Protect Your Precious
Family History Data From Disaster and Loss by
Michael Boyter
In a
frantic minute you grab the kids and get a
safe distance from your house. There you
witness your home, and everything in it,
burning to the ground. It's a total
loss.
Fire!
Fire! Fire!
In a frantic minute you grab the kids and get
a safe distance from your house. There you
witness your home, and everything in it,
burning to the ground. It's a total loss.
A disaster of any kind is not ever a pleasant
experience, but at least there is insurance
to build again and to buy new furniture. But
let's talk about what is not insured. Things
that once lost, are gone for ever!
I'm referring to your family keepsakes. Your
home videos, family photos, journals, diaries
and other priceless family treasures. Losing
any of these things is a terrible
tragedy!
-Video of your baby's first steps...Gone!
-All your wedding pictures...Gone!
-Your diary you wrote as a
teenager...Gone!
What if you had to evacuate your house and
only had minutes or less to get out?
As I pondered this, I realized that it would
be next to impossible, in a short amount of
time, for me to get all of these things out
of the house and to a safe location.
Why? Because I had 8mm tapes all through the
house. My old journals were stuck in a box
somewhere in the garage. Some photo albums
were up in closets while others I looked and
looked for but couldn't find for awhile. I
had no idea where they were. I had to go
looking for them.
In a disaster situation, there is no time to
go "looking".
Here's some of the preventative measures that
I took in order to keep myself from such a
situation. Use these ideas and tips to ensure
that your family memories are preserved for
generations to come!
FAMILY PHOTO ALBUMS:
Share them as gifts often – Pictures of
the family are great gifts to give to
grandparents and other family members. If you
lose yours, you always have a way to regain
copies.
Online photo storage – My wife and I
have put many of our pictures on a free, safe
and secure family web site. There are many of
these but I personally like MyFamily.com
Build your site in minutes and you don't need
to know a thing about making a web page. Your
pictures are stored remotely and something
like a house fire couldn't touch them.
One central location - Designate a location
for all your photo albums and don't deviate.
By putting them in a box and in one location
in your house, you increase your chances of
being able to get out quickly with all your
pictures.
HOME VIDEOS:
Duplicate them - Makes copies and get them to
other members of the family. This makes for a
great gift. What works for me is to simply
connect my video camera to my VCR. I then
push play on my video camera and press record
on my VCR. This isn't the fanciest way of
tape duplication but it works and my parents
have loved getting videos of the
grandkids.
JOURNALS, DIARIES, and PERSONAL HISTORIES
Personal histories of your own or those of an
ancestors are one of the most valuable items
in your possession. If kept protected, they
will be treasured for generations to
come.
Duplicate & Distribute - My grandma gave
me a copy of my late grandpa's life story. I
typed it up and printed multiple copies for
all of my cousins and aunts and uncles. They
loved it and we took steps to make sure
grandpa's life story will live on in the
hearts and minds of his posterity.
Diary Safeguard - If you are currently
writing a journal or diary I realize that
some of it may be personal and you may not
wish for it to be distributed out at this
time.
If you write your journal by hand, take your
journal in and photo copy any part that you
plan to pass on to your children someday!
Don't wait! You may then look into putting a
copy into a safe deposit box. Just as long as
it is out of your house.
If you write your journal with the aid of a
computer, I recommend storing copies often to
any one of the many free online storage web
sites. Nobody will be able to access your
data but you. I personally recommend Rule #1
in any of this is to duplicate your family
keepsake items and store them in multiple
locations. This is the only way to ensure
that if disaster strikes, you will be able to
easily recover those priceless family
mementos that define you as an individual and
as a family!
Written by Michael R. Boyter. Michael runs
FamilyHistoryProducts.com and is the creator
of Memorygrabber, a life story work that
makes writing your own life story, or that of
another, quicker, easier and a whole lot more
fun! www.memorygrabber.com