“Think for a moment about all of the records you’ve used in your family history research and what it took to preserve them. What are you thankful that was preserved (or what do you wish had been preserved)? What are you working to preserve?” prompt from Amy Johnson Crow for Week 40.
I have to say thank you to the government entities who carefully keep Census, Birth, Marriage and Death records and Military Information. Those are the skeleton of all my research. These records are the support system for any other details, mementos, articles etc. I am able to find. Whoever started preserving newspapers online was a genious. What a gift for future generations to be able to glimpse life back in the time our ancestors lived. I have found so many helpful tiny articles in the social news of the day.
I love all the photos my ancestors have left behind. I wish I had more because I am greedy like that. At the same time I feel very fortunate we have as many as we do. I don’t have any of my Koch family at all. They are the ones I would like to come across some where, some day. My Smith family was the best with photos, especially my grandaunt Mary whose photo album I treasure. I have all the photos scanned, individually and whole pages but I know I need to do something to preserve the photos as well. They are glued to the pages of the book which will eventually destroy the pictures. I am trying to scan everything I need to scan first and than I will go back and figure out what I need to do for preservation of the old photos.
We just got a new computer, at the same time we were dividing it up for each user. Somehow my ancestor folders ended up with double sets and they are a mess. I’m trying to straighten them out and make sure everything is labeled appropriately. I am not computer literate at all so this is a time sucking task. I’ll be glad when that is straightened out again. Keeping all of my computer records by family makes it much easier to find what I need for my posts and if someone asks me a question. Although they are much more likely to ask my sister because she can just remember everything.
I started a family group on Facebook because other people had done that for their families so they could work on family history together. They made it sound so fun to have people who would help them solve all the different family mysteries. It is nice to have a place where we can connect for important events. I found out one of my cousins has our grandfathers miners cap and street car conductor hat! She shared a photo, I think it is so amazing that these are preserved. thanks for sharing the photos Jeanette!
The tree I use the most is on Ancestry. I have it backed up to Family Tree Maker so I won’t lose it. My password is written down for my kids so they can take over my account some day if they want. I am trying to make notebooks for at least direct ancestors. I have more to do with this. So much to preserve like this snippet of my dad’s handwriting and an example of his mathematical mind.
I have a few yearbooks. My dad’s from Loyola, my mom’s from high school and my husband’s dads book from the ship he was on in the Navy during WWII. Trying not to handle these any more than I need to. I made scans of the important pages from each book.
I have a few articles of clothing. I want to make this dress of my mom’s into Christmas ornaments but I can’t seem to sew and do ancestry at the same time. The plan is one for myself and one for each of my brothers and sisters.
Noreen Thorfinnson Hartje Timian
Once my scanning is complete and my computer organized I plan to go back and do more preservation. I like Cyndi’s List for ideas on how to do this and what I will need. She has compiled masses of links for anything you might want to look up relating to genealogy, including preservation. Always a great resource.
I have a lot of work yet to do with preserving what I have and deciding what I need to keep and what I can just scan and let go. The letting go part is hard for me but trying to remember my kid’s won’t want everything. I like to be able to share what I have with any relatives who are interested. What treasures do you have? Have you found any preservation techniques that are helpful?
My Tree in the Forest 