BEVERLY — Several panels in Dorothy Straughter's quilt dedicated to the Great Migration are difficult to look at, but the Beverly quilter doesn't want people to look away.
Straughter debuted her latest quilt Wednesday at The Quilters Trunk in Beverly. The nine-panel creation offers scenes that include a lynching, slave children being used as alligator bait and more.
And yet the quilt on display at 10352 S. Western Ave. also celebrates the birth of jazz music and black professional workers enjoying a day in the park. It took six weeks for Straughter to complete.
"There are some ugly parts of history, but there are beautiful parts of history also," Straughter said Wednesday.
She previously made a quilt dedicated to the Underground Railroad in late January and followed that with a sprawling quilt that pays tribute to Africa as a homeland.
Other quilts are also in the works, including one that focuses on negrobilia and another that celebrates Hollywood actors — such as Frank Sinatra — and others who stood up against racism early on.
Her goal is to have a group of six quilts inspired by African-American history completed for a showcase that is planned for early next year in the gallery of the Beverly Arts Center.
"More of the research is revealing itself to me, letting me know what really happened," she said. "I'm just trying to grab the history and throw it out there."
Free time during the Great Migration resulted in the creation of jazz music, according to Dorothy Straughter. She combined her research into the Great Migration with her quilting skills to come up with a nine-panel quilt that tells a story. [DNAinfo/Howard Ludwig]
African-American professionals, tradesmen, entrepreneurs and soldiers all gather in the park in this panel of Dorothy Straughter's Great Migration quilt. The quilt is on display at The Quilter's Trunk in Beverly. [DNAinfo/Howard Ludwig]
The lynching scene in Dorothy Straughter's quilt is unmistakably powerful. It features a mother being hung while men hidden behind white robes fasten a noose around the neck of her son, Straughter said. [DNAinfo/Howard Ludwig]
Dorothy Straughter's quilt features a plantation scene. In the background, a young child is being used to bait alligators, she said. [DNAinfo/Howard Ludwig]
This panel of Dorothy Straughter's quilt is meant to draw attention to the abduction of slaves as well as their transport to the Americas. The background intentionally features words such as "freedom" and "U.S.A." [DNAinfo/Howard Ludwig]
The final panel of Dorothy Straughter's quilt is meant to call attention to tribal warfare in Africa that contributed to the slave trade. [DNAinfo/Howard Ludwig]
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