Family History Blogging - A Good Thing!

This weekend I received some priceless photographs. They are digitalized. They are not worth millions of dollars but they are priceless to me. Firstly, Gerald Griffiths emailed me some.

Who is Gerald Griffiths?

Gerald is the nephew of my Great Grandfather Harold Griffiths. I've never met him and until just a few weeks ago I didn't know he existed. I started this blog back in June 2012. I haven't been incredibly consistent due to other pressures, such as attempting to write a novel and Holidays etc.

But I kept the blog.

My Great Aunt Ruth Griffiths-Salmon connected me with Gerald. For many months Ruth had mentioned that we had extended family members who lived in Australia. Due to my blog, which Ruth has contributed to, my aunt knew that I would love to connect with Gerald. Gerald has published his own family history book in memory of his mother.

Without the blog Ruth and I may never have connected and the facebook conversations that are now so dear to me would not have taken place. Without the blog I would not have met Gerald over Facebook. I would not have connected with that side of the family at all.

Without the blog there would be no pictures from Gerald.

My Uncle Glyn and Aunt Norma have also been following my blog. They sent me pictures over the weekend as well. We met up with them over Christmas while my parents and brothers were in town. Norma mentioned the photographs of family that they kept and I asked for them. My Aunt, being the amazing lady that she is, has kindly begun to scan and send them to me via email.

Glyn and Norma know I love the family photographs because of the blog.

My friend Bill West is a proponent of publicly blogging the family research he discovers and the family tree. This is one of the reasons why I concur with him. It's important and it connects! There are exceptions. When I know that my blog will affect or concern those still alive I give them a chance to read the blog and make changes. They also have permission to ask me to edit any previous blog post that I've written if they notice changes that need to be made.

My Mum and Dad brought an envelope full of photographs and birth/death certificates when they visited me this past December. They said that I could keep them. They know I will look after them and that they are priceless to me. They know because despite living in Bulgaria, the best part of two continents and one ocean away; they read my blog.

The point is, blogging family history is a good thing.

And now to the grand finale; my photographs!

[Below my Great Grandfather Harold Griffiths and my great grandmother Annie Simpkins Griffiths]

[Below my Grandfather (Grampy) Idris Davies with my Grandmother (Grammy) Iris Davies and my Aunt Norma Davies]

[Below my Dad with my Grampy and Grammy Davies]

[Below my Grampy Idris Davies standing by the grave of Iris Davies. This is particularly dear to me because we did not think we had a picture of this and now here it is! Since both Idris and Iris were buried in Zimbabwe you can imagine the difficulty of getting back there at this time to search for their graves to take a photograph of it]

[Below my Great Grandfather Harold Griffiths is on the right. Then from left to right are: Ernest, Rees(Rhys) and Will.]

[Below - I believe this is Ernest, brother of Great Grandfather Harold]

[Below - I believe this is Morgan Griffiths, another of my Great Grandfather Harold's brothers and Gerald's father.]

[Below - Front left and right are my Great Great Grandfather Thomas Griffiths and his wife my Great Great Grandma Elizabeth Emanuel Griffiths. I believe Gerald said the man in the middle is Morgan on his wedding day. This photograph is another that is really important to me because I had begun to doubt I might find another picture of my Great Great Grandparents.]

These pictures will no doubt be presented again as I write about each of my ancestors in greater detail. I think this all goes to show, there are always family members or artifacts, or letters or photographs just waiting to be discovered.