parents

That's a family name (and first name but not the same - perhaps her mother!) I recognise. Local to the New Hartley and Seaton Delaval areas. I wonder if they're the same?

I had a notion that Marg Lead better

was in BBC comedy "The Good Life"?

Howard Dickins Yes there's that one too. When I was young these things didn't 'click' in my head - you simply called folk their names! Haha in later years Roger Bannister was a security guard at the warehouse I worked at! He didn't run much - he sat at a desk mostly. I guess his running days were over.. He was so sick of the jokes though - I can still see his grumpy face when folk did them.

12 years of age......wow. Such a start. Great series of photos.

A Texas sharecropper named Levi T. Steward was involved in hearings by the Federal Commission on Industrial Relations, held in Dallas, March 1915. From William James Ghent, ed., Appeal Socialist Classics(Vol 8), essay titled "Socialism and the Farmer":

"A gasp went round the room when the Steward family entered. None of them wore wraps, and several of the six children were barefoot. The day was bitterly cold. Mrs. Steward carried a three-year-old child. The family history is one long fight with poverty. The couple married in Arkansas in 1887. Eleven babies have come into the home. On three such occasions there was no doctor in attendance. The family was too poor. Three of the children have died. Ora Vivian had congestion for four days before death claimed her in her third year. Mary Bula died at nine months. Cause unknown. Willie Joe was but five months old when his little body grew cold as he lay by his mother's side and he joined his brother and sister — three baby victims of poverty. THE LOSING FIGHT. The father related his fight year by year since mar- riage. The story of each season was exactly like the other with slight variation. He testified that he never drank liquor, never kept it in the house, even for medicinal pur- poses, and the family did not squander money for fine clothes. His wife never had a ready-made suit in all her life and but three "store" hats. She had but one "trip" in her life, and that was when she took advantage of excursion rates to travel a distance of 100 miles. They lived within a few miles of Conway, Texas, for two years and his wife was to town but once in all that time ; that was when he carried her there to be attended by a doctor. The general history was summed up in the statement that the family has "made" approximately 700 bales of cotton and hundreds of bushels of corn in the last twenty-eight years and now finds itself illiterate, hopeless and about $750 in debt. "

Another excerpt:

"Levi T. Steward, the tenant farmer, and his family have practically no education, own not one inch of ground and have never entered a bank except to assume or pay off a mortgage. After years and years of productive work they find themselves more heavily in debt than when they started. The best educated members of the family can barely read; most of them can neither read nor write. Their clothes were tatters and the children were barefoot in the middle of winter. From the moment each member of this family en- tered life he has been robbed, exploited and figured as a unit of profit or loss by some member of the owning class. "

www23.us.archive.org/stream/appealsocialistc08ghen/appeal...

The report of the Walsh Commission (Commission on Industrial Relations) identifies a Levi Thomas Stewart (Bain and Mr. Ghent both seem to have the wrong spelling) who testified at hearings in Dallas on March 17, 1915. This part of the Commission's inquiry was its only investigation into agricultural issues, in this case tenant farming. His testimony, which is available online, opens a window into a world of poverty and hard work and farm families living in impossible conditions. books.google.com/books?id=o-oeAQAAMAAJ&lpg=PA8951&amp... His wife, Beulah Stewart, testified after him. She was questioned by Commissioner Florence Jaffray "Daisy" Harriman, who appears elsewhere in the Bain Collection, sometimes identified as Mrs. J.B. Harriman. www.flickr.com/search/?ss=2&w=commons&q=jaffray&a... en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Florence_Jaffray_Harriman

pennylrichardsca and artolog: thanks for the information and correct spelling of his name. We will update the record.

Same boys as this one:

They standing boy really looks like his father.

Enlarge the 'father' using the Persistent URL and compare to this: www.artistsfootsteps.com/html/McCubbin_students2.htm . You will need a magnifying glass! And also this self-portrait (c. 1913, about seventeen years later than this shot): www.ngv.vic.gov.au/collection/pub/itemDetail?artworkID=52880 . Under a magnifying glass, there is a similar rash over the left eyebrow, and a mole in front of the left ear. Is this Frederick McCubbin and family in about 1895, possibly in Melbourne?

Assuming it is the McCubbin family in about 1895, that is his wife Annie (married in 1889). Eldest boy is Louis Frederick (b.1890), younger boy on his father's lap is Alexander (b.1893), the baby is Hugh Montgomery (b.1894). A daughter Mary (b.1891) had recently died in a tragic accident (in1894). Is this why they look so sad? They had three more children. Quick McCubbin biography here: www.artistsfootsteps.com/html/McCubbin_biography.htm The wife, Annie was the model in several of his most famous paintings, "On the Wallaby Track" (1896), and "The Pioneer" (1904): www.artistsfootsteps.com/html/McCubbin_wallaby.htm and www.ngv.vic.gov.au/collection/pub/itemDetail?artworkID=52858 If this is true, it is mind-blowing!

There is another picture taken a few seconds later (or earlier?). The other picture has been retouched to remove frowns, bags under the eyes, etc., so that the family looks relatively happy. Interesting to compare all the faces using the Persistent URL magnifier. www.powerhousemuseum.com/collection/database/?irn=386437&...