Interviews of family members at the reunion of August 2005.

Analysis of Joel Ninde’s Legacy in Mobile

Family knowledge of Joel Ninde’s success is cloudy at best. However, Georgia Engwall of Atlanta, Georgia, great granddaughter of Joel Ninde’s great-aunt Mollie Roberts Taylor, brought an original photo of Joel Ninde taken in Fort Wayne to the Roberts reunion of August 2005. This evidence that the family stayed in contact throughout Joel’s career and gives a strong indication that Joel’s status as an architect was known to her family at that time, though there is no evidence in the Mobile archives.

Lauren Patton Williams, granddaughter of Joel Ninde's great-aunt Virginia Roberts Eberlein, who attended the Roberts family reunion in August 2005, stated that she lived in Ft. Wayne, Indiana, the first year or two after her marriage in 1939. Lauren was completely surprised to learn that she had an ancestor who lived in Fort Wayne. Probably, the rich tapestry of Joel Ninde’s ancestors plus the fabric of her life in Mobile provided her with the incentive to pursue an architectural career in Fort Wayne; Joel’s legacy is unknown in Mobile.