The Zadock Pratt Museum Coloring Book

The Zadock Pratt Museum Coloring Book – A Collection of Twenty-Six Catskill Historical Quilting Designs, has just been released through the museum’s publishing arm, The Abigail & Mary Press, just in time for the holidays. The book is partly funded by The A. Lindsay and Olive B. O’Connor Foundation and The Nicholas J. Juried Family Foundation.

More than a coloring book, this project is an important and enlivened educational narrative on the historical roles played by the early women who came to this corner of what eventually became the Schoharie and Greene Counties of New York State. The book, which includes tales explored through the wonderful medium of the quilts, pillows and table runners in the Pratt Museum’s textile collection, was inspired by the 2018 exhibition titled “Undercover Stories”. The text accompanying the quilts describes the settlement of the local area, touching on information all the way back to the settling of the indigenous people of the Owasco, ancestors of the Haudenosaunee, the Iroquois Nation. From there the stories spiral out, touching upon Queen Anne, the Haudenosaunee, the Palatine settlement in the Catskill Region, the founding of Prattsville, and of course the stories abound about Pratt himself. The Pratt stories are illustrated in a beautiful Presentation Quilt made by the first-graders of the Gilboa-Conesville Central School fifteen years ago.

The whimsical coloring pages and sometimes thought-provoking text can be summed up as a reflection of Early America coded in the quilting designs of the hard-working, creative women of this region and their craft. Their quilts bear tributes touching on the plight of the indigenous peoples, enslaved people, and the harsh life of women who memorialized it all.

The book can be ordered online , or by phone at (518) 299-3395, email at prattmuseum@hotmail.com, or mail at Pratt Museum, PO Box 333, Prattsville, NY 12468.

For questions about this project, you may contact Suzanne Walsh at (518) 937-6120 or suzanwal5@aol.com.

All funds go to support the Pratt Museum’s mission.