The Panguitch Quilt Walk Festival 2022 was held the second weekend in June (the 8th-11th). Happily, a whopping 380 people came and took quilt-piecing classes. This was a full house, so full that people had to be turned away. No more room was available to add other classes and organizers were trying to figure out the best way to limit the participants to 350 people.
All other areas of the festival were packed, too, which is a great problem to have! The festival brings a lot of business to the community and helps businesses to get over the let down after Memorial Day. It is a great way to start the summer season.
The Quilt Walk Dinner Theater was different this year with performers from the former casts and a short movie that tells the Quilt Walk story.
Saturday featured a great Lions Club breakfast as usual and a small antique trailer parade. This was followed by a well-attended Heritage Fair and Quilt Walk races. The Quilt Walk races included four teams of seven people who found how difficult and fun it was to stay on the quilts while going as fast as possible.
The original quilt walk was performed by seven men in 1865 who had to get to Parowan to feed for their starving families. The snow on the top of the mountain was so deep that the oxen and wagon could not go through. The men held a prayer circle and knelt on quilts to pray. They did not sink in the snow when they knelt on the quilts, and that was the answer to their prayer: they could use the quilts like snowshoes!
The men laid down one quilt and then another and were able to walk across the quilts without sinking. They picked up the ones behind and repeated the process through the deep parts of the snow. The snow could have been a much bigger problem, as they were already gone longer than expected, and the community was thrilled to see them come back with food to save them.
Each year Panguitch hosts the Quilt Walk Festival in memory of this event. This year was an outstanding year for the festival.
– The Byway
Feature image courtesy Amy Olsen.
Read more about quilt making in Quilts for Ukraine.