Monthly Archives: December 2010

Happy New Year!

Posted on December 31, 2010 | 2 Comments

May 2011 brings you serenity, happiness, and good health.  I look forward to bringing you another year of posts on subjects of particular interest to personal historians.

Thank you for your support.


Photo by Clark Miller

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From the Archives: Our Favorite Things Have Stories to Tell.

Posted on December 30, 2010 | Leave a comment

Our Favorite Things Have Stories to Tell. This past week I’ve been reminded how much our treasured possessions are a window into the stories of our life. My frail, ninety-one year old mother has  started to go through her modest collection of jewelry. She’s carefully trying to match each piece with a relative or friend she thinks would appreciate having it after she has died.   As I was sitting with her, she began telling me the stories behind each piece. There are the art deco black-and-white … Read More

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Posted in Life stories, Memoirs, Personal historian, Tips

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My Top 10 Posts of 2010.

Posted on December 29, 2010 | 2 Comments

In the past twelve months these are the posts that have ranked as the most popular with  readers.  If you’ve missed some of these, now’s  your chance to catch up over the holidays. Enjoy!

  1. How Much Should You Pay A Personal Historian?
  2. Your Photo Restoration Resource List.
  3. 15 Great Memoirs Written by Women.
  4. 5 Print-On-Demand Sites You’ll Want to Consider.
  5. #1 Secret to Getting More Clients.
  6. 5 Top Sites for Free Online Videography Training.
  7. How to Interview Someone Who Is Terminally Ill: Part One.
  8. How to Salvage a Damaged Audio Cassette.
  9. Warning: Using Copyright Music Without Permission Is Illegal.
  10. How to Make Your Life Story Workshop Memorable.

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Posted in Book reviews, End of life, How to, Interviewing, Life stories, Marketing, Personal historian, Photos, Publishing, Restoration, Tips, Video production

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Monday’s Link Roundup.

Posted on December 27, 2010 | Leave a comment

In today’s Monday’s Link Roundup, with the New Year days away, you’ll want to check out 13 Tips for Sticking to Your New Year’s Resolutions. If you have this week to relax, why not take some time to feast your eyes on 10 books to inspire you to make art. And for a piece of “blatant self-promotion” ;-)   I’d be remiss in not pointing you to the article A gift that lasts beyond a lifetime. It’s about my work at Victoria Hospice.

  • Lives of the dead come to life on tombstones. “A standard Memory Medallion remembrance package costs $225 and includes a barcode medallion for the gravesite, a website of eight photos and 1,000-word story and a printed biography. Family members also can record a video about the deceased that plays on smart phones that scan the barcode, called a QR code.”
  • The benefits of thinking about our ancestors. ” Anecdotally, there’s reason to believe that such thoughts are beneficial. Why else the public fascination with genealogy and programmes like the BBC’s Who Do You Think You Are? Now Peter Fischer and his colleagues at the Universities of Graz, Berlin and Munich have shown that thinking about our ancestors boosts our performance on intelligence tests – what they’ve dubbed the ancestor effect.”
  • A gift that lasts beyond a lifetime. “A free program through [Victoria]hospice matches volunteers trained in interview techniques with patients for up to five hours of digital recordings — preferably before they enter the facility.”
  • 10 books to inspire you to make art. “When I finish a long project I don’t actually collapse but rather wander around in a state of unfocused activity. When that happened yesterday I decided to settle down and read. Not knowing exactly what I wanted to read, I pulled a slew of books off my bookshelves. And because I love sorting things into piles and classifying them, I eventually ended up with this pile of ten books that never fail to pull me into their beauty.”
  • Vimeo Video School. “Vimeo Video School is a fun place for anyone to learn how to make better videos. Start by browsing our Vimeo Lessons, or find specific video tutorials created by other members.”

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Season’s Greetings from Victoria.

Posted on December 24, 2010 | 2 Comments

Lighting one candle
from another -
winter night.
~ Buson

My warmest wishes to all of you who have visited these pages over the past year. And a special thank you to my regular subscribers and viewers. May the coming year bless you all with good health, happiness, and serenity.

As a little holiday treat, here’s one of my favorite seasonal song lyrics  from Hearth and Fire by Gordon Bok. It’s a lovely piece and worth taking a few minutes to savor.

Hearth and Fire

Hearth and fire be ours tonight
And all the dark outside,
Fair the night, and kind on you
Wherever you may bide.

… continue here.

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From the Archives: Now for Something Completely Different: Calmness.

Posted on December 23, 2010 | Leave a comment

Now for Something Completely Different: Calmness. It’s time to stop  the rushing and working and worrying. You can always pick that up later. For now, as we come to the end of another year,  let’s all take a deep breath and calm ourselves.  As my holiday present,  I’ve put together a little virtual retreat for you. You’ll find some wonderful calming images, music, books, and quotations below. Start anywhere you like.  There’s the three minute Whispering Sea guitar video.  You can  feast your eye … Read More

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Posted in Holidays, How to, Inspiration, Personal Care

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Should I Have a Business Blog?

Posted on December 22, 2010 | Leave a comment

That’s the question that rattled around in my head three years ago. So I started reading everything that I could lay my hands on about blogging. I discovered, among other things, that blogging could be a very useful business tool. For example, in a 2008 social media survey, 93% of Americans believe a company should have a presence in social media, 85% believe a company should not only be present but also interact with its consumers via social media, and 56% of American consumers feel both a stronger connection with and better served by companies when they can interact with them in a social media environment.

I decided to take the plunge and set up my blog. What I’ve learned might be useful to those of you still thinking about doing so.  I’m not a Web 2.0 expert and I’m not going to tell you that blogging will bring you fame and fortune. But I hope you’ll see that blogging can be an important part of your personal history business.

Seven reasons why you need a business blog.

  1. Millions of people every day search for information and services on the Internet. If you’re not there, they won’t find you.
  2. Blogs are easier and cheaper to set up and maintain than websites. I spent all of $20 getting my WordPress.com blog launched.
  3. Google ranks blogs higher on its listing than web pages. Search engines like activity and links. If you post frequently and people link to your blog, you’ll eventually be on page one of Google.
  4. Blogs are more personal and informal than a website. They allow for conversations  and in our business being personal is a critical part of who we are.
  5. Blogs can establish you as an authority. Part of this has to do with publishing content regularly. As Woody Allen said, “80% of success is showing up.”
  6. Blogs are a great way to connect with clients and share valuable content about life stories.
  7. Writing on a regular basis  clarifies your thinking and adds immeasurably to your learning about the many facets of personal history.

Has blogging worked for me?  I think it has. My blog is still a work in progress, but since I launched it in July 2008 I’ve  had over 56,000 viewers and 137  have become subscribers. I consistently appear in the top five Google listings for “personal historian”.

I’ve also discovered how much I enjoy writing articles and how it has limbered up my creativity and worked my “writing muscles”.  I’ve come to know some of my personal history colleagues better and expanded my network to include genealogists, social-networkers, and writers.

So what do you say? Time to take the plunge?

Photo by Sarah

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Monday’s Link Roundup.

Posted on December 20, 2010 | 2 Comments

You still have time to ask Santa for a new camcorder. In this Monday’s Link Roundup you can find some help in selecting just the right one by going to the Videomaker’s Annual 2010 Camcorders Buyer’s Guide. For those concerned about the future of print you’ll want to head over to Bill Moggridge, Mark Zuckerberg, and Jimmy Wales on the Future of Media Design [Videos].

  • On Light and Dark: the historicity of colour and non-colour photographs. “…the photographs, appearing in beautiful  vibrant colours, were taken prior to the First World War…There’s something about a colour photo that makes it feel more recent; closer to our own lifetime; more alive. When I think about this concept I know it’s ridiculous, but I adhere to it subconsciously. I think about the way I’m seeing these images and it occurs to me that I have certain expectations – cultural cues and codes my mind has been trained to see – as an observer of images in the 21st century.”
  • More Than 50,000 Historic New York City Images Online Now! “The Museum of the City of New York is pleased to announce the soft launch of its online collections portal…This is the first phase in a project to digitize the Museum’s entire photography collection, and additional images will be uploaded as they’re digitized and cataloged.” [Thanks to APH  member Marcy Davis for alerting me to this item.]
  • Bill Moggridge, Mark Zuckerberg, and Jimmy Wales on the Future of Media Design [Videos]. “Print isn’t dead, Designing Media, a fascinating new doorstop of a book by Cooper-Hewitt, National Design Museum chief Bill Moggridge, seems to say. It’s just waiting for design to save it. That counts as one of the more provocative ideas in a book full of the stuff. Moggridge — who invented the first laptop and cofounded IDEO — takes the fraught world of media, both old and new, and looks at it as a series of design problems. How do you design news as a social platform? Or newspapers at a time when everyone’s reading websites?”
  • How to Build a Referral Engine. “Getting a steady stream of referrals is the dream of most businesses. The right kind of referred leads are pure gold. They are often more qualified, less price sensitive, and more apt to refer business once they become a customer.”
  • Videomaker’s Annual 2010 Camcorders Buyer’s Guide. “In last year’s Annual Camcorders Buyer’s Guide, we divided camcorders by price. This approach still makes some sense, but it may not offer what you need to get your ‘perfect’ camcorder. The reason? The advent of flash-based ‘brick’ camcorders – often packaged like MP3 players with digital zoom lens added – and the growing popularity of HDTV at the high end means that your choices have become ever more complex. If you buy based on price alone, you could get the wrong camcorder for your needs.”
  • Interview as story: on radio, online and in print. “Whether they use full-on storytelling or just crib a few literary devices, interviews have their own narrative arcs and angles. From political drama (think the Frost-Nixon standoff or “The Fog of War”) to Studs Terkel’s cultural layering, interviews create a kind of permanent present-tense experience for viewers.”

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From the Archives: 14 Questions to Help You Build a Better Business.

Posted on December 16, 2010 | Leave a comment

14 Questions to Help You Build a Better Business. I find the end of the year a good time to take stock of  my personal history business.  I set aside a day and look at my successes and the things that didn’t work.  I make a point of  writing this all down. It’s an important exercise that holds me accountable and keeps me growing as a professional. Why not take some time and do your own year-end review? A word of caution. Don’t beat yourself up for perceived failures but at the same time don’t  … Read More

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Posted in How to, Marketing, Personal historian, Tips, Uncategorized

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The Top Personal History Blogs of 2010.

Posted on December 15, 2010 | 11 Comments

Last December I  selected what I considered to be the top five personal history blogs of 2009.  I’m pleased to announce this year’s list which has expanded to eleven!

I’ve been asked what I’ve used as my criteria for selection.  Basically it’s the qualities I wrote about in What Everybody Ought to Know About a Successful Blog. Briefly these are:

  • Frequent posts.
  • Consistency.
  • Personal.
  • Short and scannable articles.
  • Uncluttered.
  • Use of graphics, photographs, and video.
  • Catchy headlines.
  • Generous and useful content.

If you know of a blog or you have a blog that you feel deserves inclusion, please let me know and I’ll consider it for next year’s list.

Without further ado, here are the top personal history blogs for 2010, ranked in alphabetical order.  Congratulations to everyone.  Drum role, please!

  • Family Oral History Using Digital Tools. Owner  Susan A. Kitchens  says,  “This site explores how to use digital tools and media to record and preserve spoken memories of family members.”
  • Legacy Multimedia blog. Owner Stefani Twyford says that on her blog “you will read about my passion for personal history, filmmaking techniques, genealogy, and related topics. I will veer off onto other topics from time to time but always come back to the things that make my work and my life a joy.”
  • Lifestorytriggers.com. Owner Hella Buchheim describes her blog as “helping those who want to write a life story.” She has tips on getting started, rules of life story writing, and useful writing prompts.
  • Maureen Taylor. Owner Maureen Taylor says, “As a photo curator, genealogist, and now as a writer and photo identification/preservation expert, the focus of Maureen’s work remains family photography, history and genealogy.”
  • Memoir Mentor. Owner Dawn Thurston says, “My blog is an attempt to participate in the larger community of people interested in life story writing of all kinds and perhaps help a few people persevere in writing their stories.”
  • Shoebox Stories. Owner cj Madigan says, “I revere photographs … I positively swoon over books … I have both a knack and a compulsion to give order to things … And I’m also a whip-smart project manager who makes sure that everything gets done in the right sequence at the right time. All of these strands weave together in Shoebox Stories.”
  • Video Biography Central. Owner Jane Lehmann-Shafron describes her blog as a place for “Advice, essays, samples and inspiration for people interested in preserving their personal and family history through video biography, memorial video, life story and genealogy video.”
  • Women’s Memoirs. Owners Matilda Butler and Kendra Bonnet have put together a wealth of information that includes writing prompts, book reviews, and more. Women’s Memoirs is not strictly speaking a personal history site but there’s a lot of useful material  here for anyone involved in personal histories.
  • Your Life is Your Story blog. Owner Tom Gilbert notes that his blog is a place for “… quality family history and life story news, views, methods, products, links, services…and whatever else catches our fancy.”

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