This tidbit doesn't go as far back into history as many of your stories. In the early 1800's my gr gr grandmother was a new bride living in a small cabin high in the Green Mountains of Vermont and missing her friends and family She sent squares of fabrics back to them for them to all sign and return to her She had numbered each square so when they were returned she would have a inventory. With these signed squares the pieced an Album Patch Quilt which is featured in a the book "To Love & To Cherish----Brides Remembered" By Linda Otto Lipsett copyrighted 1997 & 1989. Even though the book is now out of print I was able to locate copies for both my Mother and I last year after I learned of it's existence.
My great grandfather left Vermont in the 1880's and headed west to Denver with his wife and 2 kids. There he and his wife divorced. He then married my great grandmother who was only 15 at the time and he was 39. The later moved to Boise, Idaho and had 12 children. He was a skilled carpenter and worked on one of the wings of the Idaho State Capital Building.