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Nine of the albums in those boxes are family history that my Memaw put together for us. In the mid to late 80s she began to research our family history and by the time of her death in 1996 she had put together 7 volumes that go back as far as the 1600s. She was able to include a lot of oral histories from her brothers and sisters and aunts and uncles as well. Everything was well documented and I was amazed by how much work she was able to do without the help of the internet. I was astounded! I really wish that I’d been able to appreciate the work she did on this when she was alive. She made copies for each of her siblings and each of her daughters. My Aunt Ginger passed away when I was in high school. I thought a lot about my cousins Jessica, Amanda and Whitney while we worked on moving the family history into new binders and looked at all the hard work our grandmother did. I wondered if they still have the copies that Memaw made for Aunt Ginger. I wished that they had been here to hear the stories that Momma had to tell about going up to see Ginger and the girls when Whitney was born and how we went up to see our Great Aunt Eva afterward. I was just a little girl then and had no idea that we were there to visit and to go to cemeteries and collect more oral history. While we went through photos and Memaw’s memories of her childhood and the pictures and memories of Momma and Aunt Ginger’s childhoods I wished that my cousins could have been with us. I really don’t know if they would even have been interested in hearing about the places they lived or about the dogs they had when their mom was little, but I know I would have.
