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Mystery Vintage Photos
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This is the place
for Mystery Nebraska Vintage Photos
Photos in this section
are in need of being identified. Please contact the submitter if you
can help identify people in the photos presented here. To submit a
photo for this section, please follow the instructions on the link
listed below.
To submit an
article, contact David Gochenour
Mystery
woman photo was found in the house of Marion Isabelle
Faulkner Birk (wife of Arthur Delancy Birk, Sr.). All I know about
the mystery lady in the photo is that she was someone important to
my family because when my grandmother Marion died my father (Art,
Jr.) and his uncle (Claude Faulkner)-Marion's brother, cleaned out
her house and threw away mounds of various papers and at least a box
or more of family photos because they didn't recognize who the
people were! I still haven't forgiven them for that. My father told
me they only threw away items or photos that they did not recognize.
Unfortunately, both my uncle and father have passed away, and no one
else in the family knows who she is either!
When thinking of my various family members living in Nebraska in the
19th century, I came up with a group of POSSIBLE identities for this
tough pioneer woman:
Maria Magdalena (Mary Magdalene!) "Helen" Van Esser
Simons, who immigrated with her husband & children to NE from
Belgium in 1893. They owned and ran a cattle/sheep ranch near
Whitney, in Dawes Co. It is still in the family - belonging to one
of Helen's son's descendants, Dale Brown.
A female relative of Elsie Bryant Bailey? I've been told that
Elsie's photograph is framed and on the wall of the Dawes Co.
Historical Museum.
Elsie's mother Sarah Reynolds Bryant? A transplant from Illinois,
along with her niece Lucinda Isabelle Rause(n) Faulkner.
Perhaps the mother-in-law of Mary Simons Renshaw (Helen's daughter)?
The Renshaw's had been in the NW part of the state for many years
and I believe were ranchers.
An ancestor of Dale Brown's wife, maiden name Rasher? The Rashers
were also pioneer settlers & ranchers in Dawes Co.
A member of the Reynolds family? Another of Sarah Reynolds Bryant's
family, nephew William Henry Reynolds, lived in Dawes Co. &
served as a 3 term state senator, Dawes Co. clerk, postmaster, and
Chadron Mayor.
Or, sadly, she may be none of the above. Thank you for giving her
some notoriety; at least there's hope that someone will recognize
her.
Submitted Oct. 2006 Karen
Birk Weatherford
a North Platte native living in South Carolina
I have recently come
into possession of a photo in good condition of two
young women in their "Sunday best," hats, ties, lacy
blouses. Penciled on the back of the photo is
"Mother" so one of the women is either my grandmother, Ida
May (Campbell) Ball, born 1888, or my great grandmother, Jane Rose
(Thomalla) Campbell, born 1866 or possibly both since there are two
females in the picture. On the bottom of the face of the photo card
is printed "ELLINGSON" and "Cambridge,
Nebraska," which is in Furnas County. I see from your website
that ELLINGSON Studio Co. is listed as being in McCook in Red Willow
County. Anyway for what it is worth, here is my two cents worth
about ELLINGSON Photography.
I received at the same time another very old sepia photo in poor
condition of several folks on the
front porch of a building. One of the females has an
"X" penciled in above her image in the photo. The only
identification on this picture are the barely legible words
"Cambridge Nebraska" penciled on the back of the photo
card. The photographer is not identified
Submitted by Susan Archer
York
County Collection [East]
Click on picture to
view larger version
I have an old
picture taken in Burt County, NE about 1914. It is a large
group of children with four adults taken beside a white
building--that I think is a church. The children seem to be dressed
in their Sunday best and the ladies are wearing hats. My mother is
in it (1906-1996) but I know nothing else about the picture. Submitted
by Maxine Whitman
Unknown
man
This studio photo was in my grandmother's photo album. As far as
I know we had no family in Nebraska. It is labeled W. G. Walker,
Photographer, St. Paul, Neb. I will give it to anyone who can
identify it. Submitted by Joyce
Brown
Unknown
Tintype - Meyers or Boop
I would like to send you an unknown tintype photograph that I
found recently in a box of my Grandparent's things. (Frank &
Lilly Meyers of Hendley NE). In checking the family history, I found
it could be one of six ancestors who were in the Civil War -- one of
my great-grandfather's brothers: Isaac S. Meyers (1845-1918), or
Aaron F. Meyers (1844-1925); OR my GG-grandfather, Jacob Boop
(1826-1904); his brother, George Boop (1818-1878), or one of
George's two sons: John (1842-1898), or William (1846-?). Submitted
by Marilyn May Cozza
