Originally posted by Photogoof 11 kids????
It's not that surprising. Wasn't until the 50s/60s that these size of families really started to stop happening. My mom was the 2nd of 11 and born in 1950. When you didn't know if your kids would live to adulthood, or needed more hands on the farm, a large family was needed. There's a story of either my grandfather or great-grandfather getting busted for having a still as well.
It's always fascinating looking at old photos like these, especially when it's of family whom you only knew/remember from later in life and seeing them as kids or young adults. Seeing a photo of my grandparents, guessing shortly after WWII, I'd have never recognized them. Was a photo of them sitting in a restaurant and I'd swear they were movie stars or something. Never something I'd have associated with my grandparents as I knew them in their 70s/80s/90s after they'd already had 11 kids and I was the 6th or 7th grandkid already. (There's 10 years between my brother and I, though my youngest uncle is only about 4 years older then my brother.) Always had trouble picturing my grandfather in the Navy, as I knew him as portly, but in the photo he was a very good looking young man with a strong chiseled jaw. My grandmother was a beautiful young woman and I've a pair of twin cousins that are dead ringers for her. And since they are actresses, it goes to show that my grandmother would have had some potential.
>Sorry for rambling a bit there into some unrelated areas.