Vivid details help move stories along

Once you begin writing your ancestors' stories you might want to consider details such as the weather.

John Colletta, who instructed the writing class last month at the Salt Lake Institute of Genealogy, documented actual weather conditions for passages in his book "Only a Few Bones."

Weather was often pertinent to his family's murder-mystery story that took place just before and after the Civil War. Before you scoff at what might appear to be minutia, consider the importance weather can play in our lives.

Family lore says my ancestors left South Dakota for Northwest Territories because of a years-long drought, so weather would be important for me to investigate. Also, we need to research such details as the words our ancestors spoke. When writing about the farmers in our past, one ought to know from which end of the horse a singletree swings before embarrassing oneself forever in print by detailing a wrong explanation.

Personalize your ancestors' story with artifacts. You might determine your grandmother's character or temperament through letters, or appreciate your grandfather's work with a singletree, a contraption a farmer uses to plow his field with a single horse.

Learn what kind of home your ancestors owned. Include the legal description of the house and land into your narrative. Have recipes survived from the ethnic food Grandma cooked?

Little details will go a long way to bring your story to life.

Include portraits of your subjects and historical photos of their countryside. Use maps to locate their exact homestead or to show historical and boundary changes. Railroad maps could detail the direction the tracks took if they migrated after the days of wagon trains.

One of the first things would-be authors need to determine, Colletta said, is just who the audience will be. Readership will determine the tone of your book, he said.

I'll write for my family, those who are here now and those who will come after, using my conversational style, a tone that wouldn't be appropriate for a scholarly publication. My motivation is to leave more than just loose pieces of paper filled with names and dates with a potential demise at the business end of a match, or even computer programs and disks that might well outlive the capability of having them translated onto paper.

I'm hoping by writing a book, my family will be more enticed to learn about whom their ancestors were and what their lives were like.

Itching to begin?

Start with an outline. The better the outline, the better the book, Colletta said. His outlines tend to become the table of contents of his books.

And, if you need more motivation, consider enrolling in the institute. But be forewarned: Classes fill up fast. Enrollment for next year began at the close of the 2001 session.

Classes

Genealogist Ann Hemmert will teach two genealogy classes next month at the Corbin Senior Activity Center, 827 W. Cleveland:

"Organizing Your Family History": Mondays, March 5-19; 9 to 11 a.m.; $6.

Students will learn a simple filing system for beginning and intermediate students; organize photos, books and magazines, manage computer resources and overcome roadblocks of time. Purchase optional text, "Organizing Your Family History Search," by Sharon DeBartolo Carmack, ($17) through the instructor or bookstores.

"How to Set Up Your Searches": Wednesdays, March 7-April 11; 9:30 to 11:30 a.m.; $12.

Learn a variety of sources to help you search on the Internet, by telephone and through letters; how to write effective queries; and develop a plan for research.

Copyright 2001 Cowles Publishing Company
Provided by ProQuest Information and Learning Company. All rights Reserved.