But beyond the obvious stuff like archival sleeves, acid-free archival boxes and paper, what else can we do to protect our precious family history documents and photos?
Here's what I do. Perhaps it will help you or give you an idea. What do you do?
- Scan Photos and Documents: I have begun the painstaking process of scanning all the old family photos. I'm in posession of three or four old-style photo albums (the ones with the sticky cardboard covered in resealable plastic film). These albums are death to photos. I have some pictures from the 1970s that look like they were processed in the 1870s. The acid in the cardboard and glues used for years in most of the old-school albums just eat at your papers and photos. If you have some stored like this, get them out now and put them in sleeved modern acid-free albums, available at most craft/hobby stores. I have scanned the pictures onto my computer and filed them under a genealogy pictures photo, grouped by family. It takes a long time, but I can sleep easier knowing that at least the digital version of the pictures will not degrade any further. Plus it has the added benefit of being able to print off new pictures for display or everyday use without damaging the original.
- Transcribe photocopies: When my father and I took our family history research trip, I came across many records in courthouses such as wills, deeds and land grants pertaining to my ancestors across several states. This was before the days of portable scanners and high quality digital cameras. So I did the next best thing: I brought lots of spare change and made photocopies of the original records so that I would have a copy. Then, in my spare time, I can go back and transcribe the photocopies (see yesterday's post on the will of George Vaught) onto my computer. It takes a while because the old language can be tricky, but you'll be glad you did---I found several bits of information pertaining to the land my family owned that I had missed by "speed reading" the document to get the facts when I first copied it in the courthouse. If nothing else, transcribing photocopied documents gives you another backup.
- Photographs: For objects, like my great-grandfather's Bible, given to him by his father in the late 1800s when he was born and passed down to each generation, I recommend taking detailed large digital photographs. If your camera has large or extra-large file settings (sometimes called "high detail") use the biggest you have to capture images of the book, jewelry, dress, etc., from different angles. I also like to print out a little card with information about the object, how I came to own it, who owned it before me, how old it is, etc., and place it in the photograph of the object in at least one angle so I'll have everything together. For books, try to gently open the book and hold it there long enough to take pictures of important pages, such as the birth/death/marriage records in old family Bibles. Do it right, do it detailed, and you won't have to worry about handling brittle books and jewelry in the future---just pull up the picture on your computer. Then you can store the item in an archival box, etc., to preserve it for future generations.
- External Hard Drive: Once you have scanned, transcribed or organized all your photos and documents on your comptuer, I highly recommend getting a spare external hard drive---they are incredibly inexpensive now, compared to just a few years ago. You can get a dedicated genealogy backup drive for less than $150 that will hold hundreds of gigs of information. As one who has listened to that advice before and not acted, trust me...it's a good idea. I had my old computer crash and lost everything---or would have if I hadn't had everything backed up on an external drive. If you have a flood or a bad storm, tornado, or lightning strike your house or even simple burglary or a fire...the list goes on and on---you get the picture. A backup hard drive is invaluable.
- CD/DVD Backups: At the very least (and before I got my back up hard drive) use CD backups. Most computers sold today have a CD-ROM drive that doubles as a CD-R (or even better a DVD-R) drive, meaning you can create CDs/DVDs of information. This is helpful, but for someone that has more than about 800 megabits worth of files and photos, you're going to need multiple CDs, cases to store them, etc. The other downside to CDs is that while they may last a long time and be impervious to magnets (the bane of floppy disks of yesteryear) the drives that run them may not last. It is a great storage media, but someday it will go the way of the floppy disk, that is to say, to the recycling plant (remember all those AOL disks you used to get in the mail? When I was in college we used those things for all sorts of things...ah but that's another post.). So a CD backup is great, but once I got my hard drive, I stopped making CDs and saved a lot of money (when you have a lot of stuff to back up, those CDs can get expensive over time!). If you have the right software, burning a DVD of genealogy files or pictures will allow you to play the images or movies on any modern DVD player (which makes a great way to share photos on family vacations to far flung relatives...ah, the rebirth of the old slide show tradition!)
- File Sharing: One of the cooler things about the internet is the concept of "the cloud" that is vogue right now. Through some websites out there like Rootsweb (provided by Ancestry.com), you can upload your family tree and notes to the internet for other researchers to see and to create a backup. Should something happen to your computer, all you need do when it is repaired/replaced, is just sign on and download your information and you're back in business. You can even go to any one of the numerous photo-sharing sites out there and upload your genealogy photos as well, then download them when you need to. Which leads me to the next part of file sharing---sharing with relatives. Make copies of everything you have, if it's convenient to put on, say, a CD or DVD, and mail it to your siblings and uncles and aunts and grandkids. They may not appreciate it now (maybe they will!) but the information will not be lost if some catastrophe happens to your house, computer or files. I recently did this at Christmas last year and it was quite gratifying to share all those old family photos (some that people hadn't seen in decades) and stories and documents, scanned onto a DVD. And lets be honest, what's the point of doing all this research if we don't share the results with our family members---after all, aren't we trying to preserve everything for future generations? I say spread the wealth---who knows, you may inspire a grandchild to take up the hobby and unknowingly "pass the torch" and protect your family history at the same time!
- USB Flash Drives: Lastly, this inexpensive idea just occurred to me. You can get a 4Gig USB drive at Best Buy for $20 or so any more. Just plug it in, download your information and presto, another backup. I like to keep mine where I keep the physical photos and documents so I know I have a backup at hand. Can't get any simpler than that. If you need to travel or get a new computer, just plug in the flash drive (also called "Thumb Drives" and you're in business.
- Location, Location, Location: Something else to consider: don't keep all your eggs in one basket. Don't store your originals in a closet along with the backups in the same place. I like to spread things out----the originals are in a footlocker in a closet. The backup hard drive is upstairs in a closet in the office. The thumbdrive stays with the originals, but my backup DVDs are stored with our DVD collection. If something happens to one part of the house (a flood, fire, or say water heater failure) at least all of my information won't be damaged or lost at once. Granted, if the whole house is destroyed I'm in trouble---but! I have copies of everything sent to my sister, father and uncle. Plus I have my tree and lots of my notes online. My motto is one redundant backup is good, two is better, three is best.
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