Stacy I. Morgan is professor in the Department of American Studies at the University of Alabama. He is author of Frankie and Johnny: Race, Gender, and the Work of African American Folklore in 1930s America (winner of the Wayland D. Hand Prize from the American Folklore Society) and Rethinking Social Realism: African American Art and Literature, 1930–1953.

Yvonne Thomas Wells is a contemporary artist and lifelong educator from Tuscaloosa, Alabama. She is a recipient of the Governor’s Arts Award from the Alabama State Council on the Arts and has represented Alabama in exhibitions in Vence, France, and Pietrasanta, Italy. Her art is in the permanent collections of the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture, the High Museum of Art, the International Quilt Museum, and the Montgomery Museum of Fine Arts, among other art institutions.

“Morgan lets Wells tell her story without intruding, while deftly critiquing her work within that storyline. . . . She is the narrator, as she is of all her quilts, but Morgan amplifies her meaning, delving deeper into the symbolism for the benefit of the viewer. It is a very effective partnership.” —Gail Andrews Trechsel , coauthor of Southern Quilts: A New View— -