This Quilt Tells One Family’s Story with Phyllis Elmore

Research at the National Archives and Beyond

Join Hosts Janice and Cherekana of Speak On It ! as they discuss Phyllis Elmore's family history. Phyllis was born in Detroit, Michigan. At the age of four, she was sent to the tiny town of Livingston, Alabama to be raised by her grandmother Lula Horn (1883-1988), who made beautiful quilts out of the clothing of her loved ones. Each strip of fabric tells the story of the wearer’s life and death. She shared these mostly tragic and sometimes witty tales with little Phyllis as she sewed their clothes into a quilt that threaded broken lives back together. Phyllis now shares these profound stories with the world as Grandmother Lula told them to her.