brought, that were family pieces, I dont know who exactly
brought them over, but gratefully theyre in our hands, but what, I go to
places like Costa Rica, like I mentioned and its first generation, I mean
00:32:00here we have the delicious, delicious history of generation after generation
after generation after generation. I think thats why its so important. I
also think that quilting has documented events in our history, like the Civil
War quilts, like the Underground Railroad, like 9/11, as no other media has, medium.
MC: Im curious, what happens to your quilts? Obviously you make them for
magazines, but Im sure you make them for family and friends. What happens to
your quilts?
AA: What happens to my quilts, do I make them for family and friends? Not really
[laughs.] I have what I call my important quilts, the ones that I know kids will
fight over and then I have the quilts that are earning myself a living, yes I
00:33:00made my son and his wife a wedding quilt because I knew everybody would talk
badly about me if I didnt [laughs.] and Im making one for my daughter who
is getting married on New Years Eve. I have these quilts and some of them are
like the ones the kids are going to fight over, some are pretty good, some are
okay, and some are horrible. So right now Im trying to decide what to do. The
ones that are horrible I will probably give to a shelter, Im in a cleaning
mode, I dont even want my name attached to them. Then I have the working
quilts, and what Im doing with those are after their done earning a living,
and theyre good quilts, I am not parceling them out. For instance, after
Katrina, I put up a thing on my website if you gave any amount of money to the
American Red Cross, your name would go in a hat and somebody would win this
quilt and I think we raised like about $14,000. For the Japan tsunami
00:34:00earthquake, Ricky Tims gave a free pass to one of his retreats and I threw in a
quilt, a good quilt, and we made $35,000 for the American Red Cross. Im still
not getting rid of these quilts fast enough [laughs.] This is the latest plan,
and Im telling you this because Marianne Fons told me this, for my
daughters wedding, Im going to have a bridesmaid shower, and Im going
to give each bridesmaid a quilt and then let them fight over them, kind of like
what are those things called? A white elephant thing. Im going to hang onto
the important quilts to share, to help earn my living, and then the good quilts
that really arent helping, Im going to start getting rid of, its time
to let them go.
MC: What do you think is the biggest challenge confronting quiltmakers today?
AA: What is the biggest challenge confronting quiltmakers today? Couple years
00:35:00ago we wouldve said bringing in new quilt, younger quiltmakers, but Im
thrilled about the modern quilt guild, theyre doing their own thing. At Quilt
Market you saw all these young women and I see them facing the struggles that I
faced as a young mom, being a quiltmaker. I would say right now in history,
right now it would be the socioeconomic issues and quilt shops having to close
down. I think our industry, despite whats all going on in the world, is
relatively alive and healthy and if all of us commit to bring in one quiltmaker,
just one quiltmaker, then that quiltmaker is going to pass her fairy dust onto
somebody else just like my Katie Coons.
MC: To kind of wrap things up, Alex, how will you be remembered as quilter?
00:36:00
AA: How will I be remembered as a quilter? The good news is, is Im on the
internet now with Ricky Tims at thequiltshow.com because its really who I am.
I was, I had a persona that was dictated by Home and Garden Television, that I
needed to be, and thats really not who I am. Im a little bit, have a
little bit of a wild side, if anybody knows me. I think how I hope, I hope how I
am remembered is somebody that opened the door of quiltmaking to another person
and by the magic of me having to fall into that television opportunity, I was
blessed that particular incident. It will not be for my quiltmaking skills [laughs.]
MC: Is there any question that I didnt ask that you wanted to answer?
AA: Is there any question that you didnt ask me, that I want to answer, no,
00:37:00but thank you for not asking my weight or age [laughs.]
MC: Okay this is Meg Cox, and I want to give a great big thank you to Alex
Anderson for doing this interview today and doing it on the Festival floor, we
dont usually do these things in a big public setting and we are concluding
the interview at 11:18 A.M. and thank you very much.
AA: Now I want to say to you people before you leave, this is a really important
thing that is happening here. We had a thing called quilt days back in the
eighties, where states would document quilts that were coming in and we were
collecting history like that, it was farily unorganized. I know how much I
appreciate the quilts of the 1800s and even the turn of the century and we
simply do not have the information on it. What is going on now in our community
is seriously profound and important and so if you would be willing to donate
00:38:00money to this so they could continue their cause, if you would be willing to be
an interviewer, I want to throw this in off the record, that my daughter whos
getting married to Jerry, I found out Jerrys grandmother is a quilter and is
interviewing people, Save Our Stories, happened to interview Mary Kay Davis who
works with us at thequiltshow.com. This is a very, very important thing that
this organization is going and we must support them and help spread the word. I
want to hear, Amen, sister.
MC: Amen, sister. Im going to give you a chance to ask Alex a couple of
questions, but just a little bit of business here.
AA: You know what, leave the microphone.
MC: Okay yeah, so you arent yelling.
Unknown: We are going to open it up for just a little bit for a couple of
questions but I just want to get a little bit of business done. As Alex said were