Laurel Horton

Laurel Horton is a folklorist and an internationally known quilt researcher. A native of Kentucky, she earned a B.A. in English and an M.S. in Library Science from the University of Kentucky, and an M.A. degree in Folklore from the University of North Carolina—Chapel Hill. Her book, "Mary Black’s Family Quilts: Memory and Meaning in Everyday Life" (University of South Carolina Press, 2005) represents a new direction for the study of historic quilts as an aspect of a family’s “material behavior”. Laurel Horton skillfully weaves the story of the family’s lives, using information gleaned from oral interviews with descendants, family papers, historic documents, and the quilts themselves.