Friendship, family, and coincidence: The journey of a quilt

MARBLE HILL, Mo. (KBSI) – Earlier this week, Becky Wiginton who is in charge of the Bollinger County Quilt Show, got word of a friendship quilt that Alice Crites wanted to display at the show to try to identify anyone whose name may be on the quilt.

When Wiginton saw the quilt for the first time, she recognized a familiar name stitched on it: Cora Abernathy, her grandmother.

“I just wanted to touch her name, my grandma’s name. I just kept touching, like, ‘hey, that’s my grandma,’” Wiginton said.

A week ago, Becky Wigington had no idea this quilt even existed, but when she saw the square with her grandma’s name on it, she couldn’t hold back the tears. 

“It brought back all the flood of memories, like a good quilt does,” she said. “It brought back everything, and I cried. I totally cried when I saw it. I was like, ‘This is unreal.’” 

Another name on the quilt is that of 104-year-old Mildred Bess, aka Mildred Shell, who just happened to be good friends with Abernathy. 

“We went to church together. We went to school together, and we were neighbors. We just grew up together,” Shell said.

And when Wiginton and Shell got together and chatted about the quilt, Shell told Wiginton that there very well could be an even deeper connection than just the signatures. 

“She actually said that she thought maybe my great grandma or my grandma actually did the quilting by the look of the stitches,” Wiginton said.

What are the chances? And now, Wiginton can’t wait to show the quilt to others in her family who share a similar love for Abernathy, who passed away in 2012. 

“My dad is still living, and I’m going to get to take it out to him and show him, and I’m going to take it to show my uncle, and when my aunt gets to come in, I’ll have it out for her to see, too, because that’s their mom, and she was dear to us.”