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                   Family Group Record prepared by Kingsley Bird, husband of Margaret Hamner.
Margaret Hamner Bird was 12 when she went with Grandma Mattie Ann Craw Hamner back to Alabama to visit. ( She would get so homesick it would literally make her sick). She would visit Northport, Alabama, to visit Aunt Jessie and Uncle Jake. It felt like home at their house. One of their daughters was into Girl Scouts. Her name was Susie Anders.

Autobiography of Margaret Ellen Bird

	This is the story of my life with as many of the interesting events retold as I can remember.  I was the first child born to John A. Hamner and Zilpha Ellen Hamner on June 25th, 1913.  I was born in our family home located in la Sierra, Calif. And I am told I was the second child born in this community.  The Stadler family also lived nearby and their daughter, Lucille, was born a year before I was.  My father worked on the W. J. Hole Ranch doing farming.  We moved from this home to what was called the Water Company Ranch near Corona and my sister, Martha, was born there when I was one and half years old.  She was born on December 28, 1914 and John, my older brother was born on the red letter day in history, the 4th of July, 1916.

	Family Group Record prepared by Kingsley Bird, husband of Margaret Hamner.
Margaret Hamner Bird was 12 when she went with Grandma Mattie Ann Craw Hamner back to Alabama to visit. ( She would get so homesick it would literally make her sick). She would visit Northport, Alabama, to visit Aunt Jessie and Uncle Jake. It felt like home at their house. One of their daughters was into Girl Scouts. Her name was Susie Anders.

Autobiography of Margaret Ellen Bird

	This is the story of my life with as many of the interesting events retold as I can remember.  I was the first child born to John A. Hamner and Zilpha Ellen Hamner on June 25th, 1913.  I was born in our family home located in la Sierra, Calif. And I am told I was the second child born in this community.  The Stadler family also lived nearby and their daughter, Lucille, was born a year before I was.  My father worked on the W. J. Hole Ranch doing farming.  We moved from this home to what was called the Water Company Ranch near Corona and my sister, Martha, was born there when I was one and half years old.  She was born on December 28, 1914 and John, my older brother was born on the red letter day in history, the 4th of July, 1916.

	During the time we lived on this ranch my father had dairy cows and did farming on the land.  My mother was a very busy lady with three young children to take care of, as we didn't have the modern conveniences we have to help mothers nowadays.  She did her washing on a board and heated water outside in a big boiler.  She also had lots of chickens to take care of, so she never lacked something to do.  My mother has always been a beautiful seamstress and made all our clothes, even our coats when we were little girls.  I don't remember how long we lived at this ranch but it was while we were still very young that we moved to a dairy ranch that my Uncle Charlie and Aunt Lula Main owned.  This was what was called Alvord.  It isn't a community but more of a locality. My father went into business with him and they milked quite a herd of dairy cows.  The home we lived in was a large place with living quarters on two sides with a court or patio in the center.  There was a large kitchen and dining room for the ranch workers to eat in and we had our own dining room.
	It was while we lived here that I began the first grade at Alvord School, which at that time was a little country school with eight grades.  Some grades held classes together as we didn't have many teachers.  My Aunt Lula Main was the Principal of this school until she retired, when she was past sixty-five years old.  We enjoyed living here, as most children would as there were hundreds of acres of land all around us.  We had horses, chickens and cows and everything you would find on a farm to play with.  We lived here for a few years, when my father decided he wanted to make a change and it was at this time that we moved to Riverside.
	We lived on Highland Place, off Brocton Avenue in a frame house with lots of nice neighbors near us.  This was something of a change for us as we had always lived on a ranch before with very few people nearby.  By the time we moved here we went to the Magnolia School and walked to school with our friends, Clifford and Ruth Rome, Helen Heiser, and Esther, Martin and Gladys Williamson.  We had a new little sister born to us while we were living in Riverside.  Florence was born November 13, 1920 and it was fun having a baby sister to play with.  While we lived here my father was a salesman for an implement company and liked his work but still wanted to do something along the ranching occupation.  We lived in Riverside for a few years when father decided to go into the sheep business.
	During my early years my Grandmother and Grandfather Hamner were separated and when we decided to move from Riverside, she decided to move too.  It was at this time that my father bought a fifteen acre walnut grove that was interest with peach trees. We built a large new home on the corner of this land and my Grandmother built a new home for herself next door to us.  This was to be our home for many years as it was built for a large family and in a good location.
	We were all very happy in this home as it was what most children would want.  We were able to have a saddle horse, cows, sheep (as pets) a dog and chickens.  We even had pigs that my brother used to feed to sell.  After moving here, we again, went to the Alvord School but we had to walk to catch a bus as we lived quite a distance from the school.
	We also had many happy experiences with a grandmother we loved living next door to us.  As youngsters we used to take turns staying all night with her and felt it was a real treat when it was our turn.  And as I grew older there were many times we would stay up late at night talking over my problems or she would tell me of the many interesting experiences she had when she was a girl.

	We were all very happy in this home as it was what most children would want.  We were able to have a saddle horse, cows, sheep (as pets) a dog and chickens.  We even had pigs that my brother used to feed to sell.  After moving here, we again, went to the Alvord School but we had to walk to catch a bus as we lived quite a distance from the school.
	We also had many happy experiences with a grandmother we loved living next door to us.  As youngsters we used to take turns staying all night with her and felt it was a real treat when it was our turn.  And as I grew older there were many times we would stay up late at night talking over my problems or she would tell me of the many interesting experiences she had when she was a girl.
	It was while we lived here that we had another brother born to our family; Ben was born April 7, 1915 and, of course, we loved him like all the rest of the family.  He was a very happy baby and we played with him like a doll.  He loved having fun too.  Rosemary, my youngest sister was also born here.  She was born July 16, 1929 and was such a cute baby.  We were all older by this time and she was taken care of by all of us.
	After we lived here for a few years my father had the peach trees removed and left only the walnut trees and they were huge trees.  He also had several thousand head of sheep out in the hills near Arlington. As children we often went to the sheep camps with mother and daddy.  We would sometimes have a meal with the sheepherders, who usually were Basques or French men.  During the sheep sheering time, we often went to see them sheer the sheep and fill those huge sacks with wool weighing around three hundred pounds.  All these outings are interesting things we have done together as a family.  I can remember several times a lot of our relatives getting together and taking a picnic lunch with us to go to watch the sheep sheering.  It was always done in the hills with lots of green grass all around and shade trees so it made a picturesque place for a picnic.
	Another exciting experience of my life was during the summer just before my twelfth birthday.  My mother and father bought my ticket to go on a wonderful trip to Alabama and other parts o the country to visit some of our relatives.  I made this trip with my Grandmother Hamner and it was one of the happiest times of my life.  We saw so many new sights and parts of the country that was invaluable to me.  We had such fun together as she was such a good traveler and liked to do things for fun.  We went on the train and were gone for six weeks, while we were in Alabama, our relatives, the Faucetts, took us on a trip to Atlanta, Georgia which we enjoyed very much.
	I also remember the nice visits we often had with my Grandmother and Grandfather Davis, who were my mother's parents.  My grandma would usually have good things for us to eat when we came to visit them and while we were youngsters, we often had Christmas dinner with them and lots of other relatives.
	I went through the eighth grade at Alvord and when I was ready for the ninth grade, Chemawa Junior High School was completed, so I was in the first graduating class at Chemawa.  I took a College Prep Course thinking that I would continue my education.  I was on the Honor Roll in Junior High and most of my years in Polytechnic High School in Riverside while I attend it.   I liked school quite well but studied very hard for my grades.  During these years I made many new friends and cherished some old ones I had known since grammar school days.  One of these friends was Emery Sloat, who lived near us and I became quite fond of him and he of me.  He was two years ahead of me in school so the year he was a senior in High School, I was a sophomore. When he graduated he went to Riverside Junior College and I was still in High School but we saw each other quite often.
	As the years went on I graduated from Poly High School in 1932 and had planned to go on to school but I wasn't too well and my mother and father thought it best for me not to go to school for a year.  After that year was up, I went to Business College for a year and the following fall I entered Junior College taking business courses.  It was while I was going to Junior College that Emery and I saw a lot of each other.  We went to dances, parties, sports events and outings together.  It was at a birthday party at his home that I met a good friend of his Kingsley Bird.  These two young fellows were very good trackmen and had been on the Junior College track team together while in school.
	The following summer, I began to see quite a lot of Kingsley and we became good friends.  We enjoyed each others company and had lots of fun when we were together.  Emery went to the University of California at Berkeley the next fall and it was during his absence that Kingsley and I became very fond of each other.  During Christmas vacations and summer time I went with Emery but I also began to realize how important Kingsley was to me.  He was such an understanding person and he had all the fine qualities I had hoped to find in the person I would marry someday.
	It was after we had been going together for a year that we became engaged secretly and I had a lovely announcement party in July, announcing our coming marriage in August 29, 1930.  We were both working downtown, he was employed by the Southern California Gas Company and I was working for the California Electric Power Company.  Se we made lots of plans for our new home together and looked forward to our marriage day.
	We had a lovely wedding at the home of my parents performed by Bishop Joel G. Sedgwick, who was the Bishop at that time of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in Riverside.  We had many relatives of both families and close friends.  We left on a wonderful honeymoon to the Grand Canyon and we had such fun together.  When we returned our first home was on Eleventh Street, in an apartment owned by the Fairchilds.  We lived there for a year and during that time I went back to work temporarily for California Electric then we moved to a duplex on Fourth Street.  We made another move before we purchased a lot on the corner of Ninth and Pepper streets.  We began plans for our own home and it was completed just before Christmas in 1939.  We had a lovely old couple by the name of Charles and Effie Wagner for our neighbors and they were very thoughtful of us.
	We were very busy in our new home getting our landscaping done in our yard, which we did ourselves.  We both loved our home, and were so proud of it. The following April 10, 1940 we had a lovely daughter born to us, whom we named Virginia Ellen.  She was a beautiful baby and no parents could have been more proud of her than we were.  She looked so much like her daddy and was a real joy to both of us.

	After we lived here for a few years my father had the peach trees removed and left only the walnut trees and they were huge trees.  He also had several thousand head of sheep out in the hills near Arlington. As children we often went to the sheep camps with mother and daddy.  We would sometimes have a meal with the sheepherders, who usually were Basques or French men.  During the sheep sheering time, we often went to see them sheer the sheep and fill those huge sacks with wool weighing around three hundred pounds.  All these outings are interesting things we have done together as a family.  I can remember several times a lot of our relatives getting together and taking a picnic lunch with us to go to watch the sheep sheering.  It was always done in the hills with lots of green grass all around and shade trees so it made a picturesque place for a picnic.
	Another exciting experience of my life was during the summer just before my twelfth birthday.  My mother and father bought my ticket to go on a wonderful trip to Alabama and other parts o the country to visit some of our relatives.  I made this trip with my Grandmother Hamner and it was one of the happiest times of my life.  We saw so many new sights and parts of the country that was invaluable to me.  We had such fun together as she was such a good traveler and liked to do things for fun.  We went on the train and were gone for six weeks, while we were in Alabama, our relatives, the Faucetts, took us on a trip to Atlanta, Georgia which we enjoyed very much.
	I also remember the nice visits we often had with my Grandmother and Grandfather Davis, who were my mother's parents.  My grandma would usually have good things for us to eat when we came to visit them and while we were youngsters, we often had Christmas dinner with them and lots of other relatives.
	I went through the eighth grade at Alvord and when I was ready for the ninth grade, Chemawa Junior High School was completed, so I was in the first graduating class at Chemawa.  I took a College Prep Course thinking that I would continue my education.  I was on the Honor Roll in Junior High and most of my years in Polytechnic High School in Riverside while I attend it.   I liked school quite well but studied very hard for my grades.  During these years I made many new friends and cherished some old ones I had known since grammar school days.  One of these friends was Emery Sloat, who lived near us and I became quite fond of him and he of me.  He was two years ahead of me in school so the year he was a senior in High School, I was a sophomore. When he graduated he went to Riverside Junior College and I was still in High School but we saw each other quite often.
	As the years went on I graduated from Poly High School in 1932 and had planned to go on to school but I wasn't too well and my mother and father thought it best for me not to go to school for a year.  After that year was up, I went to Business College for a year and the following fall I entered Junior College taking business courses.  It was while I was going to Junior College that Emery and I saw a lot of each other.  We went to dances, parties, sports events and outings together.  It was at a birthday party at his home that I met a good friend of his Kingsley Bird.  These two young fellows were very good trackme