A warm retirement…

This quilt, object id 517.001, in our collection represents many in the community at the time. Created in 1939 in honor of Snoqualmie School Superintendent Richard Jacobs Schusman (he preferred to be addressed as R. J.) and presented upon his retirement.  This quilt was created by the Parent Teacher’s association of the Snoqualmie Falls Lumber Company mill town of Snoqualmie Falls Washington (1916-1958) and contains almost 600 embroidered signatures of community members — both adults and children.  Mr. Schusman was highly respected in the community and given credit for stopping a polio outbreak in the Snoqualmie schools in 1932 by convincing King County health officials that the schools must be closed and the children of the community placed in quarantine. Today there is a street named after him next to Mount Si High School.