Ora Ray Baker

The adventure of traveling was not just limited to Inayat’s side of this story. Traveling was also very much a part of Ora’s life, as was delving into spirituality and musical history within her family.

Ora Ray Baker was born in Albuquerque, New Mexico, on the other side of the globe, far from Inayat’s residence in Baroda in Gujarat.

Ora’s mother, Alletta Margaret Hiatt, came from a titled family that traced its lineage to Switzerland and went by the name of Kemp, while her father, Eurastus Warren Baker, was both a newspaper editor and a lawyer. Alletta was Baker’s second wife; his first spouse had been a distant cousin named Catherine Givens, and their son was Pierre Bernard.

Ora’s status as an adored upper-class American woman and her close relationship with her father Eurastus gave her access to travel in the early 20th century. Like Inayat, Ora toured the country with her father, even performing daring feats such as climbing the Statue of Liberty with him, going so far as to stand atop the statue’s head. Eurastus encouraged Ora’s affinity for traveling in other ways as well, as he purchased 25 traveling trunks for her, each trunk packed with a full wardrobe and accessories.

Ora traveled not only with her father, but also with her half-brother Pierre as well. One of their journeys across the United States eventually led to her meeting with Inayat. Her regular destinations while she was living under Pierre’s care were Kansas City (perhaps to visit her grandmother), Seattle, and San Francisco.

Pierre, for reasons not stated in We Rubies Four, seemed to have had some sort of  falling out with his and Ora’s father. Not only did Pierre refuse to maintain connections with Eurastus, but he also took on his stepfather’s surname, changing from Baker to Bernard, as well as changing his original first name Peter to the more French-sounding Pierre. He tried to replicate this change in Ora’s name as well, referring to her as "Ora Marcelle Bernard" when she lived under his roof. 27

Ora’s traveling, accessible to her because of socioeconomic status, made her and her family stand out against the American landscape of the 1900s. But it was not only travel that distinguished her family—their spiritual practices also marked a departure from the mainstream.

According to family legend, Mary Baker Eddy, the American woman who founded the Christian Science Movement, was a cousin of Ora’s mother Alletta.28 In addition to Eddy, there was the case of Pierre, who had reportedly traveled to both Kashmir and Bengal in India.