Margaret A. Barker is a writer, speaker and educator in the Chesapeake Bay area. She focuses on nature, especially birds and gardening.
Margaret has lived in all main parts of the wide, skinny state of Tennessee: Middle, West and East. But none of the distinct lilts, drawls or twangs ever “took.” Which proved fortunate.
Margaret was born at Vanderbilt University Hospital in Nashville, Tennessee to WWII B-24 co-pilot and Home Insurance employee Henry “Hank” McKinney Barker and French studies major, Marilyn June Barnes Ackerson Barker. She was the first of three children. Her brother Henry “Augie” followed just 15 months later. The family moved to Memphis when she was five, where sister, Mary “Molly” was born a year later. A few years after Molly’s birth, the Barker clan moved way across the state to Knoxville, the largest city in East Tennessee. In Knoxville, Margaret sang with the Episcopal Church of the Ascension choir. She acted with the University of Tennessee’s children’s Carousel Theater and served as a delegate to the YMCA’s Youth Legislature at the State Assembly in Nashville. In the winter of her Sophomore year of high school, the family moved again, this time far out of state—to West Germany near the Frankfurt area. Her father’s new job was coordinating tactical aircraft refueling exercises for US Air Forces in Europe. The Air National Guard project was called, Operation Creek Party.
While Dad remained abroad, the rest of the family—mother, brother and sister—returned home to Knoxville. This was mainly to finish Margaret’s Senior year and make plans for college. Margaret focused on theater and appeared in several school productions, including Teahouse of the August Moon and The Serpent. For the latter, she won the state’s Best Actress Award. After a competition, she was chosen to be a graduation speaker. Her talk began, “Peace now. Peace now. It didn’t work.”
Margaret set a goal to follow her parents’ footsteps and attend college in Virginia. Her mother had graduated from Sweet Briar and her father from Washington and Lee University (Hank went to W&L after the war. Prior to the war, he attended Dartmouth College in New Hampshire at just age 16. On December 7, 1941, upon learning from the student-run radio that the Japanese had attacked Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, he vowed then and there to leave college, learn to fly, join the Army-Air Corps and join the war. Which he did. Eventually he was based at Old Buckenham, England, as part of the 453rd bomb group.). Just a few weeks after high school graduation, Margaret enrolled for summer studies at Madison College (now James Madison University) in Harrisonburg, Virginia, a school that had caught her eye on trips to and from her maternal Ackerson grandparents’ home in Wilkes Barre, Pennsylvania. It also had a good theater department, and, for an out-of-state student, was relatively affordable. At the time, Madison’s main campus was situated along Route 11, while the “modern” student dorms abutted Interstate 81.
Margaret has lived in all main parts of the wide, skinny state of Tennessee: Middle, West and East. But none of the distinct lilts, drawls or twangs ever “took.” Which proved fortunate.
Margaret was born at Vanderbilt University Hospital in Nashville, Tennessee to WWII B-24 co-pilot and Home Insurance employee Henry “Hank” McKinney Barker and French studies major, Marilyn June Barnes Ackerson Barker. She was the first of three children. Her brother Henry “Augie” followed just 15 months later. The family moved to Memphis when she was five, where sister, Mary “Molly” was born a year later. A few years after Molly’s birth, the Barker clan moved way across the state to Knoxville, the largest city in East Tennessee. In Knoxville, Margaret sang with the Episcopal Church of the Ascension choir. She acted with the University of Tennessee’s children’s Carousel Theater and served as a delegate to the YMCA’s Youth Legislature at the State Assembly in Nashville. In the winter of her Sophomore year of high school, the family moved again, this time far out of state—to West Germany near the Frankfurt area. Her father’s new job was coordinating tactical aircraft refueling exercises for US Air Forces in Europe. The Air National Guard project was called, Operation Creek Party.
While Dad remained abroad, the rest of the family—mother, brother and sister—returned home to Knoxville. This was mainly to finish Margaret’s Senior year and make plans for college. Margaret focused on theater and appeared in several school productions, including Teahouse of the August Moon and The Serpent. For the latter, she won the state’s Best Actress Award. After a competition, she was chosen to be a graduation speaker. Her talk began, “Peace now. Peace now. It didn’t work.”
Margaret set a goal to follow her parents’ footsteps and attend college in Virginia. Her mother had graduated from Sweet Briar and her father from Washington and Lee University (Hank went to W&L after the war. Prior to the war, he attended Dartmouth College in New Hampshire at just age 16. On December 7, 1941, upon learning from the student-run radio that the Japanese had attacked Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, he vowed then and there to leave college, learn to fly, join the Army-Air Corps and join the war. Which he did. Eventually he was based at Old Buckenham, England, as part of the 453rd bomb group.). Just a few weeks after high school graduation, Margaret enrolled for summer studies at Madison College (now James Madison University) in Harrisonburg, Virginia, a school that had caught her eye on trips to and from her maternal Ackerson grandparents’ home in Wilkes Barre, Pennsylvania. It also had a good theater department, and, for an out-of-state student, was relatively affordable. At the time, Madison’s main campus was situated along Route 11, while the “modern” student dorms abutted Interstate 81.