115 Toronto Signature Quilt, Maple Leaf/John Fisher School, World War II Quilt, handmade, 152 cm x 172 cm, MLC Research Centre Archive, Toronto Metropolitan University. Donated by Maxine March, Canadian Red Cross Quilt Research Group, UK. The Repatriation ofWar Quilts to Canada In 2023, 64 of over 100 collected quilts sewn by Canadian women during the Second World War were repatriated from Britain and distributed to museums and heritage institutions. Twenty—the largest single group—found a home at the MLC. When opened, the quilts spilled across tables, forming a mosaic of colour dulled by decades but still vivid. Faded fabrics, frayed edges, and the faint puncture of countless needle holes marked each square. Thread traced fabric rests, and occasionally names and dates—silent witnesses to acts of care embroidered across oceans and time. They are more than textile artifacts; they are fragments of lived history. The MLC’s quilt project grew from Operation Canada, an initiative examining Canadian diaries from the First World War. The quilts came to the Centre’s attention through the British Canadian Red Cross Quilt Research Group, volunteers who spent nearly two decades locating and preserving Canadian wartime quilts in Britain. Their 2023 repatriation and the MLC’s acquisition of twenty quilts formed the cornerstone of a national effort to preserve this chapter of wartime history.
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