Details

Collection Summary
Collection: A - A Collection
Folder: 0000.000
Item: 1697_00001
Title: Mrs. Anna (Leoy Reichensperger) Udermann and Mrs. Margaret (Barr) Roberts on horses in Medora, Billings County (N.D.)
Date: 1880
Creator: Ingersoll, T. W.--(Truman Ward),--1862-1922
Inscription/Marks: [in gold on edge of cabinet card] Ingersoll, St. Paul [back of photo] A1697-1 Ana Udderman, Mrs. Roberts, Madora N.D. Mrs. Roberts in the foreground. [red stamp] State Historical Society of North Dakota. [Letter from Glanville Smith, Cold Spring, Minnesota dated May 22, 1935-see case file] North Dakota Historical Society, Bismarck North Dakota. Gentlemen: The enclosed photographs hkave been given me by Miss Rufina Friedman of this village, or rather, I rescued them from a house-cleaning bonfire she was igniting thinking that if they were to be destroyed it had best be done by persons like yourselves. Miss Friedman's father (Daniel F.) was employied on Teddy Roosevelt's North Dakota ranch as cowboy; Charles Reichensberger lately of Waite Park, Minnesota was another cowboy there. The cook was a Mrs. Roberts (the one in the foreground); when the whole bunch were invited to Washington to the inauguration only she went. She had a short velvet jacket made for the occasion, cut very full over the hips. I have no information relative to Ana Uderman, but perhaps her name as well as the other two will have meaning for a student of the by-ways of your state's histor. If you caare to add the photographs to your collection pray do so; if not, destroy them. Yours truly, Glanville Smith. Miss Friedman's photographs of her father in those ranch days she is, of course, reserving.
Summary: Two women seated side saddle on horses, Mrs. Margaret (Barr) Roberts photo right and Mrs. Anna (Leoy Reichensperger) Udermann behind her. They are dressed in dark riding dresses with bowler type hats decorated with dark feathers. They are standing amid brush and trees with the buttes in the distance. Anna was there visiting with her son, Charles M. Reichensperger, who was a cowboy on Theodore Roosevelt's ranch. (see A1697-00002) __[biography] Margaret Barr Roberts (1853-1938) was a rancher, an entrepreneur, a single mother, and a friend to Theodore Roosevelt. She was born on September 15, 1853, in Ireland. She immigrated to the United States with her family ca. 1854, when she was just an infant. She married John Lloyd Roberts, a butcher and a cattle dealer, in April 1871. In 1878-79 Roberts was a contract supplier of beef to the United States Army. By 1882 he was the foreman of the famed Custer Trail Ranch a few miles south of today’s Medora, North Dakota, on the east bank of the Little Missouri River. In 1883, at Margaret’s suggestion, the family created the Sloping Bottom Ranch approximately ten miles south of the Northern Pacific Railroad tracks. In late 1886, during the hardest winter on record on the northern Great Plains, John Lloyd Roberts disappeared. He left for Cheyenne, Wyoming, with two thousand dollars in his pocket. He was never heard from again. Margaret Roberts believed that he had been murdered for the cash he was carrying. At the age of 33, she was suddenly alone with five young children, all daughters, on a modest ranch, in a region where women were few in number and single women virtually non-existent. At the time of her “widowhood,” Margaret’s property consisted of nothing more than the house John had built for her at the Sloping Bottom Ranch, a dozen head of cattle, five horses, and a small flock of sheep. Roberts determined to stay on in the Little Missouri River valley. While holding the ranch together as well as she could, Margaret sold meat, butter, eggs, wild fruit, and garden produce to neighboring ranchers and Medora hotels and restaurants to support her young family. She also did laundry, sewing, and knitting for area cowboys. Theodore Roosevelt regarded her as a woman of courage, intelligence, and culture. Partly thanks to his support, she became known as the “First Lady of the Badlands.” Theodore Roosevelt met Margaret Roberts at least twice in the years following his Dakota sojourn: in 1903 when he traveled through North Dakota as president, and once toward the end of his life when he passed by train through Dickinson. On both occasions he singled her out in the crowd and asked that she be brought forward to talk with him. On the 1903 journey, he informed the crowd she was "the most wonderful little woman in the Bad Lands." In 1906 Mrs. Roberts moved to Dickinson, North Dakota, where she operated a boarding house. She also continued to provide a range of practical services to the public, and she is said to have become a kind of informal banker in the community. She eventually wrote a short account of her relations with Roosevelt. She died on April 9, 1938, in Dickinson. Her grandson Harry Roberts wrote extensively of the family’s adventures in western North Dakota. He was also for many years the site supervisor for the Chateau de Mores in Medora, North Dakota. [source: Theodore Roosevelt Center Dickinson N.D. http://www.theodorerooseveltcenter.org/Learn-About-TR/TR-Encyclopedia/Dakota-and-Ranching/Margaret-Roberts ] [biography] Anna Leoy Reichensperger Udermann born in 1830 in Rheinfande, Prussia. She married first, Karl Reichensperger (1828-1866) in 1849 in Germany. They emigrated to United States in 1851. Karl and Anna had five children: Elizabeth (1857-1940), John (1859-1943), Charles M.(1861-1914), Anna (1863-1902), and Gertrude (1865-1945). After her husband Karls death on March 5, 1866 in St. Cloud, Stearns County, Minnesota, she married Joseph Udermann in June of 1868. Joseph was a farmer and lived in St. Joseph, Stearns County, Minnesota. Anna and Joseph had ten children, seven of which survived in 1900. In 1903 Joseph died of blood poisoning and is buried in the St. Joseph Cemetery. Anna passed in 1907 and is buried in the same cemetery.
Red ID: PH_I_93229 Image ID: 37376 Image Notes: A1697-00001

Collection: A Digitized Images from Collection
Title: A Collection
Date: XX/XXXX

Summary:

Collection Summary
Collection: A - A Collection
Folder: 0000.000
Item: 1697_00001
Title: Mrs. Anna (Leoy Reichensperger) Udermann and Mrs. Margaret (Barr) Roberts on horses in Medora, Billings County (N.D.)
Date: 1880
Creator: Ingersoll, T. W.--(Truman Ward),--1862-1922
Inscription/Marks: [in gold on edge of cabinet card] Ingersoll, St. Paul [back of photo] A1697-1 Ana Udderman, Mrs. Roberts, Madora N.D. Mrs. Roberts in the foreground. [red stamp] State Historical Society of North Dakota. [Letter from Glanville Smith, Cold Spring, Minnesota dated May 22, 1935-see case file] North Dakota Historical Society, Bismarck North Dakota. Gentlemen: The enclosed photographs hkave been given me by Miss Rufina Friedman of this village, or rather, I rescued them from a house-cleaning bonfire she was igniting thinking that if they were to be destroyed it had best be done by persons like yourselves. Miss Friedman's father (Daniel F.) was employied on Teddy Roosevelt's North Dakota ranch as cowboy; Charles Reichensberger lately of Waite Park, Minnesota was another cowboy there. The cook was a Mrs. Roberts (the one in the foreground); when the whole bunch were invited to Washington to the inauguration only she went. She had a short velvet jacket made for the occasion, cut very full over the hips. I have no information relative to Ana Uderman, but perhaps her name as well as the other two will have meaning for a student of the by-ways of your state's histor. If you caare to add the photographs to your collection pray do so; if not, destroy them. Yours truly, Glanville Smith. Miss Friedman's photographs of her father in those ranch days she is, of course, reserving.
Summary: Two women seated side saddle on horses, Mrs. Margaret (Barr) Roberts photo right and Mrs. Anna (Leoy Reichensperger) Udermann behind her. They are dressed in dark riding dresses with bowler type hats decorated with dark feathers. They are standing amid brush and trees with the buttes in the distance. Anna was there visiting with her son, Charles M. Reichensperger, who was a cowboy on Theodore Roosevelt's ranch. (see A1697-00002) __[biography] Margaret Barr Roberts (1853-1938) was a rancher, an entrepreneur, a single mother, and a friend to Theodore Roosevelt. She was born on September 15, 1853, in Ireland. She immigrated to the United States with her family ca. 1854, when she was just an infant. She married John Lloyd Roberts, a butcher and a cattle dealer, in April 1871. In 1878-79 Roberts was a contract supplier of beef to the United States Army. By 1882 he was the foreman of the famed Custer Trail Ranch a few miles south of today’s Medora, North Dakota, on the east bank of the Little Missouri River. In 1883, at Margaret’s suggestion, the family created the Sloping Bottom Ranch approximately ten miles south of the Northern Pacific Railroad tracks. In late 1886, during the hardest winter on record on the northern Great Plains, John Lloyd Roberts disappeared. He left for Cheyenne, Wyoming, with two thousand dollars in his pocket. He was never heard from again. Margaret Roberts believed that he had been murdered for the cash he was carrying. At the age of 33, she was suddenly alone with five young children, all daughters, on a modest ranch, in a region where women were few in number and single women virtually non-existent. At the time of her “widowhood,” Margaret’s property consisted of nothing more than the house John had built for her at the Sloping Bottom Ranch, a dozen head of cattle, five horses, and a small flock of sheep. Roberts determined to stay on in the Little Missouri River valley. While holding the ranch together as well as she could, Margaret sold meat, butter, eggs, wild fruit, and garden produce to neighboring ranchers and Medora hotels and restaurants to support her young family. She also did laundry, sewing, and knitting for area cowboys. Theodore Roosevelt regarded her as a woman of courage, intelligence, and culture. Partly thanks to his support, she became known as the “First Lady of the Badlands.” Theodore Roosevelt met Margaret Roberts at least twice in the years following his Dakota sojourn: in 1903 when he traveled through North Dakota as president, and once toward the end of his life when he passed by train through Dickinson. On both occasions he singled her out in the crowd and asked that she be brought forward to talk with him. On the 1903 journey, he informed the crowd she was "the most wonderful little woman in the Bad Lands." In 1906 Mrs. Roberts moved to Dickinson, North Dakota, where she operated a boarding house. She also continued to provide a range of practical services to the public, and she is said to have become a kind of informal banker in the community. She eventually wrote a short account of her relations with Roosevelt. She died on April 9, 1938, in Dickinson. Her grandson Harry Roberts wrote extensively of the family’s adventures in western North Dakota. He was also for many years the site supervisor for the Chateau de Mores in Medora, North Dakota. [source: Theodore Roosevelt Center Dickinson N.D. http://www.theodorerooseveltcenter.org/Learn-About-TR/TR-Encyclopedia/Dakota-and-Ranching/Margaret-Roberts ] [biography] Anna Leoy Reichensperger Udermann born in 1830 in Rheinfande, Prussia. She married first, Karl Reichensperger (1828-1866) in 1849 in Germany. They emigrated to United States in 1851. Karl and Anna had five children: Elizabeth (1857-1940), John (1859-1943), Charles M.(1861-1914), Anna (1863-1902), and Gertrude (1865-1945). After her husband Karls death on March 5, 1866 in St. Cloud, Stearns County, Minnesota, she married Joseph Udermann in June of 1868. Joseph was a farmer and lived in St. Joseph, Stearns County, Minnesota. Anna and Joseph had ten children, seven of which survived in 1900. In 1903 Joseph died of blood poisoning and is buried in the St. Joseph Cemetery. Anna passed in 1907 and is buried in the same cemetery.
Red ID: PH_I_93229 Image ID: 37377 Image Notes: A1697-00001-back

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