Blog

18
Sep

How to Be a Good Steward of Family Stories: a Professional Archivist’s Perspective on Estate Planning

Posted by | · · · · · · | Family Photo Resources | 1 Comment on How to Be a Good Steward of Family Stories: a Professional Archivist’s Perspective on Estate Planning

As the youngest of four children, with almost a decade between myself and the next oldest, I have always been fascinated with figuring out what went on in my family before my arrival. I vividly remember childhood afternoons spent poking through drawers, reading letters and poring over boxes and albums of photographs. As obsessed as I […]

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17
Sep

A Box of old Kodak Film Canisters Held a Treasure Trove of Family Photos

Posted by | · · · · · · · · | Featured Family Stories | No Comments on A Box of old Kodak Film Canisters Held a Treasure Trove of Family Photos

WANT TO HEAR A CRAZY STORY??!! (Yes, one that warrants all caps and two question marks.) . While we were in Utah for my grandpa’s funeral this summer, I happened upon a box that had Kodak canisters inside. Etched onto the rolls of film were dates: 1955-1956. . I was so excited imagining what parts […]

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15
Sep

Old Polaroid Snapshots Show my Grandmother’s Spunk and Strength

Posted by | · · · · · · · | Featured Family Stories | No Comments on Old Polaroid Snapshots Show my Grandmother’s Spunk and Strength

This is my Grandma Charlotte in 1968. Eleven years earlier, when she was still in high school, she got pregnant with my mom. Two years later, she had my uncle. When she was 22, their father left and she became a single mother. . Their lives were hard but she never gave up and she […]

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03
Sep

Discovering Undeveloped Family Film from the 1950s

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Chubby me, a few years ago. . This image is the result of discovering a perfectly intact medium format negative, which we found in a box full of other negatives, dating back as far as 1952. . My mom thought she had thrown them away, but luckily she remembered wrong. . Now we go through […]

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31
Aug

Family Beach Days Before the Days of Sunscreen

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Danny, Grandpa, and Dad on the beach near Galveston, Texas, circa 1959. . In those days, they let you drive your car onto the beach, and it became something like a mobile cabana. . ~shared by @thurmfamilyphotos View on Instagram →

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30
Aug

Mysterious Picture Found In an Attic Reveals the Truth about a World Champion Grandpa

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Many years after my grandfather and his second wife passed away, their house in the country stood abandoned and vandalized. Up in the attic, I found a lot of photos. In one particular box, I found a gold medal from 1948 and this photograph. My grandfather is the dapper guy on the left. When I […]

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25
Aug

Jack and Sugar: a Vintage Love Story for All Ages

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Jack Seitz and Charlotte Forbes were voted the best couple during high school. Just one year later, they eloped to Niagara Falls because Charlotte’s daddy, who was a Lutheran minister, did not approve of Jack’s Catholic background and refused to let them marry. One of the things I will always remember about my grandparents is […]

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14
Aug

5 Instagram Feeds You Should Be Following if You’re One of Those Folks Who Collects Vintage Photos of Strangers

Posted by | · · · · · · · | Family Photo Resources | No Comments on 5 Instagram Feeds You Should Be Following if You’re One of Those Folks Who Collects Vintage Photos of Strangers

If you’re anything like me, you can’t resist those boxes of old photos in thrift shops. They draw you in, like a moth to a flame. And before you know it, half an hour has passed and you’ve got a stack of pictures in your hand. And you don’t know a single person in them. […]

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13
Aug

From the Great Depression to the Twenty-first Century, my Grandma always had moxie

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Grandma. She’s the little girl standing front and center in the first photo. She just turned 95. . She likes to tell us that the family looks like share croppers in this picture. She was raised in Kansas and grew up during the Great Depression. One of her favorite stories to tell is about raising […]

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10
Aug

My Grandma Drove a Race Car

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My awesome grandmother and her awesome Firebird. . She was born and raised in London; her home was bombed by the Nazis while she and her family slept. . She met my grandfather in Germany while he was serving in the US Army. After they got married, they moved to Kentucky. Later, they moved to […]

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