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TEACHING THE SOLAR SYSTEM

TEACHING THE SOLAR SYSTEM

June 7, 2023
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The Solar System quilt is a testament to Ellen Harding Baker's (1847–1886) perseverance of finding ways to express herself and her interests given the constraints imposed on women in the 19th century. Quilt making, the study of astronomy, and teaching were all deemed acceptable activities for women at the time but not activities easily combined. 

Taking seven years to make, Baker began stitching the wool-appliqué quilt in 1876, taking inspiration from illustrations of the solar system found in several astronomy textbooks from the 1860s, as well as from her own viewing of the skies at the original Dearborn Observatory in Chicago. Baker used the quilt as a visual aid for lectures she gave on astronomy in the Iowa towns of West Branch, Moscow, and Lone Tree.

The wool top of this appliqué  quilt is embellished with wool-fabric appliqué, wool braid, and wool and silk embroidery. The lining is a red cotton-and-wool fabric and the filling is of cotton fibre. The design of this striking and unusual quilt resembles illustrations in astronomy books of the period. Included in the design is the appliquéd inscription, “Solar System,” and the embroidered inscription, “E.H. Baker.” Mrs. Baker probably began this project in 1876, as per the “A.D.1876” in the lower right corner.



The large object in the center of the quilt is clearly the Sun, and the fixed Stars are at the outer edges. Around the Sun are the orbits of Mercury, Venus, Earth and Moon, and Mars. Not shown are the two moons of Mars that were first seen, at the U.S. Naval Observatory in 1877. The four curious clumps beyond Mars represent the asteroids. The first asteroid (Ceres) had been found in 1801, and with the proliferation of ever more powerful telescopes, ever more objects came into view. Then there is Jupiter with its four moons first seen by Galileo, and Saturn with its rings. The six moons orbiting Uranus are somewhat confusing, as astronomers did not agree on the actual number. Neptune has the one moon discovered by an English astronomer in 1846, shortly after the planet itself was seen.



The large item in the upper left of the quilt is surely the naked-eye comet that blazed into view in the spring of 1874, and that was named for Jerome Eugene Coggia, an astronomer at the Observatory in Marseilles. Americans too took note. Indeed, an amateur astronomer in Chicago put a powerful telescope on the balcony of the Interstate Industrial Exposition Building (1872-1892), a large glass structure recently erected along the shore of Lake Michigan, and offered to show Coggia’s Comet to citizens of and visitors to the Windy City.

The quilt is currently not on view but more information about the quilt and Ellen Harding Baker can be found on the Smithsonian, American Women's History Museum website HERE.

Images: Solar System, Ellen Harding Baker (1847-1886).
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