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Pioneer Quiltmaker: Story of Dorinda Moody Slade
The author tells the story of Dorinda Moody Slade with great sympathy. Its pattern is typical of a segment of the Scots-Irish immigrants who came to America in the 18th and early 19th centuries, staking and farming land until it was depleted of its nutrients, and then moving further south or west and repeating that pattern.
Born into a family that took care to see their children had an education, Dorinda moved with them to Georgia and Alabama and finally to Texas. She married another member of the general group, who died of "alcohol poisoning," leaving his young widow to provide for her two children by working as a domestic servant and by her needlework skills, which included lace making, quilting, and sewing.
Born into a family that took care to see their children had an education, Dorinda moved with them to Georgia and Alabama and finally to Texas. She married another member of the general group, who died of "alcohol poisoning," leaving his young widow to provide for her two children by working as a domestic servant and by her needlework skills, which included lace making, quilting, and sewing.
73 pages, Paperback
First published November 1, 1990
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September 24, 2015
Pioneer Quiltmaker was my first "quilt history" book. I loved it so much that it started me on the pleasant trail of following the stories of other quilters by various writers, as far as time and a tiny book budget would allow over the past two decades. However, I now have serious reservations about this book and about the author who wrote it.
Ultimately in searching quilt history, I discovered Carol Holindrake Nielson's book The Salt Late City 14th Ward Album Quilt, 1857. Oddly enough, immediately after I finished the book, I noticed a headline in the news that referenced a historical event (of which I had never heard) from that same year: the Mountain Meadows Massacre. When I saw that the two stories were essentially linked, I read further about Mountain Meadows and what I read shocked me so much that I had nightmares about blood rising from the ground.
And then I realized that there were place names that seemed familiar because they had been mentioned in Pioneer Quiltmaker; they were illustrated on a map that had gone otherwise unremarked in the book. I had always been bothered by the expression on Dorinda's face in the photographs published in Pioneer Quiltmaker: a peculiar combination of bilious bitterness and haunting horror, as though she had been forced to swallow something that just would not go down. Could it be? Well, even with my extremely limited scholarly resources, one fact became immediately apparent: Dorinda's husband William Slade was involved in the Massacre. His name is mentioned by researchers who have studied Mountain Meadows.
With this revelation, Dorinda's story began to take on an entirely different tone. Was Dorinda one of the Mormon wives who were forced to launder and repair the bloody gore-covered clothing worn by the victims of this tragedy? Was the Slade freight business founded with wagons looted from the Baker-Fancher train? When Dorinda greatly rejoiced because of her sealing to Michael Goheen, was it really because of that fondly remembered love? Or was it truly because she was released from the grip of being sealed for eternity to William Slade who had colluded in an incredibly foul crime?
Given the quality of Carolyn O'Bagy Davis's other works, I had believed that her writings were ultimately reliable. Now I was left asking why. Why would something so important be left out? My heart said that this was likely due to an abundance of kindness and consideration for Dorinda's remaining relatives. My sense of integrity as a researcher, however, cries out that such an omission necessarily leaves all other scholarship by a writer in dubious territory. Because the hand-drawn map pictured in the book prominently shows the location of Mountain Meadows, it seems fair to assume that such information was available. Was a deliberate decision made to exclude these facts? If this were the case, then this issue becomes not an omission but a censure of fact, and that would be inexcusable.
Yes, Pioneer Quiltmaker is Dorinda's story, not William Slade's. However, the connection is of stunning importance. I have read many, although not all, of Davis's books; perhaps she has addressed this story elsewhere. Dorinda's tale is one of triumph, of someone who rose above difficult circumstance to create items of lasting beauty. To shutter her husband's involvement in a heinous crime and, it must be said, Dorinda's possible link to the circumstances after the fact, draws a curtain over the light that could and should have been shed. This unrevealed connection leaves all other questions open, and renders the story alarmingly incomplete.
This concern plucks at my consciousness and will not let go.
Ultimately in searching quilt history, I discovered Carol Holindrake Nielson's book The Salt Late City 14th Ward Album Quilt, 1857. Oddly enough, immediately after I finished the book, I noticed a headline in the news that referenced a historical event (of which I had never heard) from that same year: the Mountain Meadows Massacre. When I saw that the two stories were essentially linked, I read further about Mountain Meadows and what I read shocked me so much that I had nightmares about blood rising from the ground.
And then I realized that there were place names that seemed familiar because they had been mentioned in Pioneer Quiltmaker; they were illustrated on a map that had gone otherwise unremarked in the book. I had always been bothered by the expression on Dorinda's face in the photographs published in Pioneer Quiltmaker: a peculiar combination of bilious bitterness and haunting horror, as though she had been forced to swallow something that just would not go down. Could it be? Well, even with my extremely limited scholarly resources, one fact became immediately apparent: Dorinda's husband William Slade was involved in the Massacre. His name is mentioned by researchers who have studied Mountain Meadows.
With this revelation, Dorinda's story began to take on an entirely different tone. Was Dorinda one of the Mormon wives who were forced to launder and repair the bloody gore-covered clothing worn by the victims of this tragedy? Was the Slade freight business founded with wagons looted from the Baker-Fancher train? When Dorinda greatly rejoiced because of her sealing to Michael Goheen, was it really because of that fondly remembered love? Or was it truly because she was released from the grip of being sealed for eternity to William Slade who had colluded in an incredibly foul crime?
Given the quality of Carolyn O'Bagy Davis's other works, I had believed that her writings were ultimately reliable. Now I was left asking why. Why would something so important be left out? My heart said that this was likely due to an abundance of kindness and consideration for Dorinda's remaining relatives. My sense of integrity as a researcher, however, cries out that such an omission necessarily leaves all other scholarship by a writer in dubious territory. Because the hand-drawn map pictured in the book prominently shows the location of Mountain Meadows, it seems fair to assume that such information was available. Was a deliberate decision made to exclude these facts? If this were the case, then this issue becomes not an omission but a censure of fact, and that would be inexcusable.
Yes, Pioneer Quiltmaker is Dorinda's story, not William Slade's. However, the connection is of stunning importance. I have read many, although not all, of Davis's books; perhaps she has addressed this story elsewhere. Dorinda's tale is one of triumph, of someone who rose above difficult circumstance to create items of lasting beauty. To shutter her husband's involvement in a heinous crime and, it must be said, Dorinda's possible link to the circumstances after the fact, draws a curtain over the light that could and should have been shed. This unrevealed connection leaves all other questions open, and renders the story alarmingly incomplete.
This concern plucks at my consciousness and will not let go.
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