This precious old photo was purchased at Cadwell’s Downtown Flea Market in historic downtown Branson in December 2018. The back is captioned “Florence Ava Newbecker.” The front has a photographer stamp Edgar Draper of Loup City, Neb. Unusual names like Newbecker make the search lots easier. I went to FamilySearch.org and searched for Florence Ava Newbecker born in Nebraska and immediately got several matches. In fact she popped up in the 1910, 1920, and 1930 censuses with approximate birth year 1908-1909. Her parents were Charles and Lora Newbecker and each of the three censuses show they lived at Taylor, Loup County, Nebraska. Press the “easy” button on this one. We have a match! The search also produced a FindaGrave.com entry showing that Florence Ava Newbecker Hanke was born June 11, 1908 and died on November 1, 2010 in Ord, Valley, Nebraska which a google map shows was only 30 miles away from her birthplace. Wow, she was 102 years old! Her tombstone has her name inscribed as “F. Ava Hanke.” She married Silas A. Hanke. Since Ava died just over ten years ago, hopefully, I’ll be able to find some descendants. An obituary would be really helpful!
UPDATE: It wasn’t an obituary, but I stumbled across an internet record indicating an address for a person I presume to be Ava’s son, living in Tacoma, Washington. The picture has made its way from Nebraska to Missouri to Arkansas and is now headed to family in Washington state. Another happy return!