Margery VanAmburg, 1931, Plymouth High School

Such a sweet photo of 18 year old Margery VanAmberg. This was her senior year high school photo at Plymouth High in Plymouth, Wayne county, Michigan. During the 1930 census, the year before this photo, Margery lived in Plymouth with her family: Arthur Garfield VanAmberg (dad), Nellie Friend (mom), Marian (sister, age 12) and Keith (brother, age 10). Her father was a carpenter building houses, as his father had been before him.

The family had moved to Plymouth from Bay county, Michigan where they had lived in 1920, next door to Nellie’s parents (Margery’s maternal grandparents). There, Arthur had been a farmer. Margery’s paternal grandfather (Fred VanAmberg) lived with them.

After high school, Margery did what many women of the depression/pre-war era did. She went to work. According to the 1940 census, she was a bench worker at an auto plant. Her siblings (all of them still living at home) also worked. Marion was a stenographer and Keith a machinist in the auto industry.

Eventually Margery would marry Charles Morrison and at some point move to California. It appeared to be a family move. Mother, Nellie died in California in 1983, just 3 years shy of her 100th birthday! Margery had been preceded in death by her husband, and died in California in 2005. I’m confident there will be some descendants to give this photo a good home.