SISTERS

This has always been one of my all-time favorite pics from the Bader archive. That is, of course, Barbara, with the fashionably bobbed hair, and her baby sister, Jeannie. Could they be any more adorable?

Barbara was born in 1921. Jeanne Frances Bader was born exactly one year and about two weeks later, on March 30, 1922.  This portrait is undated, but Barbara looks no more than about three, and Jeannie barely two, so I date it around 1924.

Married in 1915, Grandma ("Maudie") had five of her six children in eight years, from 1916 to 1924. I can't imagine how she did it! Especially moving around as much as they did as the family of a minister.  (Barbara remembered the family living in 10 different Nebraska towns between 1920 an 1944, as her father, Carl, was reassigned to new parishes.)

Formal portraits of the Bader children are rare. In fact, this is the only one I've ever seen, except for two studio portraits of Philip at about age two, which I'll post soon.  But Philip came along much later (eight years after his next-oldest sibling, Carl Jr.), and maybe the dust had settled a bit by then!

Here's another pic of Barbara that I love. She looks about the same age she was in the portrait (she still has the same haircut), but this is obviously just a candid snapshot in front of one of those ramshackle parish houses the children grew up in.

I found this photo inside an ancient newsprint notepad, tucked in between the last page and the cardboard backing. The notepad is empty except for the first page, where Maudie has pencilled in some notes about her will, and which daughter should get which of her few pieces of jewelry. I suspect these notes were written to herself long, long decades before a will was ever necessary.

Anyway, tucked in the back was this photo of Barbara. It had ripped in half, but was very lovingly taped back together. My guess is that Maudie kept this photo hidden in her things forever, and that it passed down to my mom in Grandpa's things after he passed away. If my mom ever even knew that this childhood photo of herself existed, she never showed it to me.

I love that gleam of adventure in her eye, and the way she's just about to start laughing! I think she looks a lot like Kiera, when she was that age.

Finally, here's another pic of  Jeannie and Barbara as very young girls. No date, of course, or any other identification, but I've found a couple of other snapshots of a large cabin in the woods, labeled, "The Bader cabin on the Platte River near Fremont, Neb." So I assume that's where this was taken, in a rowboat on the Platte!

I suppose some other Bader relation kept this cabin. Carl's four youngest siblings were all born in Fremont. His parents, Emma and J.R. Bader, and at least two of their adult children lived in Fremont for the rest of their lives.

Barbara doesn't look any older than 10, probably younger, so I date this around 1930. Pretty cute, huh?