99 Books Like The Quilts of Gee’s Bend

Faith Ringgold, an acclaimed Black artist who grew up in Harlem, tells about her childhood and explains the process of creating her extraordinary painted quilts such as Tar Beach, Sonny’s Quilt, and Dancing at the Louvre. Each tells a story. “When I was starting out,” she wrote, “there were hardly any galleries that showed the work of black women, or women at all.”  Her quilts are now housed in museums and public collections nationwide. Full-color reproductions of her work, as well as vintage photos, illustrate this inspiring book.

Clara’s story is powerful and suspenseful. Written in the first person, she tells about her life as an enslaved twelve-year-old girl who has been separated from her Momma and sent from North Farm to the Home Plantation. Although this is fiction, it is based on the history of African American quilters. For Clara, quilting means drawing a map with stitches and fabric that ultimately becomes a “freedom map,” enabling her to escape with her friend, Young Jack, and find her Momma and freedom.  The warm, luminous illustrations by James Ransome bring Clara, Young Jack, and her map to life. Ransome visited a plantation in Virginia for research, and in the process he discovered enslaved ancestors. This book is a must for readers of all ages.

Patricia McKissack introduces the quilts of Gee’s Bend to young readers in this charming picture book. McKissack not only read about Gee’s Bend but she visited and learned how to quilt. Her text is written in poems that capture the lilt and rhythm of Gee’s Bend women. The speaker, “Baby Girl,” describes how she learned how to quilt from her grandma. The soft, painterly illustrations by Cozbi A. Cabrera resemble Gee’s Bend quilts, and depict the colorful scraps of material the women used. The story includes the visit of Dr. Martin Luther King to “the Bend” on his way to Camden, then Selma, to march for the right to vote. And the aftermath of that march. A superb picture book full of history and hope for readers of all ages.

This huge volume was another reference book for me as I researched The Quilts of Gee’s Bend.  The large reproductions of the quilts showed how the women with the same material used it in different ways.  Startling to see so many imaginative versions of a pattern called Housetop. Two quilts titled Flower Garden shown side by side are dazzling. And this book contains more photos of the quilters and provides information about their lives and struggles against poverty and racism. The art they produced despite their limited resources and hardships is truly an inspiration. A miracle!

This biographical picture book tells the story of quilts made by hand by the women of Gee’s Bend, Alabama. The traditional quilts, made from scraps of cloth from clothing and cornmeal sacks, are now displayed in museums around the world.

The author does a beautiful job of showing how a family tradition has developed into spectacular works of art. Readers can see how important it is to maintain traditions that may have started for practical purposes (like staying warm!) but evolved into appreciation of the works of unknown artisans. The author includes instructions on how to make a quilt square.

William James Edward is the grandfather of the author Donald Stone. The author does a great job of highlighting the importance that William J. Edward placed on lineage at the beginning of the book. The author shows the forgotten legacy of Edwards as one of Tuskegee’s first graduates. Edwards goes on to start a secondary school in Wilcox county Alabama, following the legacy of Booker T. Washington. The school was called the Snow Hill Institute and in its prime employed over 20 teachers and had over a dozen buildings on the campus. The curriculum was like Tuskegee, where the students learned trades and received a formal education. Under the leadership of William James Edwards, the school thrived until it was forced to close in the 1960s. Donald Stone mostly uses primary sources to paint a picture of the opposition that Edwards faced in trying to operate a school outside of… show more.

I moved to Tuscaloosa, Alabama for graduate school in 1986, eleven years after this book was published, thirteen years after Nate Shaw’s death.

Reading the life of a man whose parents had been enslaved, a cotton farmer and sharecropper who bravely joined a union and stood up for other Black farmers, opened my eyes to the reality of life in the twentieth century for Black farmers in the state I now called home.

Told in expert storyteller Nate Shaw’s (a pseudonym for Ned Cobb) voice, based on interview transcripts, the book introduced me to a person and a way of life unlike anything I had encountered growing up in the city of Little Rock, Arkansas.

Sara Brooks was one of seventeen children raised by landowning African American farmers in Alabama. Hers is a lively and evocative account of growing up on the land in a loving family and a harsh coming of age at the hands of an abusive man. Like many southern black women of the era, Brooks is able to escape the bleak conditions of her life by moving first to Mobile and then to Cleveland where she worked as a domestic, eventually acquiring her own home and reuniting with the children she had been forced to leave behind. Hers is a hopeful and richly textured story of resistance and resilience.

I love a book that tells me something new. Yes, I knew WACs served in World War II and that in the 1940s, women didn’t hold combat positions. I knew Black men served in segregated units. But I didn’t know about the Black women’s WAC 6888 Central Postal Directory Battalion.

I was riveted by this story of their deployment to Europe to sort mail for the troops. So many books about wars feature men. I loved the female characters and the grandmother sharing memories with her granddaughters–creating a bridge for today’s readers. I respect how the book speaks not only to military life and commitment but also to racial segregation and its effects on the young women serving our country.

In my writing I love to relate the stories of important historical actors that are unknown. Especially young actors.

Phillip Hoose apparently shares those loves. He gives us the story of Claudette Colvin who, at fifteen, refused to give up her seat on a Montgomery, Alabama bus to a White person. This was nine months before Rosa Parks’ famous stand. Through Hoose’s beautifully-rendered narrative, we are on the bus with Colvin that day and we are later in the courtroom when she bravely tells her story. 

As I said previously, I love to use the actual words historical actors spoke in my books. Hoose seems to share that passion as well. The author carried out fourteen interviews with Ms. Colvin. Through her own voice, we come to know this amazing young woman.