So what will you be leaving for the future family historians and genealogist ?

This was the question that reignited my passion for finding out more about my family and it's ancestors, it was a question that was asked by Maria Northcote, the host and writer of the podcast and website Genies down Under . 

James Maguire 

It has made me realise how lucky I have been with my family, I had the opportunity to meet a great great grand mother, lose my last great grand parent at the age of 18 and spend time with all but one of my grand parents. I have also been fortunate enough to have a family who has taken and kept photos, school books, certificates and other family heirlooms, of which  I have been trusted with by others to have guardianship of or the time to copy or photograph them. 

It also got  me thinking, what  stories, memories and material objects will my generation and the generation of my children be leaving, as now  we are in a world of photos, music , video recording mainly exist in the digital world and letters have been replaced by  emails, text messages, snap chat and Facebook. Not to mention that news  is now something that is watched more than read and if not, it needs to fit in to a sound bite or 144 characters and newspapers now tend to have more advertising than news or moved to an on line global format.

This is not to say that I am anti internet or anti digital. It just means that we need to think more about what, where and how we are going to leave our trace and help to continue to pass on the stories of our ancestors and write our own. You may ask "so what have you done to try to make sure that you leave something for the future family historian to find and work with? "