Prairie Queen

 

The Prairie Queen is a nine-patch block, meaning its symmetry is based on a three-by-three pattern, like Tic-Tac-Toe. It has a half-square triangle in each corner, a four-patch sub block on each side, and a solid square in the center. I’ve seen Prairie Queens with the four-patches laid out in the same direction, but I prefer mine in this layout, which gives the block the illusion of motion. Prairie Queen is an old design, but no one seems to know exactly how old. The name seems to tie it to the westward expansion, so it could have been in use as early as 1810. It may even be older, attached to a different name. Hearth and Home Magazine (1868-1875) called it True Blue. In “Old Patchwork Quilts and The Women Who Made Them,” (1929) Ruth Finely calls Prairie Queen one of the, "simple but widely used nine-patches every person interested in quilts should know.”