Genealogy Chat

I would like to know how others store their old family photographs..... over the last few months we have found hundreds of them, many duplicate which we are going to see if other family members want them. We would like to put them in photo albums all labelled up but I'm worried about the acid in some destroying these often 100 years plus photos...

Invest in proper acid free albums. Whatever you do DO NOT use the kind that have a plastic sheet to hold the photographs in. I went to a seminar given by the local museum on how to deal with old photos. The cheap albums are deadly. The acid from the cardboard eats into the back of the photo and the plastic 'glues' them to the backing and they cannot be removed and are destroyed. The museum suggested that making your own albums from artist's acid free cartridge paper was a good alternative - and preferably use black. NEVER write on the back of a photo with a ball point. Use an acid free pen or a pencil. Other alternative was to purchase a photgrapher's box and stand the photos upright in compartments. Don't lie them down as the surfaces scratch each other. You can also purchase acid free pocket sleeves that are either divided into sections or are letter sized pockets and keep them in a 3 ring binder. Don't expose old photos to sun or bright light unless covered with an ultra violet glass or alternative cover.

I have many of mine in their original albums passed down via my Nan. They are the old type of album with the little corners holding the pictures on the page. A few of them are dated around 1885 - 1896 and have survived this long so I guess it's a pretty good way of storing them. I've scanned them and stored them on disc just incase and also that way I can pass copies around the family easily. Sheila

My mother gave me most of the old family photos and they were stored in an old shoe box on top of the wardrobe. I've scanned them and put them with the history records in the plastic sheets and was wondering what was the best way of storing the originals. Though Mum's shoe box seemed to have been ok - for a while anyway. Thanks for that idea.

Acid free all the way!! I scrapbook a lot of my photos using acid free everything. I have scanned them all and put them on disc which you need to redo every two or three years. The photos I don't scrapbook I put in acid free photo boxes and I have a couple of really precious ones that are damaged and I have wrapped these in acid free tissue paper and stored in the photo boxes. Certificates and documents should also be stored this way and you can buy archival quality folders specially made for this very easily in the UK but harder here in Australia. I get a family member to buy and send them over. Hope this helps. Susan

Clare, everyone has given you good advice. When I went through all the old photos' I inherited when my mother died I wrote on the backs of all of them (pencil) and then made piles - separating out the extras. These I have given to my children. Don't forget too, to give the CD/CDs with your scanned photos' to someone else to store. No point in having it in your house where, if, heaven forbid, you have a fire you will still lose everything!! Victoria

You can buy acid free albums from craft shops which stock Scrapbooking products. This is a huge craft, with many craft shops now carrying products, or many many online scrapbooking retailers. Scrapbooking is the preservation of photographs, memories etc in a safe archival acid free way. Also you can buy the most gorgeous scrapbooking papers to mount your photos on to present them in a more decorative way that just putting them in an album. All scrapbooking products are acid and lignin free.

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