Helen Willis will have several of her 9/11 Memorial Quilts on display for the Miami County Veterans Museum 9/11 Exhibit from August 24, 2026 through September 30,20026. The museum is located at 2245 S. Country Road 25 A, Troy, OH. Entrance is free and open to the public on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Thursdays from 10am to 2pm. Below is an image of some of the included quilts in the exhibit.
History of Helen’s Quilts for 9/11:
As the 9/11 attack neared its 20th Anniversary, MVAQN member and quilter Helen Willis decided to memorialize some of the iconic images in art quilts. She chose several magazine cover photos for this project: People, The New Yorker and Newsweek.
Then Willis honored each of the three sites with an art quilt: Ground Zero in New York City, The Pentagon in Washington D.C. and Flight 93 in Shanksville, Pennsylvania
Willis also made art quilts of the memorials she has visited including Lebanon, OH; the Tower of Voices at the Flight 93 National Memorial in Shanksville, PA; New York City; Kettering, OH; Fairborn, OH; Urbana, OH; Beavercreek, OH and Decatur, IL.
Helen made quilts to memorialize the skyline of New York before 9/11/01 and today.
Being a Dale Earnhardt, Jr fan, she made two quilts that depict his tributes in 2001 and 2021. Dale won the first race that was run after 9/11 at Dover, Delaware on 9/23/2001 and celebrated with a victory lap sporting a large United States flag. For the 20th Anniversary of 9/11, Dale drove a specially designed car honoring the fallen and heroes of 9/11.
In 2021 the quilts were exhibited at Woodbourne Library in Dayton, Ohio.