My Father and Mother in Late 1800's

This is a picture of my father, John Milton Phillips, and my mother Bertha Evelyn Richards taken some time before they were married. I have no pictures of the wedding. This picture was likely taken in the late 1800's when Dad was about 26 years of age.

Dad lived to be 72 and died in 1944. That means that he was born in 1872. I became his adopted son in 1918 when he was 46 years old. My adoption was one of many generous act of this fine man. My birth mother, Dora Pratt, died three weeks after I was born, and her sister, Bertha Phillips, went to Brooklyn Pa. and brought me home to the Phillips farm in Princess Anne County, Va.

The picture of my mother shows her some time after graduation from the State Normal School for teachers in Pennsylvania. My mother was a teacher and an artist. Some of her paintings rest in the home of millionaires. And some which I treasure are in the custody of my son who resides in Keysville, Va.