The grandson of William Bray Pinch - Randy Niemann and his wife Amy - have made the Rainbow Quilt Block Company (Cleveland, Ohio) patterns available once more. Mr. Pinch's company, founded in the mid-1920s sold colorful pre-printed quilt blocks that could be embroidered by color. He developed a printing process whereby the floss color was printed on the fabric and all you had to do is follow the color and make beautiful quilt blocks.I met Amy in October of 2008 at their home in Cleveland. Mr. Pinch's only daughter (and Randy's mom), Verna, had saved boxes and more boxes of patterns, tools and equipment that she and her dad used to make the quilt blocks over the years. Amy graciously showed me a some of the perforated parchment patterns and wooden print rollers they had used.
The photo is of a poster (it's about 3x5-feet in size) that Randy recalls were like the ones hanging in the 4915 Wichita Avenue factory in Cleveland, Ohio when he was a young boy.
Amy spent months reproducing the original designs so quilters everywhere can make their own Rainbow quilt. See their web page for more history about the company and order patterns.
http://www.rainbowquiltdesigns.com/
