Guest Post: Handmade Quilt Making in 1933

In the spring of 1933 my great grandmother, Effie Bernice Hunt, began a labor of love at her kitchen table: a 25 week-long handmade quilt making project of 25 applique quilt blocks. Each handmade quilts block featured a different flower beloved in the Pacific Northwest and ranged from the camellia, to the gladiolus to bluebells. The patterns were published weekly in the Sunday Oregonian newspaper. A full 60 years later I assembled those fragile polished cotton, handmade quilt blocks into the gorgeous finished "Modernistic Flower Applique Quilt." Effie had very thoughtfully tucked the directions in among the completed applique quilt blocks for the final quilt assembly. What a beautiful handmade quilt and portrait of the past she bequeathed to me!

The family story goes that the heart or Effie's handmade quilt making operation, and she made many applique quilts and patchwork quilts, was at the kitchen table in front of her beloved, huge radio set stationed smack in the middle of everything. My particular applique quilt was gradually given birth to over a weekly basis beginning in the spring of 1933. While the entire family's life revolved around that kitchen "command center," my father remembers being shooed out to play when his grandmother claimed her "alone time." The kitchen resolutely became off limits but for handmade quilt making and radio time!

Effie set aside this time daily to work on the weekly handmade quilt block, to soak up her favorite radio dramas and to listen to the world's breaking news. She is remembered as being a history buff and a news junkie! Imagine some of the awareness sewn into my handmade quilts: in 1933 Hitler became the German chancellor, the Nazi's began their reign of terror, Franklin D. Roosevelt was inaugurated as President of the United States and the New Deal was launched. Postage for a letter then was only 3 cents too!

So, on May 28,1933 the Sunday newspaper published the first weekly applique quilt block pattern: "The Tulip," "associated with Holland and spring and brilliance of hue...the tulip may be made one of the most colorful in the quilt." Buff or black were the suggested color choices for the basis of the handmade quilt blocks and I love how she chose black. The colors of the flowers are so vivid and striking on this background that they literally jump out from the applique quilt.

On Sunday, June 25th, applique quilt block #5 was published: "The Nasturtium." It pictures two yellow spurred blossoms with one head-on view and another viewed from the side. My favorite part of this handmade quilt block are the three plump, round leaves which are so identifiable with the nasturtium plant. I have grown these flowers for years because the flowers are so delicious to eat in salads!

On Sunday, July 30th, applique quilt block #10 was published: "The Bluebell." The quilter is advised to make the blue bells light in color for conspicuousness and to make the stitching a darker blue. The stitching used to connect the bells to the stem and to form the stamens is to be orange. For some reason Effie did not connect the bells to the stem with orange stitching but left them free floating. Perhaps this was more modern to her eye?

Almost two months later on October 1, applique quilt block # 19 was published: "The Morning Glory." The handmade quilt designer wrote that this flower was included "...to enable the user of the applique quilt who retires with the poppy (handmade quilt block # 16) to greet the day with the morning glory! Following in Effie's footsteps and being a history buff myself, I can imagine that while sewing this handmade quilt block Effie could have been listening to news stories about the repeal of prohibition -- what a contrast!

And so, here is just a small historical vignette about my great grandmother's personal context and the art of handmade quilt making in the 1930's. What a wonderful gift and historical portrait Effie left behind. I feel so lucky to daily gaze upon this beautiful "Modernistic Flower Applique Quilt" and to be reminded of her life and the world as she knew it.

Your Business Can Be Boring But Your Marketing Can't

Tesla, Virgin Galactic and Oculus all have something in common: They build sexy products and the media loves to give them coverage. Most businesses are more mundane. They lack the flash and sizzle inherent in an industry such as space travel. Because these companies don't have a built-in marketing advantage, they companies have to get creative if they want the media to shower them with love.

For example, consider the self-storage industry. Could there be a more boring business? The building is shaped like a box. Inside are box-shaped rooms, each filled with boxes that customers leave there for years. Not exciting. Yet the industry hit gold when "Storage Wars" became the most popular show in A&E’s history. The series attracted millions of viewers and brought attention to an industry that pop culture previously had ignored.


Not quite boring enough? Here's another: flowchart software. It’s one of those things no one thinks about until he or she needs it. That's precisely the challenge Lucid Software faced when marketing its flagship product, Lucidchart. The cloud-based platform helps users create flowcharts. It’s sophisticated technology, but unless you're an engineer, it isn't likely to raise your pulse.

“We had to find a way to change how people think about diagramming,” Lucid PR head Jackson Carpenter said. “So our marketing team decided to see if we could attach the brand to trending stories by making flowcharts for superfans and pop-culture geeks -- people like us.”

The company since has made flowcharts for topics ranging from Star Wars and fantasy football to Dungeons and Dragons. Flowcharts created in Lucidchart have been featured in The Huffington Post, Gizmodo, ScreenRant and more. The marketing campaign itself earnedecognition from the Utah Marketing Awards and produced more than 2 million views for Lucid Software in seven months. Not bad for a boring little software company from the Beehive State.

What lessons can the rest of us take from Lucid’s success?

Think bigger than your product.

If your product isn’t newsworthy on its own, don’t pitch the product. Instead, tie it to something bigger and more exciting. Lucid used movie premieres, sporting events and video-game releases to create relevant content that major outlets were sure to pick up.

Build it for the grassroots.

At the beginning of the campaign, Lucid’s staff of active Redditors shared content on their favorite subreddits. Because they were involved with the communities they were making content for, they knew what their audience would love. When a flowchart took off on Reddit, the team knew it wouldn’t be long before the press would follow.

Remember the end game.

Lucid’s campaign -- while lighthearted and fun -- served two very specific business purposes. First, it showed people who'd never thought about diagramming software how versatile flowcharts are as a medium for conveying complex ideas. Second, it helped drive traffic back to Lucid's website, where the company was able to register new users and capture email addresses for future marketing campaigns.

If you think your business is boring, look at how other “boring” businesses are promoting themselves. If self-storage facilities and flowchart-software companies can make themselves interesting, you're out of excuses for not finding a hook to tell your own business' story.

Think You're a Good Speaker?

If you desire to be a truly professional public speaker, don't make the same mistake that Steve from Florida made. I'm calling him "Steve from Florida" because I'm a Howard Stern fan. Steve is a real person and this is a real story. Steve's name is Steve, but he's not from Florida. Steve from Florida doesn't really know me and I doubt he remembers me. That’s the problem. He should. I certainly know him.

Steve was the speaker before me at a conference of regional bankers recently. He wasn't a bad speaker. He seemed to know his topic. Of course, he should. Steve from Florida's company provides financial management consulting services, products and training for CEOs and managers.


Yeah, Steve from Florida knows his stuff. He's been doing it for decades and his company has some pretty big clients. Good for him. What's surprising is that on his website he also represents himself as a professional speaker with lots of experience giving keynotes and workshops. You wouldn’t know it from the presentation I saw him give. It’s not that his content or delivery was bad. It’s because Steve from Florida made the mistake that every amateur speaker makes: he spoke too long.

At the bankers’ conference, Steve was scheduled to speak from 9:00 AM until 10:15 AM, followed by a fifteen-minute break, after which I was scheduled to speak for an hour beginning at 10:30 AM to close out the conference. Things didn't go that way. Steve talked, and talked, and talked some more. When 10:10 rolled around, and he should've been wrapping things up, he kept talking. Steve was still talking at 10:20 despite the meeting organizer's polite-yet-frantic waves from the back of the room. Sensing the mood of the room but feeling compelled to squeeze everything in, Steve rushed through his 10 remaining slide. Eventually, Steve- the-experienced speaker wrapped things up at 10:27... a full 12 minutes over his allotted time.

Thanks, Steve.

As a result, the 150 attendees were grudgingly asked to take a shorter break (which they didn't because when nature calls, nature calls). When I was ultimately brought on to do my presentation, I had less than 45 minutes remaining to do my 60-minute presentation. The meeting organizer apologized on Steve’s behalf and graciously said I could also go over my allotted time. But, c’mon…that would mean keeping these poor people beyond the stated end of the conference. Who likes to do that? Instead, I hurriedly adjusted my presentation materials so I could finish at the right time. Steve didn't care. He didn't apologize to me or the attendees for going over. Hey…it’s Steve's world and we just happen to live in it.

Do you speak? Then speak professionally.

Professional speakers are disciplined. They are respectful of the time they are allotted to speak. Speakers like me (and definitely Steve) have big egos. We love to hear ourselves talk. But the best ones know that there's a limit. They understand that it's not just their time, it's everyone's time. Taking 15 extra minutes to hear the glory of your own voice means you're causing disruption, inconvenience and great annoyance to the meeting organizer, her attendees and the next speaker who now must decide whether to further upset the audience or cut back on the content that he was paid to deliver in order to keep things on track.

When you're a professional speaker it's not about you. It's about your audience. It's about delivering valuable information in an entertaining way during the time allotted. It's about respect for others. Good speakers know this. Amateur speakers who incorrectly think of themselves as professionals like Steve from Florida need to learn this. I don't really care if he does. But I hope you do.