HI NANCY ..WELL THE QUAKERS DID A GOOD JOB .WITH THEIR MM RECORDS .. AND AS
YOU SAID THE GOOD OLD FAMILY BIBLE .. DIARYS .. YOU FORGOT ... TO PUT
YOURSELF IN THEIR ..AS A MODERN DAY RECORD KEEPER !!! THANK YOU META
----- Original Message -----
From: "MmeDefarge" <mmedefarge(a)attbi.com>
To: <INMIAMI-L(a)rootsweb.com>
Sent: Monday, November 11, 2002 10:33 PM
Subject: Re: [INMIAMI-L] Genealogy - Past and Future
Thanks to all of you who took the time to write regarding my new
granddaughters! I particularly enjoyed the comments about "100 years from
now" and it really got me thinking. Do you suppose in 100 years you will
be
able to just enter - say - your own social security number in a
computer
and
it will spit out your family history back to Adam and Eve??? (Or, at
least,
back to Noah unless your family were VERY good swimmers.)
Then I got to thinking - how DID people do family history a 100 years
ago? I can't even fathom keeping a database any where but on a computer,
and yet personal computers (for home use I mean) have only been around
what - 20 years? I used my first one in 1984 and that was a top of the
line
IBM-XT with those 2 floppy drives so you stored everything on disks.
There was no microfilm in1902 - I had to look it up, but the first
commercial use for microfilm was in 1925 and that was for microfilming
checks at a bank. I have no idea when the government first starting
microfilming the census reports, but it can't have been much before that.
And, of course, you have the 72 year privacy "rule" so in 1902 you
wouldn't
have any of the good census reports anyway (for me, 1850 was a gravy
year
in
census!).
So how did they do it? I've heard that some people kept card files
with
each individual on a separate card with all their vital information
and
then
sorted by families. Just imagine if you dropped the box! And what
did
you
start with? Well, probably where most of us started - with a page
from
the
family Bible, I suppose.
We are really so lucky with computers and, especially, the Internet.
I
cannot fathom how I would have done any of the searching I've
done without
the Internet.
Any thoughts on how family history was done in 1902??? I'd love to
hear
your thoughts. (And if you were around in 1902, it is much past
your
bedtime!)
Nancy
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