A pair of signed studio photographs by important Japanese-American photographer Takuma Kajiwara (1876-1960) identified as capturing a young St. Louis woman named Elizabeth Gettings (1906-1993). Gettings is found frequently mentioned in late-1920's society pages of St. Louis papers as a student at National Park Seminary in Washington, D.C. and the niece of politician Jacob L. Babler and prominent physician Edmund A. Babler. She married an Arthur J. Hoeman in 1934 and moved to Califonia where she lived the rest of her life. 

Kajiwara, born in Fukuoka, Japan, was a prominent photographer and painter who came to St. Louis from Japan (following a brief stint studying in Seattle) for the 1904 World's Fair and stayed until 1936 when he relocated to New York. His time in St. Louis saw him develop a national reputation for portrait photography, particularly of women, of which these are fine and uncommon surviving examples to find in commerce. Prominent subjects of his St. Louis years included Zoe Akins and Emma Goldman. 

KAJIWARA, Takuma (photographer). [Pair of Takuma Kajiwara Studio Photographs]. St. Louis, Missouri : Kajiwara Studio, [ca. 1920's]. Two sepia toned photographic prints on approximately 14" x 10" card, each signed in pencil at lower right and each with a raised blind stamp: "KAJIWARA / STUDIO / ST LOUIS." Image areas approximately 9" x 5 1/2." Mild waviness to card edges well outside of image areas. Penciled catalog numbers to versos and each in the same seemingly original gray card folder with "PICTURES OF ELIZABETH GETTINGS" hand-written in pencil to exterior. All very good.