The Alfred and Helen Smith Family – Top to Right: Robert, Delores (mom), Eldon, Bottom to Right: Adeline, Helen, Alfred and Eugene
I got a request from my Uncle Gene (indirectly) if I knew the whereabouts of two Smith Family photo albums. Sure enough, my mom had them, and I had securely packed them away in a box with the intent of doing a high resolution scan of each page.
From Left to Right: My mother’s grandmother Ida Kolb and her sisters, Aunt Tina, Aunt Bertha and Aunt Mini Hector
I started the project several years ago, but more urgent things came about (working for a living around the globe). Since they are photo albums of the Smith Family, and I am not a Smith, I figured I best return them to my uncle. So I restarted the scanning project last weekend – or attempted to. If I don’t do it, it will never be done.
The photos here are not from those albums, but found in one of the many boxes of past memories! My mom saved everthing!
The last Epson scanner (a pretty good one) did not have a printer driver for my Windows 8.1 workstation beast. Ok, my laptop still runs Windows 7. So last weekend in Blacksburg, I downloaded the printer driver on my laptop and plugged in the scanner. Nothing! It died. Crap!
Pretty much, except for professional use, flatbed scanners are going the way of CDs, as all-in-one printers have taken over the consumer market. But they are still out there, and the Epson V600 is about the best one for the buck. So I ordered it on Amazon and it was delivered today.
This is my fourth flatbed scanner that I have bought, and I hope it is my last! But I am happy to have it, as I dug into one (of many) boxes of photos and stuff my mom meticulously kept over the decades, and found too many gems from that past.
Many of the photographs are fading, and many more contain unidentified people. But if I don’t take the time to capture all of this digitally, they will be lost forever. Most is from my mom’s side, but there’s a lot of great stuff from my dad’s.
Mom is pictured to the left – she looks like my sister Kathi at that age! Well, and some of Missy as well!
Does anyone really care? Likely not, but once I upload them to cyberspace they will live on for a few more decades – or maybe more! And it will be fun preserving what would otherwise be lost forever!
