Say, Cheese!

Uncle Clarence, Aunt Margaret, Aunt Helen, Uncle Gus

Today is Camera Day, according to my weird and whacky holiday calendar. Once upon a time, taking a formal photograph was a big occasion.  This is our dad's older brother Clarence Bleam and his wife Margaret, with his sister Helen Bleam and her husband Harold (Gus) Helm. From the flowers and dresses, this is probably Clarence and Margaret's wedding portrait from the 1930's. It was taken at the Quakertown photographer's studio.

How do I know? I remember these sweet aunts and uncles from the 1950's and 60's. But the number of family members who can still say that is dwindling.

Studio portraits like this were displayed or maybe just kept in a box, along with snapshots. Photographs were expensive and always saved, which is why I have a scanned digital copy today.  It came from a real physical artifact, the thing dearest to the archivist's heart!

Helen and Gus (much later) enjoying punch

50th Wedding Anniversary?

If you're lucky enough to have inherited old family photographs, then what? A picture is just a picture without the names and stories.

These days, everyone has a digital camera in their pocket. For better or for worse (just watch the news) anything and everything is recorded on the spot. Digital photography has changed our lives in ways we couldn't have imagined.

More is not necessarily better. I have 13,548 digital images on this computer going back to 2004, the year I got my first digital camera. Each month I add dozens of new ones, along with scanned images of older snapshots.

Our life is all there: Amanda's college and Peace Corps years, her marriage, the babies, our vacations, holidays, pets, relatives, friends, parties, horses and hundreds of pictures of the garden and kids. The happy, the sad.  Sharing this digital family legacy is an enormous and interesting challenge. It makes a person nostalgic for the days of photograph albums.