The fourth surviving child of Andreas Gar and his wife Eva Seidelmann was Elizabeth Barbara Gaar who was born in Bavaria 11 Feb 1730. In Virginia, she married Michael Blankenbaker, the son of John Nicholas Blankenbaker and Apollonia Kaifer. Michael was the brother of Dorothy Blankenbaker, who married Elizabeth Barbara's brother Lawrence. Seven daughters are given in the book " Garr Genealogy " with estimated birth years (one seems to be known exactly). Using the dates from the book, the seven daughters were:
Several of the estimated birth dates above are in error, some by a significant number of years. Some information on this subject comes, not from birth and baptismal records, but from confirmations at the church. Three of the girls have recorded confirmations, and two of these give the ages of the girls. The confirmation record does not give the parents' names, but the women can be assigned confidently to Michael and Elizabeth Barbara, because no other Blankenbaker family duplicates these names.
Rosanna was confirmed in 1785 at the age of 18 so she was born in 1766/7, not 1763. Eleanor was confirmed at 16 in 1782, so she was born in 1765/6, not 1755. Jemima was confirmed in 1777, age not specified but say 17 which was a typical age. This would make her birth year ca 1760, not 1745.
There is no reason to assign a birth year of 1747 to Mary since her children appear from 1774 to 1788. The birth date given for Margaret is consistent with the appearance of her children. Elizabeth was the second wife of her husband, and children appear from 1768 to 1793. Christina's husband was born ca 1762/3 and they were married in 1783. From the confirmations, the one specific date, ages of the husbands, and appearance of the children, the birth dates that I would assign are:
Under this assignment, Elizabeth Barbara, the mother, would have been 37 when Rosanna, the last child, was born. Also the mother would have been 19 when Margaret was born, not 15 as the Garr Genealogy would have her.
We gratefully acknowledge the work of John Blankenbaker who published over 2,500 Germanna History Notes via the Germanna-L@rootsweb.com email list from 1997 to 2008. We are equally thankful to George Durman (Sgt. George) for hosting the list and republishing the notes via rootsweb.com.