I appreciate all the nice comments!
It may have been a young or teenage girl who did much of the construction of the original quilt. I probably would have done the same kind of job at a young age.
It does look like the quilt was made in stages with whatever scraps were available from other projects. I have some silky polyester scraps from the old quilt that I didn't use--maybe they'll go into a pillow, or maybe just thrown away when I have had my fill of re-purposing the quilt fabric. Time will tell