Masha Arms’s niece, Mary Arms Marsh, was one of the photographer’s favorite subjects. Masha took Mary’s photograph when she was nine years old. Mary, the daughter of Katharine (Fuller) and Richard Arms of Deerfield, Massachusetts, looked after her Aunt Masha until her death in 2005. Originally from Fitchburg, Massachusetts, Masha Arms arrived in Washington, DC, during the Great Depression. After buying a Model G Leica camera in 1934, and teaching herself about the technical aspects of photography, she landed a job teaching photography at the King-Smith Studio School in 1936. Masha Arms’ work was published in a 1936 Washington Post review of the Junior League Gallery exhibition alongside photographs by Ansel Adams and Margaret Bourke-White. In 1941, when the United States entered World War II, Masha left Washington, married William Tyler Arms of Deerfield, Massachusetts, and moved back to New England.