Vintage Winter Photos

It's been a hard winter everywhere, so I thought this would be a good time to share some of my mother's old winter photos from New Brunswick and/or Maine. I'm sorry I can't be more specific, but these photos weren't labeled. 

It looks like these kids were assembled outside the school for a quick class picture. Judging by the blowing hair, it must have been a bit windy. Perhaps it was early spring and they didn't think they needed jackets. 

Now that I've scanned, enhanced, and enlarged this picture, I can finally make out the writing: "Famous Skiiers" [sic]. I would like to think that the small kids are my Aunt Faith and Uncle David, but I am sure that family members will have an opinion. If that is little Faith, we can date the photo at around 1930. 

The girl in the middle looks like a Crabtree, too, but I'm not sure about the others. I like how they are all ready to ski with their homemade equipment and everyday winter clothes. It makes skiing look like a practical way to get around in a snowy winter, rather than the fancy recreational sport it has become. 

Here's a whole group, ready for fun in the snow. The Crabtree family wasn't quite this big, so I wonder if this might be a neighborhood get-together. Or, wait! Is it just recess time at the one-room schoolhouse?

If all these snowy scenes haven't made you feel chilly enough, take a close look at the next photo. 

This last picture is a really special and historic one, and is used here with the kind permission of Patricia Parkhurst Gee Pickard, a member of the church Uncle Clifford founded in Bangor, Maine that was to become Glad Tidings Church. Pat is an author and historian of all things Crabtree. She has taught me so much about my own family!

I think that Pat tells the story best:

Here is a 1932 photo taken during a baptism that Rev. John Dearing conducted THROUGH THE ICE at Maxfield's Mill in Kenduskeag Stream in Bangor, Maine. Brother Dearing is the man in front with the white shirt and apparently, a rubber suit on, and Blanche Craig (later Grant) is standing next to him. Ralph Grant, Blanche's son, just let me borrow the original and I have scanned it and put it up on my computer. Other people from the Bangor congregation are in the picture. This is the group of people that were in the congregation that has become Glad Tidings Church in Bangor.