Family History Month: Who's in this photo? Why the Holidays Are Your Best Chance to Find Out
We see it all the time. A family brings us a box of photos or an old photo album from a parent's or grandparent's house to digitize and organize. Some photos are beautiful. Some are funny. And a surprising number show people with no text to explain who they are.
The woman in the cat-eye glasses at the lake.
The young man in uniform.
The couple on a porch somewhere.
Someone once knew exactly who they were. That person may have been the one who kept the box.
Scanning and sorting photos can happen any time. The names and stories behind them can only be captured while the people who know them are still around.
October is the perfect time to start
October is recognized in the US as Family History Month. Genealogy groups and libraries mark it every year, and many people use this as the impetus to spend some time building and expanding family trees or digging through historical records.
If you want to mark the month, FamilySearch has a great list of 31 Ways to Celebrate Family History Month, one idea for every day of October. Many of the ideas center on photos and memories: looking through old albums with a parent, grandparent, or older siblings, calling your oldest relatives to ask about their past, and pulling out favorite family pictures to display at home.
But some of the richest family history isn't in an online archive. It's in a shoebox in your closet. And with Thanksgiving next month, you have a great opportunity to gather information from the people who can help document those photos.
Get ready before the holidays
You don't need to haul the whole collection to dinner. A little prep this month makes it easy:
Pick 10 to 20 mystery photos. Choose the ones you most want answers about. A small stack feels fun; a giant box feels like homework.
Make copies or scans first. Pass around copies, a tablet, or prints, and keep the originals safe at home. Gravy and 80-year-old prints don't mix.
Number each photo. A simple number on the back of each copy or in the file name makes it easy to match answers to pictures later.
Know who to ask. Think about which relatives are most likely to know: the oldest generation, a cousin who grew up nearby, a family friend.
Pick the right moment. After the meal, when people are relaxed and lingering, works far better than the middle of a busy kitchen.
Questions to ask
Start simple, then let the conversation wander. Some of the best stories come from a tangent.
Who is this? Do you know their full name, or a nickname?
How are they related to us?
Where was this taken? Does the house, car, or place look familiar?
About when was it? What was going on in the family then?
What do you remember about this person?
Is there anyone else who might know?
Tip: Ask if you can record the conversation on your phone. You'll catch details you'd never get down by hand, and you'll have the voices of the people telling the stories. That recording can become a treasure of its own.
Write it down where it will last
The answers are only useful if they stay with the photos. A few ways to make sure they do:
On prints: Use a photo-safe pencil (we prefer the STABILO-All Aquarellable pencil) to write lightly on the back, near the edge. Avoid ballpoint and markers, which can press through or bleed over time.
On digital files: Add names and dates to the file name or the photo's description. Most photo apps let you add a caption that travels with the image. If your family uses FamilySearch, you can also upload photos and details, including audio, to its free Memories feature and tag the relatives in them.
Not on sticky notes alone. They fall off, get lost, and the adhesive can damage photos over time.
Even a partial answer is worth saving. "Grandma's cousin from Spokane, maybe 1950s" is far better than nothing.
Don't wait for the perfect time
It's tempting to put this off until the photos are organized. But the stories matter more than the sorting, and the people who hold them won't always be at the table. Start with one small stack this year.
And if the box (or the boxes, or the hard drive) feels like too much, that's exactly what we're here for. We help families in the Pacific Northwest from our Sammamish and Depoe Bay studios sort, scan, label, and organize their photos so the memories are easy to find and share. Reach out this month, and we can help you pull together your mystery photos before the holidays.
Happy Family History Month!
