The Joy of Scanning

We have had a very productive and interesting January.  I think we are more productive because we are getting more efficient at what we are doing.  We better be, after 6 months.  It's been interesting because we have scanned some unique books.

Elder Syme is logging in, getting ready to scan the oldest book we have scanned so far.  It was published in 1812.

 It wasn't on the regular shelves, it was in the 'closed stack' which meant we had to fill out a request and have it brought to us.

 It was in very good shape.  Much better than some that we have done that are not as old.

This book takes the Barclay line back into Scotland.  Barclays in Scotland are related to the Syme family.  We may be related to those in this book.  Who wants to do the research to find out? 

 The paper was rather thin but sturdy.  You can see through to the printing on the other side.

 That should make the process of putting it in PDF interesting.

 Some books are falling apart that we get off the regular shelves.  Many of them are tied together.  This one wasn't too bad.  Just the cover was not attached on part of the book.

 This one was tied for a good reason.

 The cover was almost completely detached, along with many of the first pages.

 I'm always glad to get passed the first parts of the books when the pages are more even and easier to keep straight.

 This book needed some added information apparently.

 But there wasn't enough to fill it all in.  Actually this is not uncommon.  We often scan books that we think are 50 to 100 pages, only to find out after the first 10 or 20 the rest of the book is blank.  Weird.

 This one is the most fragile and difficult one we have done so far.

The first 15 pages were not attached at all. 

Someone did a not-so-efficient repair job by taping the pages and binding the tape together.  They were just too fragile to hold on.  

“No man putteth a piece of new cloth unto an old garment, for that which is put in to fill it up taketh from the garment, and the rent is made worse.”  Matt 9:16          

 We won't be putting this one and the other books in poor shape back on the shelf.  We will take them up to the 4th floor to restoration.

Another book is Records of the Dyer Family (1884).  It tells of Mary Dyre who was sentenced to death in Massachusetts in 1660 by the Puritans because she was a Quaker.   http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mary_Dyer 

It's another one that needs the 4th floor.

 This one was Our Duryea and Turner Lines, by Rhea Johnson.

I learned that Charles E. Duryea made the first gas automobile.  The test pull was in April 19, 1892. 

The Dunaway-Alder-Pyle Family had some interesting records that I hadn’t seen before.  In the latter part of the book they recorded names, dates and details of surgeries, broken bones, accidents to teeth (age, which ones, how many, and how), cancers, pregnancies and miscarriages.  I suppose that information will be useful to someone.

We often scan books that have pictures with blank pages on the back side that have to be deleted.  It is a little tedious and time consuming when you have a lot of them.  We did a book this week that went one further.  There was a light purple page inserted between each of the pages in the over 150 page book, The Dutton Family.  I think they did this for note taking, as a few of the pages had handwritten notes on them.  But the majority of the pages had to be deleted.  It wasn’t like the books with print on one side of the page only, like so many that we do, where you can disable one side of the scanner.  The blank pages were on alternate sides, so they had to be deleted individually.  

There have been a few books that the pages had to be cut apart because they were still connected (folded) from the printing process.  There was one, Lawrence Dowse, printed in 1926 that had 3 pages in various places in the book that I had to cut apart.  That means that I was the first to see those pages in 88 years!  This week we scanned the Dupuy Family, printed in 1910.  It had 7 pages out of 231 in various places in the book that needed cutting apart.  I was the first to see those pages in 105 years!  It’s amazing that there are very old books here that have never been opened and read.  

I am still finding names that interest me:

Whig  (written after his name: ‘shortest of 4  brothers’)

Herrick

Hulburd (male 1854)

Platoff Zane (first and middle names, male)

Lubelia

Linard

Asphelia

I have 462 names on my list.  So if you are looking for names for your kids or names for characters in the novel you are writing, let me know.  

My favorite name so far is Waitawhile Makepeace.

It takes a month or so for them to be on-line.  There are some books that are just so full of information and I hope someone finds them and makes good use of them.  Knowing that we are helping get these books to those who are looking or will be looking for them is very satisfying.

Here are the statistics since we have been here so far:

                Month                  Books              Images

                August                     25                   3,604

                September             111                15,063

                October                 118                 16,548

                November             105                  14,682

                December              105                 17,387

                January                  156                  21,341

                Total                       620                 88,625

I like these quotes from a couple of books we scanned this week.

There is much to learn and joy to experience in doing our family history.

HAPPY FAMILY SEARCHING!