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During a recent trip to a storage unit, I came across a big box of documents from a great-aunt who was heavily into genealogy. I got these years ago and had forgotten about them until now.
Her own hand-written trees go back to 1774, and after about 20 minutes on the internet using her documents, I could go back even further to 1517. That was cool.
There are a couple of diaries as well as a few other documents that I am wondering if I should try to make available to others (aside from saving these and passing them along to the next generation in our family). I have no idea where I would start.
Using google, I was able to determine that one of the documents was false. But I didn't make any headway on the others.
Any suggestions on where to go next would be greatly appreciated!
During a recent trip to a storage unit, I came across a big box of documents from a great-aunt who was heavily into genealogy. I got these years ago and had forgotten about them until now.
Her own hand-written trees go back to 1774, and after about 20 minutes on the internet using her documents, I could go back even further to 1517. That was cool.
Be careful, if you were using other trees as your resource, they may be inaccurate. There's a lot of erroneous info out there on trees.
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There are a couple of diaries as well as a few other documents that I am wondering if I should try to make available to others (aside from saving these and passing them along to the next generation in our family). I have no idea where I would start.
Digitizing them would be the place to start - do you have a scanner?
Yes I have a scanner but mine uses a feeder. They are a bit delicate, so I may need to go somewhere with a flat scanner.
Good point about records being inaccurate on-line. I was rather impressed to see that hers going back to 1774 matched almost 100% to several trees I found on-line. She did all of hers by writing letters to various people and offices all over the country.
One of the documents is a diary from the mid 1800's. That is the one that I would really like to find out more about, if it is real, etc. I tried a google search on the author's name but couldn't find anything.
When you have an ancestry.com account, can you communicate with other people who have created trees? I was thinking I might be able to confirm the author that way.
Get an ancestry.com tree, scan everything with a scanning app,upload,and make your tree public on ancestry.com.then everyone will have access to these great resources that she dedicated so much time to preserving.
I do transcriptions for a military museum. I am sure a local or state museum might be interested in the diaries. They also have the ability to digitalize them.
I have transcribed several diaries from the Civil War and WWI for the state museum which are donated as a gift.
I find myself wishing I had been able to talk to my great-aunt about these documents - but I think she died before I was in high school. The documents are kind of confusing. I can't figure out who the author is of one of the diaries - there are lots of people mentioned in the diary, but I don't know who wrote it. My two grandparents who would have known are dead. I do have an uncle that might know something, though. And he is still alive and in good health, so I need to ask him.
A flatbed scanner would probably make the best image but your average phone camera has enough resolution to capture an image from which you can print a good copy (and certainly preserve the information) and it's a lot faster and easier. Then laminate the originals and put them in permanent storage to pass down to the next generation.
I had a bad experience with pencil writing on a couple post cards. Once I started handling them the writing faded and can just barely be read -- after being left in a drawer for almost 100 years in the dark. I didn't expect pencil to fade.
One of the documents is a diary from the mid 1800's. That is the one that I would really like to find out more about, if it is real, etc. I tried a google search on the author's name but couldn't find anything.
When you have an ancestry.com account, can you communicate with other people who have created trees? I was thinking I might be able to confirm the author that way.
Is this the actual diary, or a hand-written copy by someone else? If it's the original, the rare book room at your local college or university library can tell you how to care for it and preserve it (ditto larger public libraries).
If original, a library or history museum in the area where the writer lived might be interested in adding the diary to their collections. You could still have a copy - photocopy or manuscript or printed -and you'd have the satisfaction of knowing that the original was being preserved and you might get a nice tax credit as well.
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