J is for ...A journal of a tour of discovery across the Blue Mountains, New South Wales, in the year 1813

 I've been researching my family history for over thirty years. Along this genealogy journey I have been supported by hundreds of books, many of which I have listed on my Librarything page. 

During the 2021 #AtoZChallenge I will be writing about two of my passions, books and family history. I'll be taking a trip down memory lane and revisiting some of those books that have enriched my genealogy experience.

It didn't take me long to read this modest little book that contained the 1813 Journal of Gregory Blaxland, one of the trio of explorers who forged a way over the Blue Mountains to the west of Sydney.

 William Cox who later in that decade was commissioned in 1814 with supervising the building of a road over those Blue Mountains, employed one of my convict ancestors, James Westbrook, as a brickmaker on that project. Although he is not mentioned in Cox's journals Westbrook was granted, in 1818, a mitigation of his sentence for his work. 

When I was working on a project for my local FHG with this book .A journal of a tour of discovery across the Blue Mountains, New South Wales, in the year 1813 I took a break and read it. 

It was most interesting to me as it was a contemporaneous account and primary source that described the conditions of the area in which my ancestor later travelled. 

One can now purchase facsimile copies of the book from Sydney University Press. 

Who wants memories?

"Nobody else will want them let's face it."

I happen to vehemently disagree with this statement made by a friend yesterday when we were discussing recording our memories. She has cleared the decks at her house so there will be no "rubbish" left for her children to deal with when she leaves this mortal earth.

I was telling her that I was finally going through and tossing 35 years worth of tickets, pamphlets and programs from 35 years of overseas travel..... BUT before I tossed them I scanned all that could be scanned. I am going to put all of those digital images on my hard drive in the photo folders to which they relate. I'm sure some of the kids will enjoy them. Of course I have saved hard copies of some important documents like the luncheon menu from when I dined in The Strangers' Dining Room at the House of Commons in London.

I have a bad  case of Hoarditis  and find it difficult to part with ephemera but I just don't have the physical space to store it all.

What's Next?

Although I have transcribed all of the entries in them into my online diary I still have a collection of my old physical diaries. Today I took a giant leap forward and tossed out all my old work diaries (I have been retired for nearly 7 years). I don't think I'll be quite brave enough to part with personal diaries ....just yet.

Maybe nobody else will want them but I'm giving my descendants the option of saying Yes or No.

Will you leave plenty of memories behind?

A Sentence a Day

While I was away my young geneablogging mate Caitie wrote about her new purchase the "A sentence a day" journal from Kikki K. I thought that I would like to have one and made a note to look for it on my return home.

The promotional blurb for this item says "Put pen to paper to complete a simple prompt each day of the year for three years. Without even noticing, you'll capture unique insights into your life, realise change and growth, and create a keepsake you can look back on for years to come.

A unique keepsake journal for yourself, and a gorgeous gift for any loved one."

Yesterday I parked my car in the section of the carpark that took me right past a Kikki K store so I looked in and there on the table with the sale items was a bundle of   "A sentence a day" books for 30% off. These sturdy little books are available in store or online for 17.47.

I don't know that I will write in my new book but I will use the prompts and try to write a sentence each day - surely I can manage to write at least that much!  I may record my sentences in Evernote or on a spreadsheet that I can merge with my diary but first I will have to remove the shrinkwrap from my purchase. 

The Book of Me - Prompt 6 - Journals and Diaries

This week Julie Goucher of Angler's Rest asked us to respond to the following prompt in The Book of Me, Written by You activity.

The prompt for week 6 is Journals and Diaries

Do you keep a journal or diary?

How far back do they go? What do you record?

Where do you keep them?

Do you always buy the same one or vary them?

Have you inherited any?

Do you intend to pass along your journals or destroy them?

Pictures

Do you have a favourite?

What do you use to write with – biro, pencil, ink or fountain pen?

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

This post is relatively easy for me as I blogged on this topic in 2010 in a post titled Recording my life's stories. I am pasting that post below and making additional comments in italics.

Do you keep a diary?

I have a couple of shelves of hard copy diaries in my garage. (now in my study). There are work diaries and personal diaries. I started recording a personal diary around 1980 but missed a couple of years in the eighties.

Around eighteen (21 ) years ago when I first acquired a PDA I decided to move to an online diary as I realised that I could move entries from my PDA into a file on my computer, enhance these with anecdotes and keep them as a diary. In those early days there weren't many pieces of  journalling software around and I don't think blogs were around either. I decided to keep my diary in a simple spreadsheet. Today it is still in that spreadsheet and still using the headings I set up all those years ago

Diary Headings

It's not meant to be pretty just functional.

I started by importing all of my PDA calendar entries into the spreadsheet then I  transcribed all of my diary entries; these triggered memories so I was able to add more detail to the dry dates and facts. Once this was completed I was on a roll. I then added entries for events prior to the days when I kept a diary. I added dates and memories of family events, looked at my dated photographs and recorded the stories these told me. My kids let me look at their old school diaries and calendars; these provided more dates and memory prompts. I have since gone through some (most) of our old credit card bills (and cheque butts) and added details of important purchases.





From time to time family members make a comment about an event in the past and their recollections of it.  I note these on either a scrap of paper or a note in my phone (I mostly use Evernote now) and put them in the diary as time permits recording the source of the comment. I always record my sources, not in a formal academic sense but with labels like Aunt May, 1983 school diary, Letter from Fred to Sue, Current, Photo etc.






When my Dad passed away I discovered where my hoarding genes came from. He had kept every receipt from every purchase he had made. I added these and the memories I have related to these purchases: our first refrigerator, our first radiogram, our first television, holiday dates. One of my dear friends had saved all the postcards I had sent to her, when she knew that her days were numbered she gave these back to me. I have added all of the text to the diary; these entries demonstrate in my words the awe and excitement I had when visiting distant lands. I have since acquired the postcards I have sent to my parents and inlaws and some from other family members, these too have been transcribed.



I cannot remember when all my friends got married or had their 21sts or when their kids were christened but I have vivid memories of some of these events. Whenever I come across someone whose wedding I attended I ask when they got married and add this to the diary. I then record my memories of the event. A friend lent me his collection of newsletters from our Church youth group, I have added details of the outings we had during these years. 





As technology has developed I have added entries from other sources. My daughter's emails from boarding school tell of the fun times she was having. My Facebook wall posts (and tweets) are wonderful sources of my thoughts and activities at a particular point in time. Each month I import my outlook calendar into the diary.

Whenever I travel I record my doings on a spreadsheet on my smartphone as I go and import this into the main document on my return. As I would like to access OurDiary from multiple devices I tried using a Google Drive spreadsheet but it was very sluggish and crashed repeatedly so I am still using Excel. When I plan my travel I start a Google spreadsheet using the same columns as OurDiary, as I travel I add to this and it becomes my travel diary that I can access from multiple devices and offline as well. When I return home I copy the entries into OurDiary.



The diary now sits in a folder called OurDiary (backed up weekly) into which I paste scanned images of tickets, invitations, programs etc. I hyperlink to these from the Excel spreadsheet. I also add hyperlinks to information about people, places and events. I once started to transcribe old letters and didn't get far but now I scan and hyperlink them.



What started out as a simple spreadsheet has now grown into a multimedia resource that spans my lifetime. This diary is much richer than a simple paper based diary as it combines information from a range of sources to give a picture of our family and work life. When I finish digitising my photos I will add selected ones into the folder. Whether it will stay in Excel or migrate to some other product I don't know.




Hopefully some of my descendants will be interested in our family life and gain enjoyment and enlightenment from Our Diary.

20 September 1929

From the scrapbook of  Eliza Gillespie (nee Gowans)

Recording my life's stories

Do you keep a diary?

I have a couple of shelves of hard copy diaries in my garage. There are work diaries and personal diaries. I started recording a personal diary around 1980 but missed a couple of years in the eighties.

Around eighteen years ago when I first acquired a PDA I decided to move to an online diary as I realised that I could move entries from my PDA into a file on my computer, enhance these with anecdotes and keep them as a diary. In those early days there weren't many pieces of  journalling software around and I don't think blogs were around either. I decided to keep my diary in a simple spreadsheet. Today it is still in that spreadsheet and still using the headings I set up all those years ago

Diary Headings

It's not meant to be pretty just functional.


I started by importing all of my PDA calendar entries into the spreadsheet then I  transcribed all of my diary entries; these triggered memories so I was able to add detail to the dry dates and facts. Once this was completed I was on a roll. I then added entries for events prior to the days when I kept a diary. I added dates and memories of family events, looked at my dated photographs and recorded the stories these told me. My kids let me look at their old school diaries and calendars; these provided more dates and memory prompts.I have since gone through some of our old credit card bills and added details of important purchases.

From time to time family members make a comment about an event in the past and their recollections of it.  I note these on either a scrap of paper or a note in my phone and put them in the diary as time permits recording the source of the comment. I always record my sources, not in a formal academic sense but with labels like Aunt May, 1983 school diary, Letter from Fred to Sue, Current, Photo etc.

When my Dad passed away I discovered where my hoarding gens came from. He had kept every receipt from every purchase he had made. I added these and the memories I have related to these purchases: our first refrigerator, our first radiogram, our first television, holiday dates. One of my dear friends had saved all the postcards I have sent to her, when she knew that her days were numbered she gave these back to me. I have added all of the test to the diary; these entries demonstrate in my words the awe and excitement I had when visiting distant lands.

I cannot remember when my friends got married or had their 21sts or when their kids were christened but I have vivid memories of some of these events. Whenever I come across someone whose wedding I attended I ask when they got married and add this to the diary. I then record my memories of the event.

As technology has developed I have added entries from other sources. My daughter's emails from boarding school tell of the fun times she was having. My Facebook wall posts are wonderful sources of my thoughts and activities at a particular point in time. Each month I import my outlook calendar into the diary. Whenever I travel I record my doings on a spreadsheet on my smartphone as I go and import this into the main document on my return.

The diary now sits in a folder called OurDiary into which I paste scanned images of tickets, invitations, programs etc. I hyperlink to these from the Excel spreadsheet. I also add hyperlinks to information about people, places and events. I once started to transcribe old letters and didn't get far but now I scan and hyperlink them.

What started out as a simple spreadsheet has now grown into a multimedia resource that spans my lifetime. This diary is much richer than a simple paper based diary as it combines information from a range of sources to give a picture of our family and work life. When I finish digitising my photos I will add selected ones into the folder. Whether it will stay in Excel or migrate to some other product I don't know.

Hopefully some of my descendants will be interested in our family life and gain enjoyment and enlightenment from Our Diary.

Find My Ancestor: Posterity Treasures - Keeping a Journal

Some ideas for recording your memories for future generations

Find My Ancestor: Posterity Treasures - Keeping a Journal

Posted using ShareThis

Genealogy Blog - Victorian Man's London Diary Put Online - GeneaNet

A window to the London of your ancestors.

Genealogy Blog - Victorian Man's London Diary Put Online - GeneaNet

Posted using ShareThis

Ideas for the Diary

In a recent blog post educator Will Richardson posted this list:

What did you make today that was meaningful?
What did you learn about the world?
Who are you working with?
What surprised you?
What did your teachers make with you?
What did you teach others?
What unanswered questions are you struggling with?
How did you change the world in some small (or big) way?
What’s something your teachers learned today?
What did you share with the world?
What do you want to know more about?
What did you love about today?
What made you laugh?
As someone whose diary looks like an appointment list I am going to modify and use this list of questions as prompts when writing daily entries. I already add my Facebook statuses into my diary as they express my thoughts and feelings at particular points in time. The responses to these questions should give any future generations a fuller picture of me.

Data Backup Day

Don't be an April Fool! Backup all your genealogy research! implores the blurb on Facebook for this event.

I am fairly conscientious about backing up the data in my genealogy program as I am prompted each time I log out to do so. Every few days I copy this to an external hard drive and email it to myself at Gmail. I think I have this backup covered.

But what of my other precious family resource - "Our Diary"? Our diary is an Excel spreadsheet detailing the family's activities during my lifetime. I only started keeping a diary in the mid eighties so have had to retrospectively create other entries. I have used old receipts, postcards, letters, programs, photographs and other ephemera to build this resource. Family members know that they are not allowed to throw out an old piece of paper before I check it for diary usefulness. When we are at a function and someone starts reminiscing I note down the memory to add to the diary.

I export my Outlook calendar into the diary at irregular intervals and embroider those entries for the diary where appropriate. I also copy and paste my status updates from Facebook into the diary. To date the diary has around 15,000 entries that I would hate to lose. I save this to the laptop and occasionally to an external hard drive with the file name ourdiary.

The family sometimes laugh about 'the diary' but when they have a need for a date they come running to Mum to check the diary.

As a response to Data Backup Day I have created a task in Outlook to remind me to backup the diary each week. I will be saving the diary to an external hard drive with a different file name each time in the format ourdiary20090202, ourdiary20090303 etc so that if one file is corrupted then I will have an earlier archived copy.

Thanks to Genea-Bloggers for organising this day as a memory jogger for those, like me, who may forget to take adequate care of precious family resources.