Biography

Mary “Burdine” Brooks was born February 3, 1922, to Floy Brightwell Brooks and Mortimer Brooks. She grew up on the family farm outside of Iowa Falls, Iowa, and attended country schools until high school. She graduated from Ellsworth Junior College and received a teaching certificate from the Iowa State Teacher’s College (now the University of Northern Iowa).

She married William Harold Bartling on March 15, 1943, before his deployment to Italy in World War II. During this time, many employers in the United States has “marriage bars” where they would not hire married women or retain women as employees after marriage. Due to this, Bartling stopped teaching until after her husband left for Italy, when the marriage bars were lifted due to staffing shortages during the war.

When her husband returned in 1945, they moved to Black Hawk County, Iowa, to start their family. They lived in Evansdale, Iowa, and Cedar Falls, Iowa, and eventually settled in Waterloo, Iowa. During the 1950s and 1960s Bartling was a substitute teacher while being a homemaker and raising her children.

In her later years, Bartling wrote and published several articles in magazines. She also wrote recipes and poetry.

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