Rescued Ephemera William Kreis of New York 1929

In 1929, 24 year old William Kreis of Syracuse New York signed up for an Insurance Policy. The policy and an explanatory letter arrived at his door on October 4, 1929.

Sadly young William was killed in August 1931. I doubt his insurance policy paid any money to his heirs, as it was very restrictive.

 The Daily Messenger Canandaigua, New York Monday, August 24, 1931 - P 1 

 Syracuse Journal Monday, August 24, 1931  

  The Syracuse Journal article provides the sad story of how William refused to heed his doctor's advice to go to the hospital. As his condition slowly worsened, he relented but it was too late. He died in the hospital of The Good Shepherd 3 days after being admitted. He was survived by his wife Anna Kelly Kreis, his father Emil Kreis Sr and seven brothers: Albert, Emil Jr, George, Oscar, John, Frederick, and Ernest Kreis. His funeral service was in Split Rock and he was buried in Marcellus

Thanks goes to Annette P. for rescuing these treasures and sending to Olive Tree Genealogy for publication

Sprague Letter 1917

Annette P. has generously donated ephemera from various families to be shared on Olive Tree Genealogy. This set is a photo of a man and a 3 page letter signed "L. P. Sprague, Dowager" and dated October 3, 1917 from Lexington, Kentucky.

The letter does not have a salutation other than "My dear ---" but in the first paragraph Ms. Sprague writes that she isn't sure whether or not to address the letter to "Miss James" or "Mary Elizabeth" so we might assume the person she is writing to is Mary Elizabeth James.

There are many names in the letter: Mrs. Sprague, Miss Curry/Carry Breckinbridge, Miss Kraft, Miss McClure.

 

Unknown but with Sprague Letter

Postcard to Ruth Vessey from Elizabeth Finger 1910

Annette P. has kindly donated ephemera items to Olive Tree Genealogy for sharing with other genealogists. This is an early postcard, perhaps 1910 (date is hard to read) sent to Miss Ruth Vessey in Pennsylvania. It is from Miss Elizabeth Finger in New Jersey

 

 

Ephemera Postcard to Leora Aultman

Annette P. has generously donated several ephemera items to Olive Tree Genealogy for publication. This postcard is to Mrs. Leora Aultman in Rhode Island. It is from Cape Cod Massachusetts

Richter Family Ephemera to Phoebe Rockwell

Annette P. has generously donated several ephemera items from the Richter Family in Virginia to Olive Tree Genealogy for publication.

This postcard is to Miss Phoebe J. Rockwell c/o Mrs. M. Brown, Camp Star Acres, Eaton Center, [--]

It is signed "Grombie" in Falls Church Virginia. I suspect this is the original Richter Family writing to a granddaughter.

Ephemera Schulze & Richter

Annette P. has generously donated several ephemera items from the Richter Family in Virginia to Olive Tree Genealogy for publication. This postcard is addressed to Miss Connie Schulze in Georgia and is signed "Mother"

Richter Ephemera from the Grant Family

Annette P. has generously donated several ephemera items from the Richter Family in Virginia to Olive Tree Genealogy for publication. This postcard is to Lee Richter in Falls Church Virginia. It is signed from Bob and Peggy Grant

Ephemera Richter Family in North Carolina

Annette P. has generously donated several ephemera items from the Richter Family in Virginia to Olive Tree Genealogy for publication. This postcard is to Neil Richter and Connie Schulz in Spruce Pine, North Carolina. It is from Kathy O'Neil in Utah. She signs "Kathy and Byron" and the card is sent from Arizona.

 

 

Richter Family Ephemera New York to Virginia

Annette P. has generously donated several ephemera items from the Richter Family in Virginia to Olive Tree Genealogy for publication. This postcard is to Leora Richter in Falls Church Virginia. It is from the Museum of Modern Art in New York and signed "Jane"

Richter Family in Virginia Ephemera from San Juan

Annette P. has generously donated several ephemera items from the Richter Family in Virginia to Olive Tree Genealogy for publication.This postcard is to "Mom" - Leora Richter in Virginia from Toby and Libbet in San Juan

Richter Family Ephemera 2 from Jersey Shore

Annette P. has generously donated several ephemera items from the Richter Family in Virginia to Olive Tree Genealogy for publication. This item is a postcard from the Jersey Shore sent to Mrs. C. V. Richter in Virginia

VIrginia USA Richter Family Ephemera

Annette P. has generously donated several ephemera items from the Richter Family in Virginia to Olive Tree Genealogy for publication. Here's the first one sent to Craig Richter in Virginia from Portugal in 1994

Flatbed Scanners - Which One is Right for You?

I love scanners. I love scanning my old photographs, documents, cards and every bit of ephemera I have!

Genealogists probably buy more scanners than anyone but it's not easy to make a decision as to which one is best.

I can't review scanners I have not used but I was checking Amazon last night and realized I could help out by narrowing the field of choices. So I've put together a list based on reviews on other websites and reviews on Amazon.

If you're buying yourself or someone else a scanner this Christmas, or are lucky enough to be getting one as a gift, you may want to consider these options:


Epson Perfection V37 Color Photo, Image, Document Scanner with scan-to-cloud & 4800 x 9600 dpi (B11B207201) 4  stars, reviewed by 196 customers













Canon Office Products LiDE120 Color Image Scanner  4 stars, 590 customer reviews







HP L1957A#B1H Scanjet G4050 Photo Scanner

4 stars, 218 customer reviews

Preserving Paper Treaures: Step 3 Ready To Create & Store

This is Step 3 of preserving your family ephemera. Yesterday I talked about sorting and organizing all those family papers into piles (See Preserving Paper Treasures: Step 2 Sorting & Organizing)

We're going to talk about paper Pile #1 and Pile #2 today. These consisted of your  most important and valuable papers and documents. To refresh memories, Pile #1 consists of your most valuable ORIGINAL documents that you are not ever going to throw out or see ruined.There is probably a strong emotional attachment to most items in this pile.

WHERE DO I STORE PAPERS FROM PILE #1?

Pile #1 is easy to deal with. You want to preserve these items intact for future generations. You are never going to throw them out or alter them in any way. You have digitized the papers but you need to do something with the actual documents. Here are my suggestions:

SMALL DECORATIVE BOX
 

Keep the treasured documents and papers in a small decorative box, one that is likely to be passed on down through the family after I'm gone. It's small enough that it is probably never going to be used for something else. You might want to add a family chart or note describing the contents of the box. See Passing on Your Family Genealogy Treasures to a Descendant

Remember my huge blanket box full of papers? That would almost certainly result in someone at some time in the future dumping the papers and using the box for storage of blankets or towels or some other household item. But the small antique box I use looks important enough to not be trashed and isn't big enough to store much more than the documents I've placed in it. 

Update January 20, 2014: Please see  Oops I goofed! A Correction re Preserving Paper Treasures for a caveat and correction

ACID FREE BINDER STORAGE You can also place the documents and papers from Pile #1 into acid free sleeves and keep in an archival binder or box. The idea is to keep them in something that will protect them from deteriorating and maximize the chance that they will still be in your family 100 years from now.  Whatever method you use, the papers from Pile #1 are intact and tucked away safely. And you have digital copies you can print to create something nice. (more on that after we talk about Pile #2)
   
 WHAT DO I DO WITH PAPERS FROM PILE #2?   Pile #2 is where you put papers that have meaning for you but are not as important or unique as Pile #1. You would like to see these documents survive and be passed on in the family but they do not have the same emotional attachment for you.  

Pile #2 is where you can be a bit more flexible. Remember this is the pile that contains items you didn't mind altering, keeping in mind that you have digital copies as a backup.   Before I get to what you should do with Pile #2, let me show you some ways to create some nice items from both piles that you can pass on to other family members.

CREATE BOOKS FROM YOUR DIGITAL COPIES

Shutterfly Book Example Page with scanned document

You've scanned and digitized all the items in both piles. This is where I take my digital copies and create books in Shutterfly. See my YouTube Video Tutorial on Using Shutterfly. You can use any self-publishing service such as Blurb or Lulu or, for those in the USA, MyCanvas.

The benefit of creating a coffee table sized book (30 pages or less) is that it looks professional and therefore important enough to keep and you can have multiple copies printed. This means you can give copies to family members and thus maximize your chances that at least one of those copies will survive in the future.

Shutterfly keeps your original book which means you can have copies printed at any time. Blurb has restrictions on how long they will store your book so be sure to read any restrictions before starting your book.

But what to do if you don't want to create a self-published book? Perhaps you don't want to undertake such a big project. Maybe you've never used Shutterfly or any self-publishing service and the task seems daunting. Perhaps it is just too expensive for your budget. That's okay because I have another solution for you.

MAKE A SCRAPBOOK

Trip Scrapbook I created for grandchildren

Consider creating an old-fashioned scrapbook. If you've been lucky enough to inherit a scrapbook that your mom or grandmother kept, you know the kind I mean. Or perhaps you kept one as a teenager - many of us gals glued in tickets from our first prom or a ribbon from a corsage given to us by a  boyfriend.

You can purchase acid-free scrapbook paper to create a lovely book that can be passed on to someone in the family. As you create your scrapbook remember that you are not going to use the original documents in Pile #1. Instead you will use copies. You've scanned them all so it will be easy to print copies on good quality paper. You can cut those copies up and glue them in your book. Using copies allows you to create more than one scrapbook.

Pile #2 is where you have more flexibility because you can use the originals. The papers in this pile can be cut up or altered and used in your scrapbooks. These documents don't have to be handled as carefully as those in Pile #1. You are still preserving these papers for future descendants in book format. Glue them into a scrapbook. Cut them up and create a collage. The sky's the limit because you have digital copies and you can always print more. If you're going to make more than one scrapbook you have copies of the  papers in Pile #2.

I know that professional archivists will be gasping in horror at the thought of cutting up or using the originals from Pile #2 in a scrapbook but we are preserving them and creating a way to view them and enjoy them.

YOUR SCRAPBOOK - FANCY OR PLAIN?

Your scrapbook can be as simple or as elaborate as you want. You can create fancy borders, add stickers or designs and be very creative or not, as you see fit. Remember your scrapbook does not have to be a work of art. The goal is to achieve a way of keeping these family papers together in a format that can be passed on.

Since your goal is to maximize the chances that this scrapbook will survive and be passed on, you need to put more thought and time into creating the outside cover. The nicer and more professional the cover of your scrapbook looks, the more likely it will be treasured and preserved and given to yet another generation. My husband has a saying "If it looks like junk it will be treated like junk. If it looks important it will be treated with reverence."

ARCHIVAL BINDERS

Archival Binder Box

If creating a scrapbook or a self-published book seems too daunting or time-consuming you might choose to place your original documents from both piles in an archival binder to pass on to a family member at some point.

THE GOALS

Whatever method you choose, there are 3 goals:

1. To preserve the documents
2. To pass them on to other family members
3. To be able to enjoy the documents yourself in an easy-to-use manner

THERE'S MORE!
You probably think this is the last post in this series. But guess what? We've talked about how to preserve, share and enjoy your ancestors' treasured paper records. But we haven't talked about you and your life and your documents! If you have descendants they are going to want to know about you, their ancestor. So keep watching this space for a new series on making sure you are keeping and preserving records about your life as well as the lives of your ancestors.

Preserving Paper Treasures: Step 2 Sorting & Organizing

Yesterday I talked about Step 1 of preserving your paper treasures as well as digitizing them.  Or as Eric commented on the post yesterday "Digitize it, but don't trash it!" If you missed the first post, please see Preserving Paper Treasures: What's New Today is Obsolete Tomorrow

Today I'm going to show you how to handle all those tubs, filing cabinets and blanket boxes full of unsorted miscellaneous ephemera. Because you and I both know that we genealogists are savers. We save copies of documents we find. We save great-grandma's bill for flowers dated 1889. We save Grandpa's love letter to Grandma from WW1.

Let me preface this blog post with saying that I am not including photos in this tutorial. That's a different subject with it's own issues but I'll talk about preserving your most precious photos in a future blog post. 

The problem is that it is extremely unlikely that anyone in the future will want to digitize all those papers. So we must do that now. But if we want to maximize the chances that the originals will still be in the family 100 years from now we have to go beyond digitization. 

Trust me, no one will want to keep a huge blanket box full of papers. It will be used for some other purpose or sold and the contents tossed out. But I have a few suggestions for how best to ensure that your family papers survive for many more generations to come. 


DIGITIZE FIRST!  
First you must scan and digitize all of these papers. Save the scans to your computer, to a cloud service (or several cloud services), burn them to a CD ROM, put copies on a flash drive or an external hard drive and share them with family members. 

CRITERIA FOR SORTING DOCUMENTS

Now you must sort those papers. If you're like me that is difficult. They are all treasures to me. But sorting is necessary and you will need to make 3 piles based on the importance or value of each document. The criteria for creating these 3 piles will differ from person to person but let me quickly define my criteria. 

For me personally I determine a document's "value" or importance based on:

a) the age of the document. The older the document is, the more valuable it is to me. My great-great-grandmother's receipt for bolts of cloth she bought in 1857 is a valuable document in my mind

b) the amount of information or story the document holds. The story it holds is not the same as the number of words, it is the detail within and how it sets my ancestor in history. For example a military discharge certificate tells a huge story about my  grandfather even though there are very few words on it.

c) how unique the document is. In other words if I have my mother's report card from 1922 that might be difficult or impossible to get from any other source. It is a one-of-a-kind document and is thus valuable.

ORGANIZING DOCUMENTS INTO PILES
 

Determine your criteria for prioritizing your documents and then you're ready to sort into your 3 piles.

Pile #1 consists of your most valuable ORIGINAL documents that you are not ever going to throw out or see ruined. I stressed original because this is not where you put copies of images of census records that you found online. Instead these would be such items as that WW1 love letter from Grandpa to Grandma, your uncle's military discharge papers, your dad's death certificate, or your grandmother's baptism record. You probably have a strong emotional attachment to items in this pile and you likely feel they are of historical importance.

Pile #2 This is where you put papers that have meaning for you but are not as important or unique as Pile #1. You would like to see these documents survive and be passed on in the family but they do not have the same emotional pull for you.


This pile might include such things as a newspaper clipping from Grandma's scrapbook, or Christmas cards that were sent to an ancestor from one of their friends. Perhaps there is a Valentine's card from Grandpa to Grandma with only his signature.  In other words these are items that you find interesting or your parents or grandparents treasured but they don't carry the same weight in your mind as the items in Pile #1. This is a very personal decision as to what is most important or valuable and what is of lessor importance.

Pile #3 is the toss pile. For me personally there is a good chance there will be nothing in this pile! I should purge but I will have a difficult time doing so. But the more papers you have in your possession the more ruthless you will need to be. If you can bring yourself to create this pile, please do. To show you how difficult a toss pile is for me, I have a ticket stub for a dance that my mother had in her possessions. I don't know the story behind this ticket. I don't know when the dance took place. I don't know why my mother kept it. So it has no meaning, no story behind it. I should toss it. But I doubt I will. 

You may also wish to consider creating a 4th Pile. Pile #4 consists of original documents that you are willing to pass on to other family members right now. If you aren't prepared to do this or there is no one in your family who is ready or willing to accept some of the items, that's fine. But consider doing this as it will reduce the stress on family who may be left to decide who gets what after you are gone. 

As an example you can see in my photos above that I have a serviette (napkin) from my brother's first wedding in the 1950s. It has the names of the bride and groom and the date of the wedding so it holds important details. I don't really want that napkin but perhaps one of his children would like to take over as guardian and keeper! As well I have two birth announcements for two of my nieces.  They include photos of each baby at birth, plus details of time of birth, weight, size, parents' names etc. Those notices aren't important for me to keep any longer and I think it is time to put them in Pile #4 then pop them in envelopes and mail to my nieces. 

In my next blog post I will talk about what we're going to do with Pile #1 and Pile #2 in order to maximize our chances that those papers will still be in the family 100 years from now. 

You can follow these upcoming blog posts by choosing the topic "Preserving Paper Treasures" from the right hand side bar.

Preserving Paper Treasures: What's New Today is Obsolete Tomorrow

Obsolete floppy discs

See that pile of floppy discs beside my laptop? That's called obsolete technology. I haven't got a computer or laptop that will read them. 

I could, with a great deal of effort, get my hands on something that would allow me to look through those discs and extract any information I might want to keep. But I won't. That's way too much work and time and effort!

And this is but one example of outdated technology. At the time didn't we all figure we could digitize our documents, create our files and save them until we wanted/needed them? But that is what happens with the rapid advance of technology. We end up with important data that can't be read in 5, 10, 15 or more years from when we created it.

As genealogists we save documents, whether original or copies. We need that marriage license of our great-grandparents. We treasure the original 1918 bill for Grandpa Bob's funeral. The push is on to digitize them, to go paperless. But let's be realistic! Will we be able to read or access those treasured digitized items in 10 years or 20 years time? 

Sure we saved a copy on our harddrive but computers crash and data is lost. We saved a copy to the Cloud, that was good wasn't it? But we have zero control over cloud services and they may disappear overnight, or there could be a catastrophic failure and saved data is lost. We have copies on CDs and flash drives and external hard drives and we've shared some of those with family. We're covered, right? Wrong. CDs and flash drives might not be readable in the future, just as those little floppy discs are unreadable to most of us.

Even if the cloud with our digitized documents is still there, if you are no longer around, is there anyone in your family who knows your password or has the technical skills to get to it? 

So what's a genealogist to do? Well, first of all you should absolutely digitize your papers  and photos and save them in every spot you can think of! The more backups the better. But don't be too quick to throw out those paper originals! 

Blanket Box of Ephemera

But where do you keep them? How do you ensure they get saved and passed on to future generations? I keep mine in a very large antique blanket box. It's about 2 feet by 3 feet and is used as a coffee table. It's full of paper documents. 

But I know that at some point in the future someone (most likely one of my grandson's wives, or a granddaughter) will almost certainly look at that blanket box and think "Hmmmm I could store a lot of bedding in here! And what's with these papers? Holy cow, do we really need to give up good storage space for my husband's great grandmother's driver's licence or her marriage certificate?" And his grandpa's death certificate!!??"    

And the papers I have treasured and saved for future generations will be tossed. So what do we do? How do we get the maximum chances that our paper ephemera will be kept by future generations?

In the next few blog posts I'm going to show you several different plans for preserving these paper documents and treasures such as Great Grandmother Harriet's baptism certificate or Great uncle Syd's military discharge papers.

You can follow these upcoming blog posts by choosing the topic "Preserving Paper Treasures" from the right hand side bar.

A New Hobby: Orphaned Ephemera

Ethel Crane Certificate 1899

One of my hobbies is acquiring ephemera from Guelph Ontario.

Both my parents were born there, and my father's Guelph lines go back to the first half of the 19th century.

I know the names of some of the places where my dad worked and I look for items from those businesses.

But I can't pass up a bit of ephemera that has a Guelph connection even if it has no connection to me or my family.

One of the reasons I do this is to feature that ephemera here on the blog. If a descendant sees it and wants it I will happily donate it to them for the cost of shipping.

If no descendant comes forward after a certain period of time, I'm going to donate the items I acquire to the Guelph Civil Museum. Did I mention I also do a bit of genealogical research on the item and the person or persons named?

With that in mind here is my first "up for grabs" Guelph ephemera! I found this item on E-Bay and purchased it for a reasonable price.

Ethel Crane

It is a Guelph Public Schools Certificate of Honor awarded to Ethel Crane for regular and punctual attendance, 1899.

Genealogy Research

A search of Canadian Census records on Ancestry.com revealed 1 year old Ethel E. Crane living in Guelph with her parents George C. & Hannah E. Crane. An older sister (3 year old Sarah) is also found with the family.  George was born in Ontario of English parents.

1901 census finds them still in Guelph but the family has grown to include little sisters Carrie M. age 9 and Florence H. age 1 . George's date of birth is recorded as 20 January 1959 in Ontario.

By 1911 Ethel is gone but the family still lived in Guelph and another sister Marguerite age 6 has been born. Ethel's grandmother Sarah Lester age 72 is living with them so that gave me the maiden name of Ethel's mother Hannah. Sarah says she was born in England in Febuary 1839 and immigrated to Canada in 1854.

Further research found that Sarah Lester's husband (and Ethel Crane's father) was Joseph Lester born circa 1834 England and died July 1893 in Guelph.

In 1907 Ethel Elizabeth Crane age 18 married Thomas C. Clayton age 20 in Guelph, Wellington County Ontario.  In May 1910 they had a son Thomas Alexander Clayton born in York County Ontario.

Poor Ethel died in Toronto, York County Ontario in August 1935 at the age of 46. Her husband Thomas Clayton was the informant.

Looking for a Home for Ethel's Certificate

I do not know what happened to Ethel's son Thomas, but perhaps he had family. Ethel's sisters may also have descendants who are interested in preserving family memorabilia.

Someone in that line might like to have Ethel's Certificate so if anyone is a descendant please contact me by clicking on my Profile in the side bar of this blog and using the email address found there. I'd love to see Ethel's Certificate go to someone who will treasure it.

"Soliciting a Continuance of Your Esteemed Patronage...."

My husband collect ephemera from St. Mary's Ontario Canada. One of his recent acquisitions was hundreds of miscellaneous documents from Andrews Jewellery Store. The documents date from 1870 to 1900 and remained in the Jewellery Store until quite recently.

William Andrews built his Jewellery store in 1884 and one of my husband's ancestors Fred Massey, worked as a jeweller for Mr. Andrews in later years. The store is still in St. Mary's at its original location and still operates as a jewellery store. William Andrews died in St. Mary's in 1927 at the age of 83.

William's father Henry Andrews was a Stone Mason from Devonshire England who came to Canada West (present day Ontario) in 1855 and William apprenticed as a clerk for a jeweller in St. Mary's before opening his own store.




Part of my husband's collection consists of  Post Cards sent from businesses and stores all over Canada to Mr. Andrews. These are not Post Cards as we think of them today. They are receipts for money paid by Mr. Andrews for goods and services.

This image shows one from Toronto and dated October 20, 1882. It is from H. A. Nelson & Sons on Front Street West.  A check of Google books revealed that H. A. Nelson sold brushes and brooms.

"Dear Sir - Your favor to hand enclosing the sum of Twenty-Six /78 Dollars which we have placed to your credit in settlement of invoice of Oct. 10/82.  Returning thanks, and soliciting a continuance of your esteemed patronage, We remain Respectfully yours, H. A Nelson & Sons"

I love this flowery language. I was chuckling to myself thinking how nice it would be if Visa or American Express sent me such a lovely note every time I make a payment.  "Soliciting a continuance" of my "esteemed patronage" ..... 

Reading through some of the hundreds of documents is delightful and jolts the reader back to another time where courtesy abounded and flowery language was the norm.