Here is Logan in his Christmas outfit with the “LaGarde” Santa clause - the LaGardes have a tradition of passing the Santa around the family every Christmas. Last Year Chris and I gave it to Logan, he wasn’t born yet, so we took his picture this year and passed it on to Nick and Tatiana… The Santa is REALLY old and actually came over with the LaGardes/ Truby’s when they came to America- it is Very special and so much fun that we got to enjoy having the santa for a few years!

Isn’t he handsome in his little Christmas outfit! Its so fun to dress him up!

MERRY CHRISTMAS!

(Excerpt from memoirs written by Barbara LaGarde)

In 1915-17 we were in the Panama Canal Zone where Daddy was in command of Gorgas Hospital at Ancon. We lived there in the Delesseps house. Its approach was lined with Royal palms. The third floor was completely eaten up by White Ants. While there we had an opportunity to go by Navy Ship through the Canal with friends of the family, a most exciting and memorable day. We went to a nearby school in Panama.

On our return on an Army transport after a two-year duty, we had to be aware of U-boats. This was 1918 and I remember m mother being so frightened until we had safely passed Cape Hatteras. When we arrived in Washington, DC, we found an apartment in Northwest DC on Belmont Road. Daddy was assigned to the Surgeon General’s office to try to establish ambulance airplanes. They tried out some four seater German planes. We were all given a chance to have a flight around DC., even my Grandmother, Nana. Daddy declared we all looked “green around the gills”.

Elizabeth and I were sent to Cathedral School, a day school, and were picked up by a car sent for several of us. That winter was the big snowstorm. We lived a block from the movie house, the Knickerbocker Theater. The roof collapsed from too much snow and Daddy was one of the first to arrive to help in rescue and treatment of the injured. At Cathedral School we used to go to services at Bethlehem Chapel of the National Cathedral, being built close by on the grounds of the School.

After being in DC for two or three years, we returned to San Francisco and Letterman Hospital where Daddy was in command. Elizabeth and I went to Miss Burke’s School on Jackson Street, not too far from The Presidio. We arrived there in a WWI ambulance pulled by two Army mules. This was quite a contrast to those girls arriving in chauffeured limousines! It was very embarrassing to me!

Our house was big and comfortable and made more so by glassed-in porch with all sorts of plants Mother and Nana took pleasure in growing. We also received a daily bouquet of flowers from the Hospital greenhouse. There was a golf course nearby where we took lessons. We also rode horses from The Presidio stables on wonderful scenic and sandy trails. Elizabeth stayed with Uncle Elliot and his wife so she could finish high school at Miss Burke’s School, and then joined us in Manila.

We left San Francisco for the Philippines in 1924. Mother was pregnant with my brother, Jack, and I’m sure the long trip by Transport Thomas was not always easy. After a stopover in Honolulu, we arrived in Manila twenty-eight days in all after we started out. We had a big airy house in Military Plaza with a cook, houseboy, lavendara and chauffeur.

Jack was born in 1924 at Sternberg Hospital in Manila. I went to the American School where most of the white children went. There were about 75 of us in all. I was the only one in my class in high school. The Manila Hotel was nearby and we went there for dances- a glamorous setting! I played hooky from school with a naval officer’s daughter who lived there. We hired a “calesa”, a native pony and carriage, to take us to the Polo Club to swim at the beach there. We had a fun day!

There was a vacation spot in the mountains called Bagino where we had quarters and ate at the club served by the native Igorotes in their “G” strings and white jackets. There was a nine-hole golf course, native pony-back trips to Santo Thomas and mummy caves and going to the local market of the Igorotes. The Brent School for Boys was also located in Baguio with four or five young guys as teachers. They helped a lot to make it a fun time there.

We left Manila for China in 1926, going first to Hong Kong where we stayed a couple of days and bought fur coats for the trip home. It was lucky we did, because when we arrived in Shanghai it was bitterly cold. Jack came down with acidosis so he and Mother went to some Chinese nursing home until we had to leave for Nagasaki to catch the Transport Thomas for San Francisco. We were unable to go to Peking because the warlords were fighting and made it dangerous. An Englishman friend of Elizabeth’s was killed while traveling there. As we left Shanghai harbor our Japanese ship sank a Chinese junk. No effort was made to save their lives as the Chinese believed that, if you saved a life, it was your responsibility to look after him.

(Excerpt from memoirs written by Barbara LaGarde)
They had four children: Albert, the oldest, Carrie, Charles and John. As the oldest, Albert got to go to Cornell and then to University of Pennsylvania Medical School. Upon graduation, he sent money back to the family for the next one. Charles, however, never returned money for John. This was a big family problem! But Elizabeth and I thought he was fun. He owned a Stanley Steamer automobile and always brought wonderful fireworks for the 4th of July celebration.

Carrie, after the death of her husband, Fitch Powers, lived with Olive and John who were the Postmasters of the town of Otto, NY. Both Bee and Bim and I drove to Otto for her ninetieth birthday and to take home some of her furniture, rugs, lamps, etc., that she treasured and wanted me to have. She lived to the age of 92.

To return to my father’s tours of duty, after Letterman Hospital in 1910 we went by Army transport to the Philippine Islands where we lived in Iloilo, south of Manila. Mother had a Japanese “Amah” to take care of us three children. On the way back to Manila by interisland transport, the Japanese Amah took my brother and jumped overboard; they were presumed lost at sea. I dimly remember the stateroom and being so frightened at the turmoil. I remember crying so much from missing him, and my mother crying for so long after.

We returned to San Francisco about 1912-13. From there we went to Governor’s Island in NY harbor. In earlier days the island was a fortification for the protection of New York. It had a five-star shaped fortification, gun emplacements, a moat, drawbridge, and barracks on the inside. On the opposite side of the island there was a parapet where the Officer’s Club stood. I went to dancing school there, carrying my patent leather dancing shoes in a bag to be changed there. We lived in brick quarters at Ft. Jay. Elizabeth and I went to a small school there.

During that time on Governor’s Island, there were events that made a lasting impression. The worst for me as a seven-year old was being taken to a N.Y. hospital, where scary women in black robes and white caps took me away from Mother and Daddy. They made me lie on a cold, tile floor in a bathroom. There they gave me an enema, which, of course, scared me even more. I don’t remember anything until I woke up and realized I was in a crib and my neck hurt. So I screamed and cried for hours. Finally, Mother and Daddy appeared, so I cried some more! A little boy in a crib next to mine told them: “Him cry all the time!” Both Elizabeth and I had infected glands in our necks, the result of having measles. Back home again, Daddy had to change bandages for both of us, which was most painful.

Another event was the exciting trip to the Hippodrome Theater and its wondrous variety program. We had also had lunch in N.Y. City, which I gulped down in my hurry to go to the show. All that noise and excitement was too much. I had to leave the show before I threw up. It was awful!
We also saw in N.Y the Fire Department: a wagon pulled by six or eight horses. They came racing pell mell down the street with the bells clanging wildly. It was most thrilling and exciting!
Around 1915 Daddy was sent to Galveston, Texas to help with the devastation there caused by a fierce hurricane and tidal wave. While there he wrote cute little letters to my sister, Elizabeth, and me. They usually told a bedtime story of “Jocko and Mose”, a vivid picture of his life in a tent and how he missed us. He also did little drawings to illustrate. These are now in a protected album. They are priceless for the humor and the conditions with which he had to cope.