Name/Title
Print, PhotographicEntry/Object ID
2008.017.0004Description
B/W photograph of the inside of Benicia High School classroom. Students are sitting at their desks. There are two adults (a man and woman) at the front of the class. Clara Virginia Rauhut Snyder is identified as the girl in the third row from the left in the first seat looking at the camera.
Taped to the back of the frame (now removed) was a typed sheet of paper that reads:
This photograph was originally donated to BUSD by Will Snyder (b. 1947), grandson of Clara Virginia Rauhut Snyder. Will Snyder is a school teacher in Fall River Mills, California. He has a keen interest in his family history and has been a genealogist since he was a boy. His grandmother, Clara Snyder, is the 10th person (counting from the left) and looking at the camera. She is in the third row, front seat.
Clara Virginia Rauhut was born on May 30, 1881, in Virginia City (her middle name), Nevada. Her parents were Charles August (1856-1938) and Christine Pauline Rauhut (1857-1911). They were first cousins who were born in Germany. Clara came from a family of 8 children, but only two lived. Her sister, Cecil Rauhut (1890-1935) was the only other surviving child. The Rauhuts moved to Benicia in 1884, where they remained for the next 15 years.
In 1886 Clara began attending public school in Benicia. She graduated from Benicia High School. While a student at Benicia, she studied Latin and Greek. She wrote for the Benicia High School Journal and was on the debate team. She won several prizes for reciting and spoke and wrote German fluently. After her family left Benicia, she went to San Francisco. From their she went to Germany where she graduated from Leipzig Conservatoire in 1904.
Upon returning to San Francisco, she became one of the best known pianists in the area. She married Benjamin Frederick Snyder on May 7, 1912 and they had four children: Jack (1913-1991), Robert (b. 1914), Ben (b. 1918) and Christine (1919-1974). Clara died in San Leandro in 1960.Collection
Benicia School Collection
