1909 -  

Miriam Harder-Barnes, a pianist, singer, and conductor, taught in schools in Canada, the United States, India, and the Caribbean. Born in Hillsboro, Kansas, she spent her childhood in Saskatchewan, Canada, one of three daughters born to Peter John and Tina Loewen Harder.

She attended Battleford Academy, where in her senior year she and another student cared for the music program when the teacher became ill and was unable to finish the school year. Following graduation from BA in 1927, she entered Canadian Junior College, now Canadian University College, where in her first year as a student, she became assistant piano instructor. An article in the Western Canadian Tidings about a program she played in noted that she enjoyed a reputation as "a careful, painstaking, and altogether trustworthy accompanist."

Harder was hired to teach music at BA in 1929, where she taught until 1932, when she accepted a position at Oshawa Missionary College, now Kingsway College, as head of the music department. In 1936 she left OMC and taught in the fall quarter at Walla Walla College, now University, before leaving in January to be the music teacher at Vincent Hill School in India.

By the time of her coming to the U.S. to teach, Harder had completed a solo performer's diploma in piano and also an ATCM at the Toronto Conservatory of Music. She married J. R. Barnes on December 6, 1938, and would teach in India until 1942, when all Seventh-day Adventist missionaries in Burma and India were recalled because of World War II. She spent the final years of her career teaching in the East Caribbean Conference.

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