Backstory: The freedom ferry

Taking the ferry away didn't stop change from coming, and bringing it back 44 years later won't speed it along, says Mr. Pettway. State lawmakers and local business leaders may have resumed ferry service, but it's the people themselves – close-mouthed, tight-knit, stubbornly aloof – who will wring progress from the muddy soil. "It's the quilters really," he says, referring to the 40 or so women who've gone from being Alabama homemakers to American folk heroes. "That's why I think the ferry is back now. Nobody else but the quilters."

Every few years, an outsider stumbles upon the colorful quilts, and fascination with Gee's Bend rises again. Like everything here, the quilts are a testament to freedom, a fact not missed by art critics, who laud them as "some of the most miraculous works of modern art America has produced." Hems snake crookedly through whatever materials can be found: burlap sacks, work clothes, faded blue jeans with pockets. They weren't intended to be art; they were meant to keep winter winds at bay in houses made of little more than mud and logs. Now they sell for as much as $30,000 to New York collectors and can be found in stores like Bloomingdale's and Saks and museums from Boston to San Francisco. Last month, the US Postal Service issued a series of stamps featuring 10 of the creations.

"You'd look at some of them and say, 'These ugly things?' " Pettway says. But there's pride in his voice. The humble quilters are quiet royalty around here, much respected and well loved. They're on the road a lot, traveling to shows, but Gee's Bend is home, even if it's getting crowded with tourists coming to see where the stitching all started.

Change might be coming, but residents say the things they treasure most will endure. No one has much, but days come and go with a simple sweetness. The men are welders, mechanics, blue-collar laborers. The women work at sewing factories and food processing plants an hour away in Selma. As young people move out, older people move back, and life continues in a slow circle. "You can't find a better place to raise kids," says Pettway. "There's no crime rate and you don't have to worry about gangs. It's just not here – not in Gee's Bend."

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Another Pettway, Annette, echoes those sentiments. As one of the esteemed quilters, she's had her chances to leave and even tried life in Connecticut for a while. It wasn't for her.

"People in the city, they lock up so much," she says, sitting on her couch, keeping one eye on her soap operas and the other on the deserted stretch of County Road 29 that wanders in a five-mile horseshoe around the town. "When I go shopping, I just shut my door. It's a free spirit down here. You're in the country for real, though. There ain't no stores, and the two we got be closed most of the time."

Pettway hasn't taken the ferry yet, but says its return is a convenience – and vindication. "The ambulance can get here quicker, and for the people who work over there, it's a real help," she says. "It shouldn't have been taken in the first place."

As dusk lopes toward evening, the ferry lies still on the river, the day's work complete, stars twinkling above. The same stars shine in Indianapolis tonight, where the quilters are preparing for another show. The same stars shine in Camden, where the busy sidewalks are now empty. But as the lights go out one by one in Gee's Bend, the stars seem to twinkle brightest of all, and slowly, softly, a hush falls across the land.

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