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Your Stories Two weeks ago I wrote about family stories. I wanted to share one reader's response, as well as more thoughts on capturing family and local history stories. First, thanks to Carolyn Clark for sending along this memory:
My father's family members were all especially gifted storytellers. Every family gathering—whether a reunion, graduation, wedding or funeral—would end up with everyone crammed into the kitchen eating family favorites and listening to wonderful stories told on each other followed by someone else's version of said incident. My father and his two sisters were particularly detailed when telling their tales. I never tired of hearing them over and over. Actually, there was a great comfort in them (plus insight into growing up during the Depression) no matter how silly they were. My greatest regret is that I didn't have the presence of mind to tape-record those sessions. I'd give almost anything to have those voices and all that laughter on tape. Welcome to my world.
Similarly, my friend George Kelley in Old Glade Springs, Va., e-mailed me the other day about preparing for a bicycle ride on the Virginia Creeper Trail, a rails-to-trails project. George told me he'd happened to mention to friends that he was going to ride the trail and "That opened a flood gate of information." He went on:
What do you think of the notion of being a historical tales collector? No matter where I travel, it seems I pick up stories here and there-so why not begin putting them in a document I can donate to a historical society or local genealogical society? I'm wondering what kind of fantastic document we could create if everyone reading this newsletter sent in one local history story that might otherwise be lost to time. What do you think?
• Oral History Association
• Preserving Local History
• Historical Societies Directory
• Historical Societies and State Archives
• Genealogy Organizations at Yahoo!
Contact your local genealogy or historical society for information on how you can help preserve local history.
Nancy Hendrickson is a contributing editor for Family Tree Magazine. She also is a family historian, freelance writer
and the author of two astronomy books. Her Web site
is at www.ancestornews.com. E-mail her at stjoemo@pobox.com.
by Nancy Hendrickson
Family stories give a Technicolor punch to genealogy!
Speaking of stories . . . I don't know if it's age or curiosity, but the older I get, the more my ears prick up when I hear stories that need to be preserved. For example, on my recent Florida trip, my brother told me about the man after which his street was named, and how the street name is actually pronounced differently from how it looks. "What's going to happen in 100 years," he asked, when no one knows that story?"
In his youth, my friend Bob sorted mail in a mail car pulled by the Virginia Creeper from Abingdon to West Jefferson, NC. He told how the telegrapher at the train station in Damascus would go through the passenger car and take lunch orders from the passengers. This info he telegraphed to the Green Cove Station [shown in the photo, used with permission from David Cortner] where the telegrapher would deliver the picnic lunch orders to Mrs. Buchanan next door (now a bed and breakfast). Mrs. Buchanan would prepare the orders and have them at the station when the train arrived.
And the stories kept coming. George said he was going to type up the tales and take them to his local Washington County, Va., historical society. What if your ancestor were associated with the early days of this railroad line—wouldn't it be great to read these stories?
www.dickinson.edu/organizations/oha
www.vermontcommunityworks.org/cwresources/cwtools/communitytools/howto-oralhistgs/howto-oralhistgs.html
www.daddezio.com/society/hill/index.html
http://web.syr.edu/~jryan/infopro/hs.html
dir.yahoo.com/Arts/Humanities/History/Genealogy/Organizations
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