Creating a Family History Geography Road Trip

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1 The Old Shoebox Newsletter by Marlo E. Schuldt c Copyright 2014 Volume 8 #1 Road Trip We live in a fast changing world. The old home and buildings on our grandparent s farm may have been torn down when the farm was sold. In the 1960 s I worked at this Conoco gas station with my dad. The job helped me earn spending money. I worked each day after school and on weekends. My dad taught me how to work on cars which benefits me to this day. This job paid for my gas and the first used car I purchased after graduating from high school. Many memories are associated with this location and photo. The home we grew up in may have been extensively remodeled making it almost unrecognizable and hard to find. Many of the landmarks and places we visited as children have changed or no longer exist. The context of our personal history and geographic clues are changing, deteriorating and disappearing before our eyes. It s time to take the family on a Road Trip! Preservation - It s Now or Never! Changes in our personal geography makes family history more abstract, less tangible and difficult for our children to comprehend when all that s left are a few old photos and stories told out of context at family gatherings. Years later the service station was converted to a Mr. Brake business. The photo above was taken in 2009 showing yet another name change and repurposing to become a Domino s Pizza. I m glad the building continues to survive N W Marinus Baadsgaard traveled from Denmark to the United States in around At sixteen years of age, his first job was to heard sheep for his room and board. 1

2 During the winter months he lived in brick house out on an isolated farm. The old house was not an easy place to locate because it was out in the middle of an cow pasture. Several years ago an older relative guided us to the location of the farm. Recently we traveled to the old house but had a hard time finding it because it had disappeared. Century Old Brick Farm House Grandpa First Lived in Around N W No trace of the old brick home remained. We assumed It had been torn down because it was in very dangerous and unstable condition. The bricks were probably sold as antiques and may now be a part of a new home. We were able to compare the old photos and surroundings with our new photos (above). We also looked at the GPS location on the Internet to verify the old and new photos were of the same place. We are fortunate to have taken photos and coordinates back in 2005 since the house is now gone forever. We knew there would be problems at several of our family history locations because there were no structures remaining there to see and associate with a story. Many fond memories of fishing here as a boy with my parents on the Snake River at St. Anthony, Idaho. My children need to visit this place and see the eagle nest on the bridge Location of the Family Farm Home Today. House as it appeared many years ago N W Oc 2

3 The century old brick house had been torn down and the old family home on the family farm had been leveled to utilize more ground. Grandpa passed several years ago so he could not be there tell his life and death swimming story. Travel Back in Time - Take a Road Trip Recently we invited our brothers, sisters and their children to go on a short guided tour of their family history. Our goal was to visit the locations of stories and events from our personal history. Combining stories with photos at each stop helped everyone feel more connected with the events in their family history. Geographical Landmarks Combined With Stories Enrich and Make the Experience Real and Tangible Heritage Collector was used to print a GPS map. It had correspondingly numbered photo thumbnails to assist with the navigation route marker to each location. Our tour began at the old farm home where great grandfather lived around The old brick home was gone making it difficult for the children to visualize where their great great grandfather had lived as a teenager. However, holding up and passing around the 2005 photo of the house while telling the story made it easy to associate the missing landmark with the story. Economic times were difficult in the early days and people worked hard just to feed their families. The children learned where their grandpa had worked at the sugar factory while standing in front of the old refinery. His mode of transportation was by foot during the summer heat, or the cold and snowy days of winter. The distance is now hard to visualize at ground level. However, looking at the terrain from a satellite view makes it easier to see how far grandpa had to travel each day. Children and their parents visit the graves and hear stories about their great grand parents N W We traveled in a caravan to each location, gathered everyone around, and shared a story that occurred at each location. Other previously unknown stories were spontaneously offered which enriched each experience. We gathered at the appointed time in the parking lot of a restaurant near an interstate highway. A brief summary was given about each of the places we planned to visit in case someone became separated during the journey. Photo of the old sugar processing plant today N W 3

4 Showing a photo of the missing family farm house while standing in front of the location makes it easier to visualize where the house stood (above). Comparing the photo of the farm house with the photo of grandma standing in front of the house makes it easy to verify where the photo was taken right). Preparing for Your Family History Road Trip 1. Create a Family History Geography collection. Import or copy photos into the collection. 2. Travel and take photos of all the remaining landmarks, homes and locations that have relevance to your family history. 3. Use a smart phone to associate GPS coordinates with each of the photos. Make sure your phone has the location option turned on so the photos will have GPS coordinates added as you take each photo. 4. Don t have a smart phone? Use the Get GPS option in the Edit Info option to get and associate coordinates. Right click on the thumbnail and select Edit Info. Click the Get GPS button. Oc Grandma standing in front of the family farm home. It appears they had just cut down a very large tree N W This will display a map. Zoom out and drag your cursor to the location of the image. Left click on the map. This will display the GPS coordinates in the upper left window. Click OK. This will return you to the photo display with the coordinates. Click the Save button. Refer to pages 41 and 49 In your manual or click the Help button at the bottom of the Edit Info display and then scroll down to the information about adding GPS coordinates to a photo. 4

5 select safe places to park along the road. 2. You may be making several U turns. Make the U turn BEFORE you stop at the site so everyone will ready to proceed to the next stop. This will save time and confusion before you start your presentation and help keep everyone together as you depart from each site. 3. Safety is critical since you will have children along the side of roads and highways that might be busy. Everyone needs to be vigilant in watching out for everyone standing on the side of a roadway. Grandchildren touching the same bricks laid by their great grandpa as he built the 60 foot chimney for this beautiful old school N W Preparing for Your Road Trip Tour of Discovery A little advanced planning and preparation can save frustration and time and make the experience more enjoyable for all attending. While in the GPS Track option, Print out a map for each family attending or for each car that will be in your caravan. This will help keep everyone together if you get separated along the journey. 1. Select the collection, click the GPS Tab and then click the GPS Track option. 2. Zoom down on the map to get a more detailed view listing the road and street names. 3. Click the Print button and select Map and Thumbnails with captions. 4. Review and give everyone a map before you start so you can all stay together. 5. Allow for extra time for stories and questions that will come up at each stop. 6. Take photos, video and audio recordings at each stop to capture the new information. 7. Add the new information to the geography collection. 8. For those who can not attend, there may be a desire to travel to these locations in the future to get more of a feel and to put it into perspective. Share the geography collection via a Gift CD /DVD or via a shared folder in Dropbox. Note that the thumbnails are numbered to correspond with the number on the orange pointer on the map. (See bottom of page three). Travel Suggestions 1. There may be several cars in your procession. Scout out in advance the route so you can Advanced Tip. Go into the GPS Track option. Clicking the Play button at the top left will cause a split screen slideshow to play with oral narrative while showing the photo and a GPS satellite view of the site of the location. 5