Tuesday, January 20, 2015

A box of old photos - So Many Memories

A few years ago, after my mother passed away, I volunteered to take the boxes and boxes of family photos that were left in my parents house.  There are over 80 years worth of photos, thousands of individual images, some of these precious photos go all the way back to the 1930’s. 

I decided that I really want to scan these photos, to save and preserve them for future generations.  I did some research and picked out a scanner.  I have only just begun to get through the pictures, but it has been a very moving experience to go through these boxes.  Hidden in these albums so far were; a picture of my Great Grandma holding my infant Grandmother in her arms, photos of my great uncle in his Navy uniform right before he was shipped out for World War II, pictures of my mother as a teenager in the 1940’s and1950’s, and a picture of all my siblings from 50 years ago, at what is obviously my first Christmas.  Its overwhelming, the incredible amount of memories stored in these boxes.  It is as if history has come alive right before my eyes. 


I still don’t know exactly how to work the scanner and do all the cool photo editing options, and I don’t have a fantastic plan for storing all these photos yet, but I am having so much fun going through the pictures.  Most of the photos are in those awful sticky back photo albums, so I have to be extremely carefully removing the photos.  On the bright side, my mom was really great about actually labeling quite a few of the photos, so for many of the pictures I know who is in the photo and when it was taken.  This has been tremendously helpful. 
I found a few photos of a famous Navy Vice Admiral from World War II and I wish I knew more about that story.  How did my Grandma know him?  Why were there photos of him?   I wish I knew more about all of the stories.  I only wish I had paid more attention to the stories that my mom and grandma told us.  They are no longer around to help fill in the details. 

My hope is to organize and scan all of the photos and have them available for my siblings to view/download also if they wanted to. These photos represent my history, and it is incredible to see these smiling faces staring up at me from the past.  I want to be able to share their stories with my daughters and I want to preserve their stories for many generations to come. 








14 comments:

  1. What a lovely post - ans fascination family/ world history in the photos. So many times we don'r label those photos because WE know who they'r of. There must be a family saga (my genre) in these for you. Good luck - and happy and many more memories

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    1. Thanks Judith, I am enjoying even the labels that my mom did write on some of the photos, just looking at her comments and her handwriting lets me 'visit' with her one more time. Thanks for stopping by my blog

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  2. Stopping by from Turn It Up Tuesday. You have a box of treasures. I spent time on ancestry.com tracing my ancestors. I'm in the process of trying to track photos from other family memories. Glad your going to preserve the pictures. Enjoy those memories.

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    1. Thanks Rhonda, I also tried the free trial membership on Ancestry, but its so hard to find the time and money to do all that I want to do. Thanks for stopping by my blog.

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  3. I love this post :) My dad passed away almost seven years ago, and I finally feel like doing the same thing. I have a bag and box of old photos that I want to go through (to start) and preserve for years to come. My sister just had a baby, and I want my niece and my sisters to be able to look at these pictures any time they want to. You have inspired me to begin my photo (and video) journey. Thank you. Lots of love to you <3 Holly

    findingmyeverydayhappy.blogspot.com

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    1. Thanks so much Holly - make sure you have the tissues ready, I am sure some of those photos will bring a few tears, but it is an amazing experience. Good Luck! Thanks for stopping by my blog

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  4. Hi Laurie,
    I love this post. I love old black and white photos and history. I think so many of these images tell a story of us all. Keep up the good work.
    E

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    1. Thanks so much Elizabeth - I am really enjoying this process, thanks for stopping by my blog

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  5. This is AMAZING!! I love looking at old pictures...especially ones of family. Thank you for sharing with us!

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    1. So glad you like it, thanks for stopping by my blog!

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  6. What a treasure to have all of those pictures. I'd get the scanning out of the way and edit them later. I have a box of slides. I wish I had known that there was a slide feature of scanners before I bought the one I had. I'll have to send these slides somewhere to get them converted. Love your photos. The quality is excellent.

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    1. There were so many choices when picking out a scanner - I spent two weeks researching them before I chose the one I wanted and I still don't know most of the features it can do, but it feels great to get the photos saved electronically. I finally finished with all those awful sticky-backed albums, but I still have a lot of pictures to scan. Thanks for stopping by.

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  7. That second photo looks Edwardian to me. What a treasure trove!

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    1. Thanks! It has been so much fun to look through the photos, they really are a treasure

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