Smile for the Camera, 21st Edition--Give Their Face A Place - Women's History Month

The word prompt for the 21st Edition of Smile For The Camera is "Give Their Face A Place." March is Women's History month and you are asked to picture women back into history. The unknown, known and unsung women who are often the foundation of our family history. Give their face a place. The interpretation is yours. Admission is free with every photograph! Thank you to footnoteMaven over at Shades of the Departed for again sponsoring the event.

I wonder what she is thinking? My paternal great great grandmother, Mary Louise Hill VanGilder was the daughter of Joseph Davidson Hill and Sarah Houston. She was born on in Morgantown, West Virginia and died in the same city in her Hill family home--the very home in which she was born.

I have found another genealogist who is also a direct descendant of Mary Hill VanGilder and she also had a copy of this photograph, although the copy she sent me does not have a tear in the cardboard cover of the photo.


I believe that the handwritten names on the flipside of the photograph were done by my paternal grandmother, Sarah Margaret VanGilder Hughes. Written up in the upper right-hand corner is "Grandma VanGilder"--her grandmother. The middle section--"Great Grandmother VanGilder" was written for Sarah's children as Mary Hill VanGilder was their great grandmother.

The Happy Dance moment for me was when I saw Mary's middle name written on the photograph's back. I did not know that it was Louise. My great grandmother, Jessica Pool VanGilder, named her first daughter after her mother-in-law--Mary Louise VanGilder. This was a common practice in the 1880's to name babies after other family members and an honor to the person whose name was used.

© 2010, copyright Linda Hughes Hiser