Last week I gave a presentation at Jamboree, the nation’s third largest genealogy conference, held annually at the Convention Center next to the Marriott Hotel in Burbank, CA, and sponsored by the Southern California Genealogy Society. I’m always amazed at how many people (somewhere around 2000 this year), travel from all over the country to attend this two-day conference.

This year a family history writer’s conference was held the day before the conference, and it was at that event that I spoke, addressing one of my favorite topics: “The Family History Writer’s Conundrum: How to Write about Family Skeletons and Other Prickly People,” a subject I’m often asked about in my classes. We all have family skeletons of one variety or another. The question is, do we write about them? If so, how much truth should we tell? What are the risks, etc., etc.? I had a great time teaching the folks who showed up to hear me. That over, I enjoyed attending the rest of the conference, soaking up as much information as I could and wishing I had more time when I got home to apply some of what I learned to unearth and untangle some of my troublesome family roots.

I ran into a number of people I knew as I rushed between classes. I found two of my students, Dotty and Marcia, dressed in Mayflower attire to attract people to their Mayflower Society table in the Exhibit Hall. Dotty and Marcia (I wish I’d asked the third woman’s name!), are real troopers. They also own Civil War-era dresses they don when they travel around the country to participate in Civil War enactments. We genealogists really like to get close to our ancestors! If you’d come to the conference, you could have talked to all kinds of zealous genealogy hobbyists with ties to the DAR and SAR, Sons of Norway, Cousins of Canadians, and other proud kin of Germans, Irish, Scottish, Dutch, you name it. I just wish they’d stop digging for names and dates and start writing their stories.

When writing family history, it’s difficult to create a realistic picture of people long gone. Genealogy data reveals little about how people looked, moved, or talked, or what strengths and weaknesses shaped their lives. Then there’s family pride. Absent any evidence to the contrary, we tend to idealize our forebears. We want them to be exemplary rather than human. I suspect the image that exists in our mind’s eye bears little resemblance to how they actually were.

How can it be otherwise, especially when we’re writing about people who lived decades, even centuries, before we were born? In my recent efforts to write my Parrett family history, I’ve been grappling with how to capture the life of Joseph J. Parrett, a man removed from me by six generations. I have collected a fair amount of data about him, for he served in the War of 1812, appears in census records, and is mentioned a few times in various community histories, where he’s sometimes called “Tennessee Joe,” a moniker distinguishing him from relatives with the same name. He wasn’t a community leader, as far as I can tell. I mostly picture him as a hardworking farmer in the early days of Ohio statehood who with his wife, Rebecca, raised a large family (nine kids), in the custom of those times. All this makes him feel like a type rather than a man of flesh and bones. Those who have ancestors who wrote letters or kept diaries definitely have more of a window into the minds and hearts of their ancestors than I do.

I have one piece of personal information that individualizes my Joseph. Some years ago I received a letter from an elderly Parrett correspondent in Iowa who remembered a conversation he had with an elderly Parrett relative in Ohio some years earlier. The Ohio Parrett observed that “Old Tenn Joe Parrett would not work, except at night. All he liked to do was sit and comb his whiskers.”  Ouch! Did you feel that stab to my family pride?

My genealogy records tell me that the Ohio man who made this statement was born after Joseph Parrett died in 1859, which means he had to learn this information from someone else. So what I’m dealing with here is a third- or fourth-hand account of some anonymous person’s opinion. Who knows what circumstances and biases shaped that perception. It could have come from anyone, a young grandson, even a great-grandson, who only saw Joseph as an old man and had no concept of how his arduous life had sapped his vitality. That’s only one scenario among many explanations. And how has that observation been shaped and filtered by the memories and biases of the people sharing it over time? We have so many things to weigh when considering how to use a story like this in a family history.

I feel sorry for poor Joseph, frozen in time by this snapshot of himself. In my mind it conjures up images associated with words like cantankerous, eccentric, vain, self-centered, and lazy. I think of movie scenes set in the Appalachian backwoods where toothless old men without hope slump in rickety porch rockers, tobacco juice staining their beards and soiled shirts. All this is just crazy imagination, of course, but my family pride winces at the thought of it.

As a family historian who weighs all the evidence, I have to balance that snapshot with other things I know about him. He was a man who honorably served out his War of 1812 enlistment, his unit suffering from near starvation at one point, according to one account. In 1814 Joseph set out in a wagon for Ohio with his wife and infant son, purchasing and cultivating several several hundred acres of densely timbered land that he lived on for the rest of his life. A number of his children became teachers, served in local politics, and held positions in the Methodist church. He doesn’t sound like a lazy man, at least at this time in his life.

Here’s something else: I looked at Joseph Parrett’s probate file when I visited Ohio last May and found a doctor’s receipt for repeated visits to the Parrett farm in the last three months of Joseph’s life. During those visits, the doctor administered medicine, primarily whiskey (a common “remedy” for all ailments in those days), for pain associated with  Joseph’s kidney stones. From what I know of that condition, it can drain a person’s energy, maybe even send him to his rocking chair for days on end.

I’m not trying to rationalize or whitewash some negative character evidence to create a more idealized version of one of my forebears. Who knows, maybe he was a lazy lout after all, and his wife and kids did all the work. I’m primarily trying to point out the dangers of using one fact or one piece of evidence to create a whole picture. We need to gather a wide range of evidence to paint as fair and nuanced story of our ancestors as we can. This is is particularly difficult when we have little to go on, but we should strive to capture as much of the whole person and the whole story as we can, and acknowledge what’s truth and what’s speculation. Family historians are the repositories of family reputations. It’s a heavy charge.

If I were to die suddenly, I wonder what snapshot of me would linger through the generations. What would my grandchildren remember about their grandmother? They’ll have more to draw from than I have for Joseph, obviously, for they will have more records and photos available to them to shape their memory. But it’s likely something may stick in their minds that they’ll repeat to their children. Sometimes we tend to remember the aberration rather than the norm. Maybe my grand-daughter will remember the time I jumped in the swimming pool with my clothes on. Future generations hearing that story could deduce that their great-grandma was a quirky, spontaneous soul—something that couldn’t be farther from the truth. Or maybe my grandson will remember the time I lost my temper with him because he kept teasing our dog. We can’t control what people remember about us, but—and  I suspect you know where I’m going with this—writing our own stories will give our descendants a broader sense of who we are, not just a snapshot that gets passed down through the vagaries of people’s memories.

My husband and I had the great opportunity last week to teach four days at a week-long adult education event called Campus Education Week, sponsored by Brigham Young University in Provo, Utah. The university has been hosting this program for years, always the third week in August, and it draws folks from all over the country looking to get away from home for a while to learn something new or find that proverbial shot in the arm they need to meet a challenge or pursue a dream.

This year’s 20,000 attendees could choose from the more than 1000 classes taught from 8:30 a.m. to 9:30 p.m. daily. Many stay in the university dorms, likely resurrecting memories of the good old days when their bones better weathered those thin dorm-room mattresses. Provo’s many hotels offer more comfort and privacy and run at full capacity all week.

I’ve attended this event a few times as a student some years ago, and have taught classes there on numerous occasions.  When I teach, I always attend other classes when I’ve finishing my own presentations. I always come away from the week invigorated, my head full of things I’ve learned, brimming with ideas and goals for self-improvement. It’s a great program.

My husband and I enjoy the opportunity to teach together. Two heads are better than one, and we learn from each other. I believe our students enjoy hearing our two perspectives. This year we focused on the following concepts, one taught each day:

• Who Am I?—Revealing Yourself through Your Story
• Putting Your Readers in Your World—It’s All in the Details
• Making It Real—Showing vs. Telling
• Writing Honestly about Sensitive Issues—Telling Your Emotional Truth

While a few of the 350 people who attended our class had heard us speak before, the majority had not. I enjoy presenting our writing techniques to new people, many who have not thought about using scenes and dialogue in their personal histories or know the difference between “showing and telling.” When I first introduce these concepts, I sometimes perceive some reticence in the faces of my listeners. I’ve been at it long enough that I generally know what they want to say to me: “I can’t write lile this”; “I don’t want to write like this because it’s imbellishing the truth.” I know, though, that if they hear me out and consider the various examples I show them, they’ll generally come around…which is what happened again this week. The energy and enthusiasm I observed by week’s end told me my husband and I had expanded their vision of what they could do with their stories.

People are always concerned about addressing those difficult issues all families experience: people who have hurt them; personal failings; relatives who are difficult to be around but who have played a major role in their lives. How do you write honestly about these thorny problems? We saved this lecture for the last day, but invited students to let us know in advance what topics were giving them trouble. Many took us up on our invitation, providing us with plenty of material to discuss in Friday’s class.

Friday came, and as my husband and I discussed the problems and the various issues people need to consider, we assured them that there is no right or wrong answer. Sometimes we had different opinions, creating kind of a “He Said/She Said” scenario that our audience found entertaining and, hopefully, educational. We needed twice as much time as we were allotted to address these sticky, sometimes painful, issues—which means we have something left to teach next year.

I’m always looking for examples of creative ways people write family histories that breathe life into ancestors long gone. I have posted a list of books I particularly admire in the Toolbox section of my website, www.MemoirMentor.com. I recently finished another family history I’d like to recommend to you, one that will surely go on the top of my list. It’s The Journey Takers, written by Leslie Albrecht Huber. I am impressed with the way Huber structured her family history and told her story, and I’ve picked up some ideas I’d like to implement in the Parrett family history I’m writing.

Huber’s narrative traces the lives of several families on her paternal line who made the brave choice to forsake their homeland–in this case, Germany, England, and Sweden–to immigrate to America. Hence, the title, The Journey Takers. This is an interesting focus, one that provides a unified theme to the varied individual life stories. My husband and I have frequently discussed writing a joint family history about all of our immigrant ancestors who came to America. Huber has beat us to the punch and provided a superb template to boot.

The Journey Takers is also about Huber’s own journey, actually several journeys, including research trips to her ancestral homelands to comb through archives, talk to the locals, and walk the land her people called their own. While researching for this book–a ten-year project, she tells us–her own young family is also in a state of flux. Educational pursuits and job responsibilities require the Hubers to move to several different states and spend a year in Spain. She recounts these different experiences in an engaging way, candidly telling us about her difficult pregnancies, parenting adjustments, and frustrations about being sidetracked from her research and writing goals. Her children are her top priority, she tells us, but she’s also ambitious and driven to complete this book. The worst thing she can imagine, she thinks, would be to lead an ordinary life. A woman so driven finds ways to fulfill her goals. I had to smile at some of her solutions: bouncing a restless toddler on her hip at the Family History Library, juggling babysitters, toting her mother and pre-school-age children with her as she navigates the Oregon Trail. I felt like I knew this woman and could relate to her conflicted desires. 

The sections about Huber are told in first person, of course, and are also written in the present tense, which makes them feel both personal and immediate. The ancestral narratives are told in the past tense and third person. Huber has done her reseach, in both primary documents and social history, which she combines in an interesting, seamless way, documented inobtrusively with endnotes that appear at the back of the book.

Here’s the best part, however. The book is full of scenes…and you know how I like scenes. The book is worth reading just to convince yourself that scenes infuse lifeless names and facts with flesh and bones–and a heart and soul. Huber does a fine job with this creative form of writing, inbuing her scenes with engaging detail, dialogue, and emotion.

I love the slick way she transitions into scenes. For example, after describing horrible conditions on board an 1861 immigrant ship bound for America from Sweden, she writes the following:

When I think of Karsti’s voyage across the ocean, one image stands out in my mind.

Karsti hurries down the steps leading below deck in the semi-dark as the massive, angry sea tossed the ship back and forth. Behind her, she hears the hatch door slam shut with a resounding thud. She reminds herself that this is to protect the passengers–to keep the water out, not to make them miserable. A few lanterns give off a dim glow, the only light available. She searches for something to hold on to in order to steady herself against the relentless motion of the ship. Around her, she sees other passengers gripping their beds, their faces white.

The scene carries on in this vein for several more paragraphs, helping us visualize what Huber clearly visualized from her reseach about that voyage. It’s all done to good effect. I include below several more  examples showing how Huber transitions from narriative to scene. 

Sometimes I imagine Karsti at Castle Gardens. She stacks her luggage, which represents all her possessions, around her. She rolls up a piece of clothing and places it under her head….

In my mind, I can see James stopping to knock on a door. A few seconds later, Elizabeth answers. Her long, brown hair is pulled up neatly on top of her head….

I picture their wagon bumping over the parched ground as John guides the horses along the dirt trail lined with sagebrush.

The book contains many other fine examples of this type. We can learn a lot by reading books similar to the ones we want to write. This is no ordinary book, written by no ordinary writer and genealogist. Leslie Albrecht Huber has nothing to worry about. 

Leslie Ann Huber, The Journey Takers, Foundation Books, 2010, 332 pages, 6 x 9, with appendix and bibliography. ISBN 2010924144, $19.95 (paperback). The book can be ordered through Leslie’s website, http://www.thejourneytakers.com/.

Next post: A bit about my glorious Baltic Cruise

More than two centuries ago Abigail Adams penned a letter to her husband, John, the future president, when he was then serving as a representative to the Continental Congress. She admonished him that while he and his colleagues were crafting new laws, “I desire you would Remember the Ladies, and be more generous and favourable to them than your ancestors.” 

I recalled Abigail’s advice at the end of an aggravating day researching in libraries and archives this week. Men, Men, Men…that’s all I read about. Women were invisible, for the most part. If their existence was acknowledged, they were usually identified as Mrs. So and So. Didn’t they have names of their own?  

I know, I know, we genealogists know all about this. We shake our heads about the sad inequity of it all, but most of us continue to research and write about our male forbears–because it’s easier–and thus perpetuate the situation.  

Sometimes it just gets to me—like when I scour cemeteries for my ancestors and see women identified on gravestones as someone’s wife. Why aren’t men identified as someone’s husband? Or what about the many occasions when men have stones with their names on them and their wives aren’t mentioned at all? Where were they buried?

The incident that really got me riled this week occurred during a tour of a lovely mansion that serves as a museum and repository for the Ross County Historic Society in Chillicothe, Ohio. Our tour group, consisting entirely of women, entered the mansion’s parlor and our female guide pointed to a painting hanging over the fireplace mantel. She identified the man in the painting as the owner of the home and recounted his many achievements. The man’s wife was portrayed in another painting that hung alongside her husband’s. She smiled down at us from her place on the wall, but we never learned a thing about her. I should have piped up and asked, “Can you tell us something about the woman?” But I didn’t.

I’m as guilty as the next person. I’m here in Ohio researching my paternal line, writing specifically about the men in that line.

I supposed it’s partially the fault of society’s naming conventions. Our birth surname is part of our identity, and it’s natural for a researcher to trace the history of her birth name. If we inherited our surname from our mother, our research focus might be different. And, of course, there are the age-old culprits that keep women out of historical records–power, authority, sexism, etc.–making it virtually impossible to find out anything about our female relations.

I can understand why women aren’t mentioned in military histories. I really get bugged, though, when early church histories mention only the contributions of men. Come on, we all know that if women weren’t around, men wouldn’t set foot inside a chapel! Just kidding here, folks, but women do form the backbone of most churches. Why aren’t they mentioned?

Some people and institutions have been trying to balance the historical record by recognizing and publishing the accomplishments of women. I’m currently involved in a project directed by a friend of mine that involves interviewing and recording the life stories of women in our church. In the last nine months more than 60 women have been interviewed, providing a valuable archive for future generations.

After I finish my Parrett family history, I plan to do more to “remember the ladies” among my forbears by writing their stories. I also need to finish my own personal history.

I’d like to hear if any of you are involved in projects that honor your female heritage. If you, like me, have been busy chasing after the men, consider Abigail’s admonition. She was a wise woman. John thought so, too.