Family history *is* local history

My great-grandparents, Judson & Anna White, 1909.

 (Note: The foundational structure of the article below was written four years ago as part of an assignment during my tenure as features editor at The Enterprise Newspapers in Lynnwood, Wash. 

At the time, while digging into the microfiche archive, I discovered that the Enterprise was on the verge of its 50th year of publication. No one else seemed be aware of the milestone, or that the Enterprise could actually trace its beginnings even earlier in the 20th century. 

It got me to thinking about how quickly people, buildings, institutions and even traditions can come and go out of community memory so quickly. This article fleshes out the second part of the origins of this blog and its purpose. -- AM)

Before my breast cancer diagnosis two years ago, my husband and I were among that odd group of people you know who, instead of sleeping in on a Saturday morning, got up at the crack of dawn to go to “sale-ing” – i.e., garage sales, yard sales, rummage sales, moving sales and estate sales.

We each have our own little eclectic collections – he collects vinyl records, I collect Northwest nostalgia. He collects vintage barware, I collect vintage Halloween decorations. While our collecting interests are different, our “hobby” is one that allows us to spend time together that we otherwise might not be able to carve out for ourselves.   

We always had mixed feelings about attending estate sales, which generally take place following the death of a surviving spouse, or a lifelong bachelor uncle. It’s sobering to see a lifetime of someone’s cherished belongings indifferently picked through by strangers, who haggle to buy them for pennies on the dollar.

My enthusiasm was especially dampened when I saw boxes and albums of family photos being sold. I often stopped and thumbed through the photos, looking for images to add to my collection of familiar historical locations.

More often than not, I'd find dozens, sometimes hundreds, of images of people. People whose names are forever lost in time. There are 100 year old photos of someone’s great-grandparents in traditional ethnic wedding clothes. There are sepia-toned family portraits depicting multiple generations of one family. There are photos of summer vacations to Yellowstone, or perhaps Glacier National Park – but no one, except the long departed people in those photos, would know for sure.

My great-great grandfather, William White, with his children.

 At a time when we seem to be losing so many of the physical landmarks that give our communities context, on an individual level we are also rapidly losing the smaller, more intimate details of our personal histories.

Why is that? Is it because today’s families are scattered across greater distances than before, able to make transient connections at the touch of a button? Is it that younger generations move at an accelerated speed, and we find it difficult to slow down to the pace our elders move through the world at?

One of the most important things my mother was able to do with my grandmother before she passed away nine years ago was to sit down with her and go through all of our family photos. With more than one hundred years of history contained in boxes and albums, they had their work cut out for them. But in the end, it was worth it. Many afternoons later, they had catalogued the names and locations and anecdotes contained in hundreds of photos.

I've been reflecting further on the purpose of this blog. I’m hoping that by sharing some of the images and resources I've collected over the years, it might help encourage readers to sit down with their elder family members and talk about family history and genealogy. More importantly, to make an effort to document and preserve it – whether it’s writing names (in pencil of course) on the backs of old photos, or recording video or audio “interviews.”

Even if you personally have no interest or time, there is almost always someone in your family who does. And if you can’t find someone who wants to be your family historian, you can always donate photos and documents to your local historical museum. Those photos of your grandparents standing in front of an old gas station may seem insignificant to you, but to local historians, they are invaluable.