As an employee of the History Center, I’m privileged to see
what goes on behind the scenes and to see documents that we have housed for
research purposes. A blog post last year chronicled the work being done on
Council of Defense documents from WWI and two of our volunteers are working on
WWII’s pieces. As we began work on the latest issue of the Old Fort News,
observations about the personal stories of African Americans and Germans in
Fort Wayne during WWI were part of our conversations. You’ll be happy, or
distressed depending upon your views, to know in this election year that some
things never change.
But what has always been true is that it’s those personal
stories that make history come to life. The idea for this post came from a
story in my hometown newspaper. Check it out because it’s quite interesting.
This past summer, I spent a week in Nebraska, helping my
mother sort through papers and other things that she and my father had
accumulated over the course of 61 years of marriage. Since Dad is now in an
Alzheimer’s Unit, we’ve tried to find some things that might spark a memory
here and there, and so my sisters and I plus a niece and nephew, took a ride
with him and a driver from the Kearney (NE) Volunteer Fire Department in a small
fire truck he helped to build in the 1950s for the local department. The muscle
memory was there—he still remembers how to drive—but his memories of being a
volunteer fireman are gone.
We tried for a long time to get him to write down his life
experiences—growing up in the depression and serving on an aircraft carrier in
WWII that was sunk in the Battle of the Coral Sea. But, if he wrote anything
down, we have yet to find it.
We did find, however, the story of his Uncle Benji, who was
orphaned as a teenager and lied about his age to enlist in the Army during WWI.
I remember as a kid getting our “family letter” and trying to decipher some of
the worst handwriting ever imagined because his letters were wonderful.
Fortunately, he had typed what he’d written about his time in France and his
recuperation from being wounded as well as “gassed” during combat. A copy of
those experiences now resides in the Genealogy Department of the Allen County
Public Library.
This past month, my husband and I took a two-week journey to
England to study one of his ancestors, Archbishop William Sancroft. Sancroft
was Dean of St. Paul’s Cathedral when the Great Fire of London occurred and is
responsible for hiring Christopher Wren to rebuild the structure. He served at
York Minster and Emmanuel College, where his library of close to 7000 volumes
is kept under lock and key in a room where the temperature and lighting are
designed to preserve the collection. We got a special look at the books—no
photos were allowed—and in the process of the study I learned more about
English history than I ever did in a history class. Sancroft was booted from
the office of Archbishop when he would not support the monarchy of William and
Mary, even though he had disagreed with the previous king about the role of
Roman Catholicism in the country. He’s buried in the churchyard in
Fressingfield, a small village in Suffolk.
As someone who has loved history since elementary school,
and who continues to study it, I found at an early age that biographies,
autobiographies, news stories and conversations are far more interesting ways
to learn about events than memorizing presidents, dates and wars. You can “look
up” that information. But it’s just a small piece of the puzzle of the past.
The Indiana Historical Society occasionally de-accessions
books they own and offers these works to those who receive their Friday e-news
“Communique on Line”. Last summer I asked for, and received, a copy of “My
History Is America’s History: 15 Things You Can Do to Save American’s Stories”.
The work was a millennium project of The National Endowment for the Humanities
in partnership with the White House Millennium Council.
With the holidays coming up, and families gathering
together, here are their suggestions for preserving your family history in a
way that is meaningful. We’ll elaborate on these in future blog posts.
- Keep a
journal
- Family
recollections matter—preserve them
- Play
detective with photographs
- Discover
clues in family papers
- Uncover
history in the attic
- Explore
your home’s history
- Climb
your family tree
- Find
your family’s place in American history
- Write
your own story
- Make
studying history a fun family activity
- Share
your story
- Connect
with your community
- Use
resources available to explore your history
- Teach
American history through family history
- Join
your hometown experts
That last one is THEIR idea but a perfect way to plug
membership in the History Center. It’s a wonderful gift for your family. Join
us today!
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