Old Christmas Photos from My Grandma: 52 Ancestors 2021 Prompt “Holidays”

Christmas 1962 and 1964: My Brother and I
Photographs by Ivan Macbeth and Nora Macbeth

 

During my childhood, holidays were usually spent at my grandparents’ house on their farm near Eagle Lake, Minnesota, or at my family’s farm near Hanska. While looking through photos I inherited from my Grandma Nora Hoffman Macbeth, I found two cute holiday pictures of my brother and I from over fifty years ago.

The first photo was taken Christmas Day 1962 at the Macbeth house and features a three-year-old me and my baby brother Kent. This photo sparks so many memories. Kent is happily lying on his back in a little footed baby outfit, smiling at the camera, legs kicking in the air. He would have been nearly five months old on Christmas day.

I am sitting on the blanket next to him, wearing a light-colored long-sleeved tee and dark pants, probably accompanied by a pair of hard leather lace up shoes that came up over the ankle and had stiff, hard soles—popular footwear for toddlers then that would probably inspire horror among pediatricians today. I remember them as being reddish brown in color—I think they were Buster Brown shoes, but I’m not sure. My hair was cut in a pixie cut—a popular style in 1962 for girls—and my expression was equally pixie-like. My hair was mussed as usual—I rarely appear in photos with neatly combed hair. I must have always run my hands through it or rolled around while playing.

The blanket was resting on my grandparents’ patterned carpet. I remember the swirls of color and the stiff feel of the fibers although my memory of the shade has faded. Behind me is a comfortable chair that was a sort of silvery gray color as I recall. The arm of the chair is piled with Christmas wrap and tissue—the presents had been opened. It looks like someone got some new clothes, piled amid the wrap. I had obviously received a new doll, who has been abandoned to recline stiffly against the other chair arm. It looks like she has a thermometer sticking out of her mouth—was she a doll you could do doctor exams on? Or is that some other object that sticks out behind her? I don’t remember her very clearly—later in my childhood her shoes and clothes were no longer pretty, and she’d lost a lot of hair to my over-enthusiastic efforts to comb and style it. Poor dolly.

To my left in the gloom of the wall near the living room door is another chair I remember—an adjustable piano stool that could be spun around to go up and down in height. Unlike many piano stools, it had arms, which I would hold tightly as I spun slowly around. I think that chair eventually ended up back at our farm.

The next photo was taken two years later, Christmas 1964. The printing on the back says “Roxana age 5, Kent age 2.” That Christmas the family had gathered at the Peterson farm. I’m seated on the living room couch, with the window that faced the road at my back. Kent is standing next to me, a huge smile lighting his face, probably due to the new teddy bear his hand is resting on proudly.

We are dressed up for the occasion. Kent is in a cute little vest, dress shirt and pants combo with a tiny little bow tie at the collar. He looks adorable! I’m in a checkered dress—I believe it was red and white, paired with red tights. My hair is now in a bob with short, crooked bangs, slightly mussed as usual. My dollies are next to me on the couch—is the tilted, wide-legged one the same doll I received two years before? She looks like a war refugee, poor thing, with that same shell-shocked expression. The other, smaller doll I remember better. I think I called her Betty, and her hair shows the tragic effect of my vigorous brushing, sticking straight up and starting to recede. Before much longer, she developed a bald spot with tiny holes in her plastic head where hair used to sprout.

I remember the sectional couch and the combination pole lamp and occasional table in the corner. The couch was covered with a loose, washable fabric cover—smart with two small, frequently sticky children in the house.

I loved finding these photos and remembering those early years of my childhood. Christmas was always special and exciting, and you can see that in our faces.