Labelling photos for posterity

[Davran]

My husband and I have been trying for some time to interest my father-in-law in the family history and have begged him to look at the old photos and say who is depicted in them. He was very reluctant to do so as he said it made him feel sad.

Unfortunately, he has now died and we are left with three drawers full of old photos, most of which have no labels on them and we obviously have no idea who some of the people are. Some we will be able to deduce from the few labelled photos and we have been able to visit my father-in-law's cousin who could name a few, but it is a sad waste of a wonderful family history resource. :(

So PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE label any photos of your family for the benefit of generations to come!

[Lillian Davies]

My cousin writes the details of a person in the photo on a sticky label and when completed sticks it to the back of the photo. This way the writing is not seen coming through and if a mistake is made it can be rewritten on a new label before sticking.
Lillian

[Wilkes_ml]

can you get acid free sticky labels, which don't fall off after a few years? I know sellotape is not good for documents. For original photos, I'm creating a scrap book with acid free materials which can be purchased in craft shops under the scrapbooking section.

Another option if you have computer, is to scan the original photos, and then label the copies using software. I would certainly recommend scanning all photos and backing up the files. I would stores all original photos in acid free storage and just use copies in my general family history folders which are plastic and not acid free.

[busyglen]

I have recently started scanning all of the old family photos, and a cousin has started doing the same. We have been able to share quite a few family photos in this way, and it has also given us the opportunity to find out a bit more about our relatives.

As well as having them scanned into my pc, I have also transferred them onto a CD (I do this with all my normal photographs) for safety. It is much easier to store photos on CD's than to put them all in albums, and you don't have the problem of them fading etc. during time.

Glenys

[Oates]

I have a ridiculous number of family photos scanned into my computer. Not all by any means as there are thousands upon thousands (including photos from the 1960s onwards). There are also quite a lot of photos from WWII. When my paternal grandparents died, they left a laundry basket stuffed to the brim with mainly black and white photos (and a few other things). I scanned over 300 of those photos but there are still plenty in there I might want to keep a record of.

[debsy]

I have recently finished scanning my mum's and dad's photos from when they were young children to the time they got married. Then I made scrapbook albums using these same photos, one for my dad and one for my mum. (They have been divorced and remarried for many years now so I only went up to the time they were married). I did fairly plain albums in keeping with the time frame (1930 -1960) and made up sheets to go in the back which explain each photo rather than putting it on the page. I have put my own photos into new acid free albums but haven't scanned them, maybe one day. Fortunately my parents have been able to tell me a lot about the photos and I have been able to name most of the people in them.

[Sue Mackay]

I scanned most of the best family photos to import into the family history write-up, but I have a CD of more recent photos as well as the historical ones which I keep by the rope ladder fire escape we keep in the bedroom in case of fire. I have also given my brother a copy. I actually did this after seeing pictures of people being winched to safety during the New Orleans floods. Photo albums would not survive floods or fire, and we have a whole bookcase full of them anyway!

[castellcoch]

Instead of recording onto a CD or DVD I save all my images to the hard disk and to three standalone hard disk drives. As long as the present computer operating systems survive they'll be readable, and if there's a fire the drives are easy to grab and run off with.

[apehangmom]

my Aunt told me she was throwing away all the negatives to all my grandmas photos.( 99% of the photos were taken in the 70's and 60's. I felt a sudden twinge of OCD... My heart started racing .. I started to sweat... I do not believe in that taking a photo of my photo is as good as making one from the negative. She is the care taker of my grandma who is 97. so this is her option.. I live a thousand miles away.. so I cant just go and say okay .. puttem in a box and we shall see ya later.. I just do not think that technology is that good a reproducing photos yet.. what do you think? thanks chris . |banghead|

[apehangmom]

Yeah I will be the dead lady who's house is a fire and I went back in for the photo album.... and the p.c tower.. funny how all of us put a great value on our old photos. But yet I know that I could pull my tote of photos out of my room into safety if needed.

[salcat]

PLEASE PLEASE

Put a back up of your photos/family history research somewhere else - give them to a relation or friend to look after or use one of the commercial stores - you may not be in the house when it catches fire - we weren't!!

Our house was totally gutted and it was 12 months before we could return. Luckily most of our photos and my FH stuff survived, and so did the computer, but we could have lost the lot, and I didn't realise how important these things are until we nearly lost them.

regs

Sally

[sandiep]

Having just scanned an album of photos that are mostly unnamed and having boxes of unnamed photos I would agree with Davran Please Label all photos...............I know I have been just as bad and I have just realised that other photos I have scanned to my Pendrives I havent labelled all of them!!!!

Better get on with it I suppose

sandie