This seems obvious, but it’s easy to get side-tracked and start going back and forth in time. These types of items really add texture and interest to a book, and help the reader to see that you’ve really done your homework. In A Nurse In Training, I included scanned images of skating rink tickets, programs and announcements from my grandma’s scrapbook and journal pages in my grandmother’s own hand. If you’re lacking in family photos, consult my Genealogy Gems Podcast episodes for countless ideas for finding appropriate images. And since words in a small book will be limited, photographs will be your best friend. Pack it with photos and graphics.Ī picture is definitely worth a thousand words.

I made sure some of the most compelling stories were at the beginning: if you can capture their interest in the first three pages, you’ll have them hooked for the entire book. Grandma working the TB ward at San Francisco Hospital in 1933 Anyone who reads the book should hopefully come away with the fact that my grandma had a sense of humor and could laugh at herself. My grandma had many funny stories, but there just wasn’t room for all of them. This goes back to conveying the theme and being a tough editor. And if it’s well done, they’ll find that they’ve suddenly finished the entire book without once thinking of putting it down! Hopefully they’ll walk away with a real sense of having gotten to know that ancestor. People will be willing to pick up a thinner book off the coffee table. I create books that are 20 double-sided pages. Strive to create a book that doesn’t look intimidating.

Like it or not, if the book takes too long read, your relatives won’t. It’s your job to be a sharp editor to pick out the critical pieces. You don’t need every scrap of research and every photo to get this theme across. And the best part? My family actually opened and read them them cover to cover. I found that the solution to sharing with all family members was a good old fashioned book!īooks are still hard to beat for telling a story in words and pictures in an extremely easy to use way. Self-publishing little hardbound family history books helped me break up my research sharing into digestible chunks.

And many people just don’t care for viewing photos, documents or stories on a computer screen. Individual items on CDs didn’t easily or smoothly tell a story.Īlso, I think some of my relatives found the technology a bit intimidating back then. Initially, I sent CDs full of digitized photos and documents, but they just didn’t get looked at like I had hoped. We don’t live close to them, so I had to mail whatever I shared. Several years ago, I began sharing my family history research with my relatives. My Dilemma: How to Share My Family History These 6 strategies helped me share my genealogy research findings in books that made fascinating, affordable and easy-to-mail gifts. I started creating family history books a decade ago.

Family history book template