Photos are probably most meaningful when they introduce someone to us, to whom we are related, but whom we have never met. While I never had the chance to know any of my grandparents, I am lucky to have photos of everyone except my mother’s father. For some reason, he doesn’t appear in any known photo. Perhaps I should check with other family members.
Below are photos of my father’s mother and father.
My father’s mother, according to family oral history, once worked as a pastry chef in the White House.
My grandfather, a descendant of Irish immigrants, was a trolley car driver in Manchester, NH.
My grandmother, standing next to her mother. My father is standing in the foreground. In all, Grammy would have seven children.
The picture above is one of only two images I have of my paternal great-grandmother.
Time moves along faster than we can ever imagine. Many of us who are “baby boomers” are grandmothers already! It’s fun to experience the joy of seeing a grandchild growing, at the touch of a button that connects me to photos, like the one below, and which I conveniently “lift” to show you. Just shoot me!
Our grandson, Patrick, amid the pumpkins at Schartner’s Farm. Eventually, he ended up with a Patrick-size pumpkin!
The challenge in the future will be how to store digital images so that they don’t get corrupted or lost, over time. Luckily, I hear that there are new archival “gold” discs for saving photos. They are most costly, but are said to store information for 100 years. That could be worth investigating, not that I plan to still be here then!
Patricia Cummings
