Joseph L. Baker was the Judge's only brother, and Florence Baker Burtis his only sister. Joe Baker was a noted athlete who still holds the Woodford County record, 48 feet and five inches in the shot put,¹ established in 1914, and he would have been a member of the American Olympic team but for his unfortunate death in a train wreck at Porter, Indiana in 1916. Frederick B. Baker still carries on the law practice under the name of Baker & Baker.

Robert A. Barracks, newspaperman, was born in El Paso on October 2, 1898, the son of Alfred Reuben and Lillian Pleasants Barracks. In 1907, weakened by scarlet fever, Robert was taken to New Mexico for his health. There the family lived in a copper mining camp sixty miles from a railroad, supplies coming in by mule train. "It was a great experience," Mr. Barracks now relates; "The men wore six-shooters, Indians still broke out of nearby reservations to cause trouble, and there were about sixty rattlesnakes to the mile."

The family then moved to Tuscola, Illinois, where Robert continued his education in the fourth grade, being in the seventh when his folks moved to Baton Rouge, Louisiana. While on the track team there, he held state records in the 100 yard dash and the high jump. Robert Barracks graduated from El Paso Township High School with the class of 1916 after he came back to El Paso with his parents. They moved to Decatur in 1917, where Robert attended but did not graduate from James Milliken University. Good in English composition, he collaborated on musical shows and was put on the staff of the Millidek. Money was scarce, so he got a job as a cub reporter with the Decatur Review, starting to work on his birthday, October 2, 1921. He had found the work for which he was fitted, and exactly three years later on another birthday, he became the city editor.

Continuing to think his birthday was his lucky day, Robert was married on October 2, 1925. Soon after, he became news editor of the Review and held that position until 1934 when he became managing editor of the East St. Louis Journal which the Review had purchased, taking over the job on October 2.

Barracks was commissioned a second lieutenant in the infantry of the Army Reserve Corps, after serving three years in the Illinois National Guard when he had been Decatur's entry as lightweight boxing champion of the 33rd Division. However, when World War II broke out, he joined the U. S. Navy and was commissioned a lieutenant in that service, reporting to New York as press officer for the naval district there. He graduated from the advanced Naval Intelligence School, did anti-submarine patrol work, and handled the navy publicity in the raising of the Normandie, the launching of the U. S. S. Missouri, and the repatriation of the Japanese. In 1944 he was ordered to Pearl Harbor as press officer for Admiral Chester W. Nimitz. On January 1, 1945 Barracks went to Guam as media officer in charge of press and

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