Funny Ancestral Pictures
Roxanne Turpin sent me a photo that made me think about the transition in photo poses. In most of the images from the 1840s, 1850s and even 1860s technology and our ancestors' discomfort with being photographed combine to make folks look like they're in pain. Then suddenly, people started to...
View DetailsCalling the Shots Premium
Having trouble attaching names to the faces in your family portraits? Fill in the blanks with our step-by-step photo-identification guide and worksheet.
View DetailsPhoto Firsts Premium
Does your photo collection include cased portraits? The author of Preserving Your Family Photographs shares secrets for identifying and storing these early photographic images.
View DetailsCollecting Pictures of Your Ancestors
Genealogists are famous for collecting relatives, but what about acquiring images of those folks? Is it really possible to find previously unknown photos of family members from the advent of photography in 1839? The answer is that it depends. Family circumstances, their comfort level with photography and the availability of...
View DetailsSpotlight: Denver Public Library Picture Collection
It's over 90 degrees in my town today. The heat and humidity make me start thinking about winter. With months to go before the snow, I did the next best thing. I looked at pictures of cooler temperatures I found on the Denver Public Library Web site. All right. Not...
View DetailsPictures Without Provenance
Hilda Barton sent me this lovely photo of a young girl with the subject line: "No Idea Who This is..." It's a picture without provenance. I've written about provenance before. It's the history of ownership of a photograph or other object. It's easy to underestimate the value of knowing...
View DetailsSign up for the Family Tree Newsletter
Plus, you'll receive our 10 Essential Genealogy Research Forms PDF as a special thank you!
Get Your Free Genealogy Forms
"*" indicates required fields
Tweet. Tweet. I’m on Twitter.
I've watched fellow genealogists talk about Twitter, but I've held back. Books, magazine articles and newspaper articles mention the power of Twitter. Oh boy, I thought. What is this new tool and how will I use it? I'm not really sure at this point...
View DetailsAdding Up Photo Clues
I had trouble deciding the angle for this story. Would I discuss the problem of trying to figure out the photographic method or mention a family brick wall? Then I re-read all the emails from Randy Majors and decided to cover those topics as well as how he identified his...
View DetailsPhotos on the Web: Copyright Woes
If you've ever tried to copy a family photo at a store or photo lab and been denied due to copyright issues, there's an article you might be interested in. On July 19, the New York Times published an article about photos on Wikipedia, "Wikipedia May Be a Font of...
View DetailsWhich Immigrant is It?
I've been asked to determine which wife is in a picture or which child, but this is the first inquiry that referred to an immigrant-ancestor mystery. Jeanette Bias told me that "she knows everything about her family," just not who's in this picture. It's a scan of a cousin's...
View Details