As told by Mary Carl and Edyth Yeomans

Nine enthusiastic quilters, who had all been involved in the Etobicoke Quilters Guild and wanted a guild formed in North York, met at Mary Carl’s home on March 7, 1979. We examined the possibilities, and decided we needed some outside advice from established Guilds before our project

We met again in mid-April at Barbara Roberts’ with Sandy Small, the founder of the Etobicoke Guild, and Bobby Leseur, the first president of the Toronto Guild of Stitchery. Their enthousiasm gave us the push we needed. We outlined a plan of action and volunteered for positions. Because of our inexperience we decided to work in pairs.

That summer we organized a meeting place and dates for our first year, as well as speakers. We concentrated on publicity by organizing showings at Scarborough Town Centre and the new North York Y. We sent flyers to appoximately 400 prospective members and took advantage of as much free publicity as possible – in newspapers, magazines and quilt stores. To provide the group with some working capital we each contributed ten dollars, which was in fact our first membership fee.

Instead of the hoped-for 40 members at our first meeting, we had a crowd of 120! Kim Ondaatje was our speaker that first evening and she helped us outline our goals for the Guild, as well as giving a delightful talk about her quilt collection. We had also arranged for the Canada Packers Quilts to be on display. Truly, the warm feeling that has always been part of this Guild was generated first at that meeting.

At the four remaining meetings that winter we had speakers who, in retrospect, were far beyond us, but who gave us a wonderful insight of what was out there in the Quilt World and what we could achieve.

There were Workshops that winter, too: some given by our own members, some by outsiders (Ginny Beyers (!) and Sandra Gullen); and Bus Trips and Swap Sale. Our naivety was far out-shadowed by our enthousiasm, we literally said “no” to nothing.

Kim Ondaatje had asked us to help create the Brookman Maple Quilt, and the members of the executive did just that on an individual basis regrettably!!

In the spring of 1980 we agreed to co-host, with the Etobicoke Quilters Guild a quilt conference (Quilt Toronto ’81) to be held at York University (Glendon Campus). This would be a combined show and conference which truly put quilting on the front page for a week. (And was the birth place of the Canadian. Quilters Association).

In the summer of 1980, a committee of three, (Mary Ellen, Mary Carl, Barbara Roberts), drafted a constitution and by-laws, and another committee (Debbie Salsbert, Edyth Yeomans, Mary Carl) drew up a series of executive job outlines.

The momentum generated that first winter has never diminished — and we are all aware of the success in the ensuing years…….