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Here is what Grandmother wrote about the trip to Springfield to have the family photos taken. Only two of the "cabinet cards" are still in our family's possession.
In the parlor there was a...big family album with pictures of relatives and friends. Some were many years old: some small daguerreotypes, some on tin. Mother used to show me the album and point out the pictures of her sisters and cousins and talk about them.
Finally my picture found a place in her album. She decided that all of us should go to Springfield and have our pictures taken. The three oldest refused to go. As far as I know, Sister and Will never did have a picture taken except once when they were quite small. One cold winter day, Mother, Father, Elmer, Bert and I went. The others got there looking nice in their Sunday clothes but I didn’t. My face, and especially my nose, has always been very sensitive to cold, so riding twenty-five miles in the cold in an open vehicle didn’t enhance its looks this day. I arrived at the photographer’s with a red swollen nose and face. Mother was quite put out about it and didn’t know whether to have my picture taken or not. But after the photographer had finished taking Mother’s and Father’s and Elmer’s and Bert’s, she decided to have mine taken.
She always said it didn’t look like me because my nose and upper lip were swollen. I didn’t worry about my face, but I was never very well satisfied with the way my feet looked. The photographer made me stand with one foot sort of crossed over the other with my toes on the floor and my heel up in the air. As I never in my life stood that way, I couldn’t see why I should have my picture taken standing that way.
We were always glad she did have the pictures taken. Elmer died a few years later and it was the only picture she had of him.
