Memorabilia

No, not directly oral history. But an adjunct, something that often accompanies delving into someone's history. Letters, scrapbooks, diaries, mementos, or things. just. saved., that's what's in this category

Not your father’s iPod… well, actually it is (a Walkman)

For Sony Walkman’s 30th anniversary, 13-year old Scott Campbell tries it for a week. Hilarious for us oldsters to see our old fave equipment through a young-person’s eyes.

My dad had told me it was the iPod of its day.
He had told me it was big, but I hadn’t realised he meant THAT big. It was the size of a small book.

Size? cumbersome. Handy belt-clip, but with that weight? (you hafta read the article to find out its effect for current 13 year olds).

When I wore it walking down the street or going into shops, I got strange looks, a mixture of surprise and curiosity,... Read More

Posted by Susan A. Kitchens in • Audio • Audio: Hardware • Digitality • Longevity • Memorabilia
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News Roundup

Recent news stories that caught my eye from Austin TX, Lewiston NY, San Diego CA, Washington DC. Capturing stories of aging Mexican-Americans, Archival treasure-trove at Odd Fellows lodge, call for Washington DC secretaries, and the dwindling number of holocaust survivors.

Austin, Texas: Austin history project aims to preserve voices of elders.
Mexican American Oral History Project held a workshop this last weekend to train people to conduct interviews. Interviews will be conducted throughout the month of May. The article opens with a nice description of “the problem” that these oral histories seek to solve:

Many of us have parents and family who are entering the twilight of their rich lives. They have stories to tell — tales of bedazzling beauty... Read More

Posted by Susan A. Kitchens in • Memorabilia • Oral history in the news
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Restored Reel-to-Reel Tape Decks as Art.

A Gallery of Custom Tape Decks, wherein Jeff Jacobs restores old audio technology as art, via BoingBoing Gadgets. I love the meta-line here. Jacobs restores tape decks, which I think of as tools for restoring (and digitizing) audio. If tape decks are art, then there’s a ton of art at Richard Hess’s audio tape restoration studio! In decades to come, when those machines grow ever scarcer, the BoingBoing post points to another source to find those long-obsolete tape decks of the world: the personal collections of geeks.

Posted by Susan A. Kitchens in • Audio • Audio: Hardware • Longevity • Memorabilia • Restoration
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It’s our past coming back to life

Wow. 32-page typewritten transcript — from 100 years ago — provides a description of a pictoral history of Sioux nation. The Twin Cites (MN) family finds it in a trunk of Grandma’s old possessions (Great-Grandma typed it up), and gives a copy of it to members of the Lakota tribe.

Libby Holden [pictured with transcript, above] said her grandmother, who inherited the oral history, never spoke about it. It’s possible she never knew she had the document. When she died, her possessions were stored at the family’s printing company.

Last summer, Libby Holden and several other family members began sorting through the items. Holden says one big musty old trunk was especially interesting. [... It] contained the White Horse oral history. She said it’s possible the items were packed away... Read More

Posted by Susan A. Kitchens in • Memorabilia • Oral history in the news
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Jeannette Rankin, first woman congressperson

Transcript of an oral history interview with Rankin. I just read two letters written by my Great Grandma Fannie in 1917 that refer to Jeanette Rankin (she was elected in 1916, began her term in Congress in April, 1917… This was when the state of Montana granted women the right to vote, but before the right to vote was won nationwide.). Rankin wrote my great-grandmother to ask her advice on matters of “Indian Affairs.” Fannie taught school on the Crow reservation.

Posted by Susan A. Kitchens in • Memorabilia • Oral History Projects • Personal History
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Shades of the Departed Guest Blog

Hooray for Footnote Maven, who invited me to guest blog at Shades of the Departed. My post is about interviewing people about photo albums. Why photos rock, and what sorts of practical things you can do during an interview. You may already be a winner! Read the entry to find out why. (I certainly won-in a slightly different way. Thanks to fM for the nudge to write that post. If it weren’t for that deadline, I might’ve waited a little while longer before blogging here again.)

Posted by Susan A. Kitchens in • Interviewing • Memorabilia • Personal History • Photographs
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Creating Memories Using Maps

A blog called Very Spatial links to a number of sources for using maps to create (or preserve) memories. An old post here was one destination, but the others in the post are worth a peek. Did you know the USGS has a Maps and Genealogy page?

Posted by Susan A. Kitchens in • Memorabilia • Personal History
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Holiday visits: Witness to an Interview

Photo albums are a thing of beauty. I got to witness an oral history interview about a photo album on my Christmas holiday travels. I was the silent third party, operating the equipment, and asking the occasional question to pull out a few more details. Son brings Father a photo album, put together by Son’s Mother. The album was discovered after Mother’s death. It covers the time in Mother’s and Father’s early life together, before the kids were born, and before the Mother and Father’s divorce. Father is the only one alive who can describe what’s going on in the photos. Here are a few observations I made about interviewing with photo albums.

Photos are a fabulous memory trigger. When sparking a conversation about someone’s recollections, how do you get to the well of memories inside a person’s mind? Questions may trigger… they are words to tap that well, but that recollection-well still resides inside the person’s mind. Pictures are external triggers. They bring back the memories for the interviewee. Plus, being external, the interviewer can make his or her own observations about what’s in the picture, and use them to elicit more... Read More

Posted by Susan A. Kitchens in • Interviewing • Memorabilia • Photographs
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Contents of attic seeks family

In New Zealand, discovery of a suitcase full of memorabilia. Family sought— Mr. Gale or Alma Ansin. [via Megan’s Roots World]

The suitcase, filled with family photographs and personal letters, was found last Friday by builders working in the attic of Caleb Fryatt’s Tweed St home.

Mr Fryatt is hoping to find relatives of the person who owned the case and has appealed for them to get in touch.

He first found out about the suitcase on Monday when he received a phone call from Peter Gooding of Renovation Masters.

Mr Fryatt said he was amazed to find what it contained.

“The stuff in there is just incredible. It’s a very interesting find,” he said. “Once you start looking through it, you don’t want to stop. It’s pretty addictive.”

Among the letters and photos are military buttons, death certificates and clippings from the Bay of Plenty Times dating back to 1939.

Posted by Susan A. Kitchens in • Memorabilia
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Historic online eye candy

Grandma’s ‘37 Road Trip. Not digital scrapbooking, but a scrapbook, digitized. [via Making Light Particles] Hmm. I’ve got a scrapbook that includes Grandma climbing Mt. Rainier. Hmmm. scanfest? Oh, that was Sunday.

Posted by Susan A. Kitchens in • Memorabilia
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A blaze of story

Southern California is burning up. Again. best wishes to Randy Seaver of Genea-Musings. I just saw that evacuations are being issued for Chula Vista, where he lives.

My brother lives in San Diego county; he got a 6am robo-call saying No School and other local news alerts related to fires in the area. I always think about the things I’d take if I had to (bummer about that small car!). In his case, he keeps meaning to unearth a tape he made with our Grandpa. Er, this is a thought I have on his behalf, not a thought he has.

Also, the San Bernardino Mountain fire is... Read More

Posted by Susan A. Kitchens in • Memorabilia • Personal History
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NY Times to open up old archives

(upated) The news story as others see it: The paywall’s coming down. But this little tidbit about old, old archives caught my eye:

In addition to opening the entire site to all readers, The Times will also make available its archives from 1987 to the present without charge, as well as those from 1851 to 1922, which are in the public domain.

Score!!! I’m reading letters from around this time. Stories about my grandmother appeared in the NYTimes. There’s gotta be other stuff that’s just plain interesting that’ll appear.

UPDATE: Here’s a press release that discusses the fate of stories between 1923 and 1986: “Archives for the years 1923 - 1986 are available to be purchased in single or 10-article packages.”

Posted by Susan A. Kitchens in • History • Memorabilia
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Papa’s Diary Project

New blog discovery! Blogging grandpa’s 1924 diary. Matt Unger (grandson) transcribes Harry Scheurman (his grandfather)’s diary. An entry a day, a post a day. Plus commentary. [via Digitization 101] Another example of A small daily task that I mentioned in my Letters in the Attic post.

Posted by Susan A. Kitchens in • Cool Website • History • Memorabilia
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