Legacy Multimedia Blog

Starting the School Year With a Personal History Project

Posted on August 24, 2010 - Filed Under Family Memories, Personal History, Preserving Memories

When my own children were young, my father suggested taking a photograph of them every month, in the same location and pose. These photographs, he explained, could later be assembled into a type of time-line of their growth and development. While I did take many photos of both of my sons, I never did manage to do that specific project, although it still think it’s a terrific idea and would have been a wonderful thing to have now.

I did take a photograph of them every year, as they were leaving for their first day of school. Taken at the front door, they had their lunchboxes or backpacks and were ready to go. These photos stopped as they got older but now play an important role in their childhood photo albums.

With school starting in the next week around the United States, its a good time to think about helping your child start a personal history project to document his or her school year and provide them with many memories later on.

A nice scrapbook, photo album or even a good quality archival storage box is the first step. Have your child enrolled in the project from the beginning and create a calendar event once a week or once a month to spend a little bit of time collecting and organizing items to go into the history project. You may decide to go with a video project from the beginning, but you will still need to organize the materials the same way you would any other project.

Some specific things to add to this personal history are:

Photographs – of special school events and classroom shots with the teacher and classmates. Right now, some of the most valuable photos my grade-school friends are finding are candid shots taken of school mates around the school yard and in the classroom. Non-professionally posed shots can be so valuable later on.
Academic accomplishments – awards, certificates, report cards and even examples of class work are great to add.
Extra-curricular activities – band, sports, scouting, art class; all the other activities that your child participates in throughout the year.
Notes and comments from teachers and coaches and friends.
Try to have your child write a note or two about what they like about their school, friends, studies and activities.
Video taken from any of the above mentioned activities.

At the end of the year, this project can be shared with teachers and school friends and any comments and notes collected and added to the project.

Stefani Twyford is a personal historian sharing life stories, connecting generations and preserving legacies. To learn more, visit her web site, find her on Twitter as @stefanitwyford, visit the Legacy Multimedia Facebook Fan Page, or send her an e-mail.

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China Diary: Adoption, Genealogy Charts and Family History

Posted on July 27, 2010 - Filed Under China Diary, Personal History, Preserving Memories

I was recently in China for 10 days, visiting the main cities of Beijing, Shanghai and Hong Kong. What I found most interesting is how different the context of their beliefs and practices are to my own. Because I am a video biographer, some of the things that I noticed have cause me to look at my field and how much I take for granted about what I do in the context of our American culture.

One thing that I have been giving a lot of thought to is that in our American culture, it has become common for nuclear families to split up and for children to move away and raise their own families in a different geographical location than their own parents or where from they grew up. Grandparents often have to travel to visit their grandkids and video conferencing such as iChat and Skype have become a common way for families to keep in touch. As I tell my own parents (who I don’t have the luxury of living in the same town as), it’s the lucky few that have their extended families with them.

In Beijing, our guide explained that taking care of one’s parents is a cultural norm and that those few who do not help take care of their aging parents are ostracized by the community, and have a difficult time finding jobs or otherwise being respected locally. It’s not unusual for 2 or 3 generations of Chinese families to live in the same house and the elders hold an honored place in the family, and often serve as caregivers and home schoolers for young children. China has a one-child policy introduced in 1978 as a way of alleviating social, economic and environmental problems cause by their growing population. Although there are many exemptions, each couple is officially restricted to one child. Because of this, many only children are growing up in homes with 2 parents and four grandparents. An only child in China is frequently regarded as “a little emperor” or “a little sun”, namely, a spoiled child.

As in many cultures, greater value is placed on a male heir which leaves many young baby girls up for adoption. On my flight back from Hong Kong, there were probably 7 or 8 Chinese children who were coming to the United States for the first time with their newly adopted American mothers and fathers. It really had me thinking about how you explain these histories, both in the family that gave away the child and in the family that adopted this new child.

More and more, American families are supporting open adoption ideals and now call them non-paternal events to explain the genealogical linkage during genealogical research. They celebrate their new child’s cultural heritage and teach them the customs and symbols of their birth cultures. I think it sure makes it easier to know where you come from once you’re older and hopefully, have a better understanding of the political and cultural turn of events that lead to the adoptions in the first place.

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My Grandmother’s Recipe For Franz Josef Cookies – The Secret Is Revealed!

Posted on July 22, 2010 - Filed Under Family Memories, Preserving Memories

My grandmother almost carried the recipe for her famous cookies to her grave. She was a marvelous cook and had several recipes that were family favorites. She loved getting the praise and glory for producing these specialties for us and could never be coaxed to share the recipes. Finally, at some point in her 80s (she passed away in 1997 at the age of 93) she beautifully typed up the recipe and gave a copy to me and a copy to my sister. I’m not sure who else got copies.

This photo was taken at the last apartment she lived in Los Angeles before she and my grandfather went into an assisted living facility. She must have been in her early 80s at this point. She’s bringing out two cups of tea from the tiny little galley kitchen. I remember working with her in this kitchen making enough potato pancakes for 10 people. We had three pans going and it was a regular assembly line.

Because of her secrecy around her recipes I feel a bit of conflict putting these out online for everyone but I made a comment on Facebook about making these cookies for my father and several people asked for the recipe. So without further ado, here it is, word for word, from the typed sheet she gave me.

EMPEROR FRANZ JOSEF COOKIES
Isli Tea Sutemeny (ISCHL COOKIES from Hungary)

These chocolate hazelnut cookies were highly favored by Franz Josef, former emperor-king of Austria-Hungary. They were named in honor of a summer resort in the Austrian Alps where Franz Josef liked to spend his leisure hours.

INGREDIENTS
3 oz. hazelnuts (1/2 cup, shelled) These will make about one cup grated
1 1/2 cup sifted flour
1/4 tsp cinnamon
1/4 tsp cocoa powder
3/4 cup butter
1 tsp grated lemon peel (avoid the white pith)
1/2 tsp lemon juice
3/4 cup confectioners sugar
1/4 cup apricot or strawberry jam
1/2 pound semi-sweet chocolate for dipping

Lightly grease two cookie sheets. Grate nuts finely and set aside. Sift flour, cinnamon and cocoa together and set aside. Cream butter with grated lemon peel and lemon juice until soft. Add sugar gradually, creaming mix evenly after each addition of sugar. Blend ground nuts into mixture.

Add the flour mixture to the creamed butter and sugar slowly, creaming mixture thoroughly after each addition. Cover bowl and let dough rest about fifteen minutes. Roll on lightly floured surface to 1/4 inch thickness and cut into 1 1/2 inch rounds with a lightly floured cookie cutter. Place about 1″ apart on lightly greased cookie sheet and bake at 350 degrees 15-20 minutes or until lightly browned. Check cookies after 10 minutes to prevent burning. When cookies are done baking, place on racks to cool.

When cool, turn one half of them upside down and spread about 1/2 tsp jam on each. Place another cookie on top and squeeze together lightly to make a sandwich until all the cookies are used. Set up two cooking racks and cover surface with waxed paper. Partially melt chocolate in top of a double boiler, remove from heat and stir until chocolate is completely melted. (You may add one tsp butter for a smoother chocolate finish. ) Dip tops of cookie sandwiches in chocolate or spread chocolate on top of cookie sandwiches with a butter knife until smooth. Place cookies, chocolate side up, on waxed paper covered racks and immediately press a whole blanched almond into the top of each cookie, before the chocolate has time to cool and harden. Refrigerate cookies until firm.

Makes about 2 dozen cookies.

TO BLANCH ALMONDS
To preserve the delicate almond flavor, blanch almonds quickly in small amounts, say 1/2 cup at a time. Boil enough water to cover shelled almonds. When at a rolling boil, drop in almonds and remove from heat. Allow to stand one minute, remove with slotted spoon to paper towel and pat dry. Gently squeeze almond skins off with light finger pressure. Allow almonds to dry thoroughly.

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China Diary: Looking At Ancestors

Posted on July 13, 2010 - Filed Under China Diary, Family Memories, Personal History, Preserving Memories

I recently got back from a 10 day trip to China where I visited the main cities of Beijing, Shanghai and Hong Kong. I had a really great time although I haven’t finished organizing and tagging all my photos and hope to get that done soon before I forget all the finer details of where each photo was taken. As I go through notes and photos I’ll be adding some thoughts to this “China Diary” over the next couple of months.

People have been asking me if I went to China for work or pleasure. In many eastern religions and philosophies lies the belief that all things are inter-related, which is referred to as non-duality. So while I went to China strictly for pleasure, it has certainly affected how I see the work that I do as as a personal historian as well as many other areas of my life. It was a profound trip for me; the first time I’ve been to an Asian culture, and I found the juxtaposition between our cultures fascinating.

My work as a personal historian and video biographer often finds me connecting generations through history. It’s not unusual for me to hear, “how did you get that story our of my (father)? ” or ” I’ve never heard that before.” I suppose part of the problem is that in families, we get to ‘know’ people so well that we stop listening. And part of it is that as we get older, we often think our children won’t be interested in our stories or it will occur as bragging, or a variety of other reasons that family and personal stories don’t get passed down.

While in China I heard a lot of stories about the histories of emperors and the dynasties, but nothing of the common man, although he (and she) is greatly depicted in artwork. Here is a photo of a wall relief at the Shanghai Urban Planning Center that depicts the Chinese workers building the country.

I suppose that is normal for a tourist not to really get to know personal details, you don’t have the opportunity to get into people’s daily lives and talk to them about who they are, who their ancestors are and what they did. We had three guides over in China and all were wonderful but very professional and careful about what they told us regarding their own personal feelings and experiences.

I learned that the Chinese are very family focused and have deeply rooted beliefs in their deceased ancestors that are complexly intertwined with religion, superstition and folklore.

In Taoist religion, one of two main religions in China, spirits of departed ancestors are celebrated by putting photos of them on personal or temple alters. This article on Chinese Beliefs describes in length, the complicated rituals of caring for the departed spirits.

I suspect that their culture has been one of orally passing down the stories from one generation to another and in some cases, those stories managed to get written down in family tablets. Similar to how it was in the US before our family culture began to experience fracture as family members moved away in search of work and a better life. I suspect this too may be happening in China but didn’t have enough time there to find out.

Technorati Tags: Shanghai Urban Planning Center

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Dick Eastman Reviews Maureen Taylor’s New Book “The Last Muster”

Posted on July 12, 2010 - Filed Under Geneaology, Photos & Snapshots, Preserving Memories

My friend Maureen Taylor, aka The Photo Detective, just published her newest book, “The Last Muster.”

“A remarkable work of documentary history, The Last Muster is a collection of rare nineteenth-century photographic images—primarily daguerreotypes, ambrotypes, and carte des visite paper photographs—of the Revolutionary War generation. This extraordinary collection of images assigns faces to an un-illustrated war and tells the stories of our nation’s founding fathers and mothers, updating and supplementing research last collected and published over a century ago. “

Dick Eastman’s Online Genealogy Newsletter wrote a review of the book that itself is a fascinating read. Even if you’re not a history buff or a photography buff, Dick’s review provides insight and commentary on an area of our history that has little photographic documentation.

Technorati Tags: Dick Eastman Online Genealogy Newsletter, Maureen Taylor, Maureen Taylor The Photo Detective, The Last Muster

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Keeping Your Memory Alive With Personal History

Posted on June 4, 2010 - Filed Under Family Memories, Multimedia Storytelling, Personal History, Preserving Memories

Flickr Photo: Eric Lafforgue

Yesterday, on the Association of Personal Historians Listserve, someone posted a question asking if anyone remembered an African proverb that was told to us by James Walsh. Walsh, a history professor at the University of Colorado at Denver, presented at the annual APH Conference in Nashville late in 2008. I’ve had this on my mind all day since that inquiry since I was at that conference and I too was struck by the power of that proverb.

The proverb recognizes two spirits. “Sasha are spirits known by someone still alive, while Zamani are spirits not known by someone currently alive.” According to James Loewen in his book Lies My Teacher Told Me: “The recently departed whose time overlapped with people still here are the Sasha, the living dead. They are not wholly dead, for they live on in the memories of the living … when the last person knowing an ancestor dies, that ancestor leaves the Sasha for the Zamani, the dead.”

Walsh’s use of the proverb was in illustrating the power of oral and personal history. As a Personal Historian, I spend a lot of time educating people on the power and value of leaving your story for future generations. As long as people are alive and can pass your stories on to future generations, you will retain some degree of immortality. But like the game Telephone, each iteration of the story becomes less and less reliable and more anecdotal until what is left after a few generations is, if you are lucky, merely a name on a genealogical chart and some mention of characteristics.

Walsh’s intention was to enforce that value with a visual metaphor that shows that when the stories come to the end of the line, you are truly dead to the world.

The African proverb itself is more about the collective unconscious (as Carl Jung would later refer to it.) This is a reservoir of experience that we all belong to that has us share certain knowledge such as archetypes, in a collective and universal fashion. According to Wikipedia, Zamani “is the final storehouse for all phenomena and events, the ocean of time in which everything becomes absorbed into a reality t hat is neither after nor before.”

In the African culture, it’s not unusual for people to be able to name all of their great-grandparents and great-great-grandparents. There is a clearly defined culture of storytelling and keeping memories alive that is devolving as our culture moves away from the nuclear family in search of jobs and opportunity. Oral and Personal Historians are trying to bring back that culture of storytelling and show the value in keeping your memory alive for future generations.

Technorati Tags: APH, Association of Personal Historians, James Walsh

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Memorial Tribute for Dan Duncan

Posted on May 4, 2010 - Filed Under Family Memories, Multimedia Storytelling, Personal History, Preserving Memories, Video Tributes

A few weeks ago one of my clients, Dan Duncan, a well known businessman and philanthropist, passed away. His passing was unexpected and we were just days away from shooting new footage for a another tribute video on the Duncans. Both Dan and his wife Jan were chosen as the 2010 Tapestry Award recipients by Interfaith Ministries, a local non-profit whose mission is for all faiths to work together to create a more compassionate society.

Right after Dan passed away, Jan asked me if we could create a tribute to be shown at his memorial service, a week away. We had worked very closely with the Duncans previously, and while I’m usually not eager to work on memorial videos because of the short turn around time, I agreed because of my fondness for the Duncans and how much I enjoy working with them.

We ended up using a pretty good size piece of a previous video that focused on Dan’s personal history and expanded on that, adding in details about his work accomplishments, family, travel and hobbies. Fortunately we had quite a bit of previously unused footage we shot at the end of 2008 that we were able to utilize in the memorial. At one point, Jan and I were sitting together going over all the footage we’d shot of Dan talking about his life and she turned to me and said, “we are so lucky we have all this!” I couldn’t have agreed more.

I spend all the time that I’m not creating videos about my clients, writing and speaking about how important it is to capture the stories of those close to you while they are with you. Not a day goes by where I’m not talking with someone that says, “I wish I had met you last year, before my (close relative) died.” It saddens me to hear these stories because I understand that once they are gone, there’s no way of going back to capture video. We’ve done several posthumous pieces with photos and text but it’s not the same as hearing the stories directly in a video that communicates that person’s experiences and wisdom along with the ability to hear their voice and see their smile. Video is so powerful because of this.

After a week of coordinating the collection of new materials from several sources, the writing of a new script, recording new voiceover, and editing a brand new video, the piece was completely finished about 12 hours before the service. Jan and I did a final proof at 3AM and we hand-delivered it to Second Baptist Church at 9AM.

If you’ve never been to Second Baptist, it has a beautiful sanctuary with three huge video screens that come down out of the ceiling. I normally like to scan the audience while they are watching my videos to see their reaction but I was mesmerized watching the three video screens. I had never seen one of our videos played on such a large screen, let alone three!

As I left the church, watching people in the atrium meet and talk about the service and the video, I was struck at the impact of what I was experiencing. The people in attendance, if they didn’t already know Dan, went away knowing who he was. As Jan told me later, we had captured the true spirit of Dan’s generous and kind heart, and I believe that too. We had created something that will continue to speak for Dan long into the future, well after all his current living relatives are gone. The future will know him as he wanted to be known, for the compassionate and generous man he was.

Technorati Tags: Dan Duncan, Interfaith Ministries of Greater Houston

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Multimedia Storytelling Reaches Technological Heights with Brian Storm

Posted on April 27, 2010 - Filed Under Multimedia Storytelling

At the end of March I attended an all-day workshop on Multimedia Storytelling led by Brian Storm of MediaStorm, an award-winning company based in New York and focused on creating cinematic narratives for distribution across a variety of platforms.

The workshop was put on by FotoFest, a Houston based arts organization, as part of their 2010 Biennial. FotoFest’s purpose “is to promote the exchange of art and ideas through international programs and the presentation of photographic art. Their programs work globally and locally, bringing together an international vision of art and cross-cultural exchange with a commitment to community involvement and the enrichment of Houston’s cultural resources.”

I was invited by Stacey Holzer of Houston’s VisualSeen, an online dialogue about contemporary art, photography, music and performing arts, to write a review of the workshop.

You can read my full article at VisualSeen’s website. I welcome your feedback on both the article as well as your perception of the workshop’s content, here on my blog.

Technorati Tags: Brian Storm, MediaStorm, Stacey Holzer, VisualSeen

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Creating a Beautiful Family Tree

Posted on April 20, 2010 - Filed Under Family Memories, Geneaology, Personal History

Aside from creating a family history so that future generations of your family will know who you are, one of the nicer gifts you can give your family is a graphical representation of your family tree.

I recently learned about Arbor Arts, an online company that provides beautiful family trees at a reasonable price. They have 16 tree templates to choose from that are about 28 inches wide and can hold up to 5 generations of information. Once you select the template you like you upload all the information about the family members into a very easy interface. You can also send them a list or spreadsheet with the same information. After that, they merge your family info with the selected design, print, mat and frame, if you so choose, and ship it to you. They print on 120 lb paper with high quality archival ink that is designed to resist fading for 200 years. All framing is done with archival quality mats and framed behind plexiglass for extra protection.

Prices of the tree run $99 with additional costs for matting and framing.

We have custom-designed several family trees for our clients and they can be very labor intensive and costly. I have to say that I am impressed with the designs of Arbor Art’s trees and think this is an excellent way to provide a tree at a reasonable cost.

Think about this as an option for your family reunions, birthday or anniversary gifts or a great gift for that person who has everything.

Technorati Tags: Arbor Arts, family tree

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Who Do You Know You Are? Exploring Your Family & Personal History

Posted on March 12, 2010 - Filed Under Geneaology, Personal History, Preserving Memories

Flickr photo: Roots

America is riveted right now by NBC’s hit show “Who Do You Think You Are?” which, in partnership with Ancestry.com, shares the genealogical history of well known entertainment personalities Spike Lee, Brooke Shields, Susan Sarandon, Lisa Kudrow (who is also the Executive Producer), Sarah Jessica Parker & husband Matthew Broderick as well as Emmitt Smith. It airs on Fridays at 8/7 PM. You can find more information about the show including the schedule and full episodes at NBC’s website.

Genealogy is hot right now. The ease of online databases such as Ancestry.com, World Vital Records and Ellis Island, among others, allows the armchair genealogist to quickly and inexpensively find records such as census, birth and death certificates, immigration manifests and other important tracks in the lives of their ancestors. Over at Geneabloggers.com you can find a variety of blogs and resources dedicated to helping you explore your family tree.

There’s no knowing how difficult the trail will be until you start. You can do it all yourself and if you choose that path, you should be prepared to dedicate many months if not years to putting your family puzzle together. You can get assistance from genealogical libraries. Here in Houston we have the Clayton Library Center for Genealogical Research which hosts a variety of classes to better help you utilize the library as well as providing individual support during your search. The Houston Chronicle has done several articles about locals who have successfully used the Clayton Library to locate information on their families. Most recently this article appeared on March 7, 2010.

If time is a consideration and money is not, you can hire a genealogist to help you in your search. Like most experts, genealogists can specialize in different geographical areas or different time periods so it’s always a good idea to find out what their specialties might be should you go that route. Ancestry.com as well as ProGenealogists and Genealogy Wise are some good places to begin your search for a professional genealogist.

Now the real point of this blog post is to differentiate the difference between a family history and a personal history. There are so many names that get thrown about and used synonymously. To me, a family history outlines the family structure (also referred to as a family tree or pedigree) and diagrams relationships within the family.

When you watch the show “Who Do You Think You Are,” each subject is presented with the results of extensive genealogical searches which provide information about who their descendants were and details about them such as where they lived, what their occupation was, and if they were lucky, other important details about their lives. In Sarah Jessica Parker’s story that aired this past Friday March 5th, she learned that on her mother’s side, one of her descendants was one of the last women tried during the Salem witch trials in Massachusetts. She was accused and then later the charges were dropped and in effect, her case ended the persecution of women for witchcraft. These details were found in letters and other documents and provide a glimpse into her ancestor’s life that speaks volumes more than a birth/death certificate or census report. She now has some key pieces to her family history.

A personal history, also referred to as an oral history or biography, is a retelling of events based on the subject’s personal experiences and opinions. It can also be the interpretation of historical events based on their eye-witness experience as well as family anecdotes, rumors and other stories passed down over the years. These personal histories are most typically presented in book form, oral recording or video, although websites, photo albums with comments, scrapbooks and family cookbooks are other vehicles for recording personal histories. The quality of books can range from a collection of photos and notes xeroxed at the local copy shop to professionally hard-bound books with photo dust jackets. Videos and audio can run from unedited tapes to polished presentations incorporating photographs, vintage film clips, archival footage and other mementos to support the storyline.

Just as in the case of researching your genealogy, personal history can be done by yourself or by hiring a professional such as myself (Legacy Multimedia). A great resource for locating a personal historian is through the Association of Personal Historians (of which I am a member.) There too, you will find a wide variety of specialties and mediums.

While piecing together your family history seems to get easier with the passing of time due to the developments of online databases and other large genealogical collection projects such as the Church of the Latter Day Saints Library, creating your personal history is something that you can’t really afford to put off. Life happens and not a day goes by where I don’t meet someone that says, “I wish I met you 6 months ago before my mother passed away.” After these people are gone from our lives, these stories become anecdotal, and like the childrens’ game Telephone, details continue to get lost in each retelling of the stories.

Technorati Tags: Alzheimer's Association, ancestry.com, Who Do You Think You Are

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