The Stuff in the Attic (if we had an attic)
I love this ol’ green suitcase of Granny’s. It’s filled to overflowing with photos dating from my great-grandparents’ wedding through to the mid-1990′s. There are letters, notebooks, school reports and bills of sale. There are photos of my Aunts’ and Uncles’ weddings, in all their technicolour, wide-tie and muttonchopped glory. There are lots of snapshots from my grandfather’s stretch in the army and postcards from his brother Jeff in various parts of Southeast Asia. There are photos my mother took, and photos from before my mother was born. There are birthday cards from ten years ago, and a 21st birthday invitation from 1945.
One of the more interesting things to find in this case (from a non-family point of view) is the assortment of negative envelopes. This is arguably Kodak inspiration at it’s cheesiest – after all, everyone knows that “All out-of-doors suggests picture-making!” and that girls with large dogs in long grass are more photogenic – maybe it’s their high risk of snakebite, or something. Also, check out the size of the negatives. A person with the right kind of scanner can make these into high definition digital images that are as big as the top quality setting on my digital camera. But I keep hundreds of photos on one tiny card, less than an eighth of the size of this negative packet!
