Thank you. I've had several relatives die recently and I've thought much about the stories that die with them because they aren't written down. Haunts me.
Lytle said an ancestor of his cut up a Continental Army uniform for a goat harness. I suppose the lack of nostalgia amongst some of us is a reminder that, after all, we Southerners are still Americans.
Wonderful piece. Thanks for putting the time into it.
Your article reminded me of the windrush scandal in the UK. https://jcwi.org.uk/reportsbriefings/windrush-scandal-explained/ As a long time family historian, I couldn't believe how the UK government just destroyed an archive. And also, a recent effort to destroy company records here in Massachusetts going back in time.
I also wanted to ask a question related to the top of your article, in the book you were reading, did you come across any mention of the Dutch republic? Ever since I read a book about the Dutch republic's early printing industry, I've been asking this question in relation to any 17th century research I've been conducting.
The Southern Colonies in the Seventeenth Century mentions the Dutch but not the Dutch Republic. A few others that you might already know about that mention the Dutch Republic:
The Dutch Republic and the American Revolution by Friedrich Edler (Johns Hopkins Press, 1911).
M.E. Bradford mentions the Dutch Republic in "On Remembering Who We Are, A Political Credo" (Modern Age 26, 1982).
The Atlantic Economy During the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries by Peter A. Coclanis (University of South Carolina Press, 2005).
William E. Dodd has a chapter "The Dutch Republic and Early Chesapeake Bay Settlers" in The Old South, Struggles for Democracy (Macmillan, 1937).
You describe a context much larger than simple record keeping. It is how the culture of the modern world transition from famiily history captured in grave yards of churches in small towns where the oral tradition passed down from family to family was the record of history to a culture more detached from human community. In many respects that older time, that still exists in the present century, is closer to the ancient Hebrew's oral tradition that eventually became the Penateuch, the five books of Moses.
Recently, I've walked through two old church graveyards near where I live, looking for gravestones of family members long forgotten.
In the case of one, two sisters of Morrison ancestry published in separate volumes, the geneology of three Morrison brothers who immigrated to the colonies in 1750 from Cambeltown, Scotland. They ended up the Rocky River Community of Cabarras County, NC.
In the other case, i was reading in the records of the Moravian Church settlement of Salem in Forsyth County, NC to find more specific information on my Boehlow ancesters. In those records, there is a reference to when John Frederick Boehlow (1780-1827) left Hernnhut, Germany, landed in Philadelphia, and then arrived in Salem. He was the first Boehlow to come to the New World. Just this week, I went looking for his wife's grave, Maria Strub Boehlow (1787-1853), I was not successful. I need to find out where she resides today.
The Moravian religion back then was organized as a communistic culture. The single men lived together. The single women had their own house. In the grave yard, God's Acre, the marriage men, the married women, the single men, the single women, and the children who died are buried in separate sections of the graveyard. I have wondered as I looked at their history whether seeing the church and community as a family, the communitas fratrum, made it more likely that they kept better records of their community, because they saw themselves as a family.
The context of family history and the local community history of families is quickly being replace by a history of political and governmental happenings. Those historical references are highly prejudiced by political opinion, not historical happenings.
It is exactly what I see as The Spectacle of the Real. Its effect is not dissimilar to your accounting of the lost of records. It is the loss of memory. In this case generational memory, because the culture of the world we live in has not reference point back to any traditional social structures. Not just families or local church social structures, but schools, fraternal organizations, and even local history societies.
Of course, as Bill Faulkner reminded us "The past isn't dead. It isn't even past."
Thank you. I've had several relatives die recently and I've thought much about the stories that die with them because they aren't written down. Haunts me.
Lytle said an ancestor of his cut up a Continental Army uniform for a goat harness. I suppose the lack of nostalgia amongst some of us is a reminder that, after all, we Southerners are still Americans.
Wonderful piece. Thanks for putting the time into it.
Thank you, brother. Maybe because my family has no heirlooms and many lost stories, I'm very romantic/nostalgic.
If I remember my (very rusty) Greek, nostalgia means longing for home. I think one must be fairly insensate not to gaze in that direction.
Your article reminded me of the windrush scandal in the UK. https://jcwi.org.uk/reportsbriefings/windrush-scandal-explained/ As a long time family historian, I couldn't believe how the UK government just destroyed an archive. And also, a recent effort to destroy company records here in Massachusetts going back in time.
I also wanted to ask a question related to the top of your article, in the book you were reading, did you come across any mention of the Dutch republic? Ever since I read a book about the Dutch republic's early printing industry, I've been asking this question in relation to any 17th century research I've been conducting.
Thanks for reading and for commenting. I'll check the book and a few others for anything on the Dutch Republic.
Thanks!
The Southern Colonies in the Seventeenth Century mentions the Dutch but not the Dutch Republic. A few others that you might already know about that mention the Dutch Republic:
The Dutch Republic and the American Revolution by Friedrich Edler (Johns Hopkins Press, 1911).
M.E. Bradford mentions the Dutch Republic in "On Remembering Who We Are, A Political Credo" (Modern Age 26, 1982).
The Atlantic Economy During the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries by Peter A. Coclanis (University of South Carolina Press, 2005).
William E. Dodd has a chapter "The Dutch Republic and Early Chesapeake Bay Settlers" in The Old South, Struggles for Democracy (Macmillan, 1937).
Thanks so much!
You describe a context much larger than simple record keeping. It is how the culture of the modern world transition from famiily history captured in grave yards of churches in small towns where the oral tradition passed down from family to family was the record of history to a culture more detached from human community. In many respects that older time, that still exists in the present century, is closer to the ancient Hebrew's oral tradition that eventually became the Penateuch, the five books of Moses.
Recently, I've walked through two old church graveyards near where I live, looking for gravestones of family members long forgotten.
In the case of one, two sisters of Morrison ancestry published in separate volumes, the geneology of three Morrison brothers who immigrated to the colonies in 1750 from Cambeltown, Scotland. They ended up the Rocky River Community of Cabarras County, NC.
In the other case, i was reading in the records of the Moravian Church settlement of Salem in Forsyth County, NC to find more specific information on my Boehlow ancesters. In those records, there is a reference to when John Frederick Boehlow (1780-1827) left Hernnhut, Germany, landed in Philadelphia, and then arrived in Salem. He was the first Boehlow to come to the New World. Just this week, I went looking for his wife's grave, Maria Strub Boehlow (1787-1853), I was not successful. I need to find out where she resides today.
The Moravian religion back then was organized as a communistic culture. The single men lived together. The single women had their own house. In the grave yard, God's Acre, the marriage men, the married women, the single men, the single women, and the children who died are buried in separate sections of the graveyard. I have wondered as I looked at their history whether seeing the church and community as a family, the communitas fratrum, made it more likely that they kept better records of their community, because they saw themselves as a family.
The context of family history and the local community history of families is quickly being replace by a history of political and governmental happenings. Those historical references are highly prejudiced by political opinion, not historical happenings.
It is exactly what I see as The Spectacle of the Real. Its effect is not dissimilar to your accounting of the lost of records. It is the loss of memory. In this case generational memory, because the culture of the world we live in has not reference point back to any traditional social structures. Not just families or local church social structures, but schools, fraternal organizations, and even local history societies.
Of course, as Bill Faulkner reminded us "The past isn't dead. It isn't even past."