I really like your thoughtful ideas. I don't have any military stories, but I do include family stories in my writing. I think they make the family history more colorful, and it tells you something about the personality of the storyteller. In many cases I have tried to verify the story, only to find out it happened to a different great-grandfather or is greatly exaggerated. In some cases, different branches of the family have different stories about the same event, such as Coming to America.
I have these stories in my blog in posts labeled "Is the Legend True?" I think it's fun to compare the family story with the historical fact and try to figure out how the story came about. I even made a chart of Legend, Fact, Likelihood of being True, Proof, and How the Info Got Confused in my blog post, https://grandmasgrannysfamilyalbum.blogspot.com/2021/07/is-legend-true-how-sulzbachs-came-to.html
Thanks for reading and also sharing your post. I love this line: "However, as a kid, I had no reason to doubt her, especially because the story was consistent down to the exact wording."
Most people I'm sure have uttered similar words.
Your table at the end is fantastic! I'm always looking for new ways to share information, find family patterns, beliefs, behaviors, traumas and sometimes lies and secrets. This is a great way to document it and see it in a different way than just looking at records or your genealogy database!
Happily it works in reverse also. After receiving my father's WWII military records, I learned he was not eligible for the Navy Good Conduct medal. I assumed the worst. It was only later in reviewing those records on the advice of a retired military officer, I learned my father was ineligible on a technicality only because the war ended a few months two soon. In fact he received a promotion to non commissioned officer during his 18 months of service.
I really like your thoughtful ideas. I don't have any military stories, but I do include family stories in my writing. I think they make the family history more colorful, and it tells you something about the personality of the storyteller. In many cases I have tried to verify the story, only to find out it happened to a different great-grandfather or is greatly exaggerated. In some cases, different branches of the family have different stories about the same event, such as Coming to America.
I have these stories in my blog in posts labeled "Is the Legend True?" I think it's fun to compare the family story with the historical fact and try to figure out how the story came about. I even made a chart of Legend, Fact, Likelihood of being True, Proof, and How the Info Got Confused in my blog post, https://grandmasgrannysfamilyalbum.blogspot.com/2021/07/is-legend-true-how-sulzbachs-came-to.html
Thanks for reading and also sharing your post. I love this line: "However, as a kid, I had no reason to doubt her, especially because the story was consistent down to the exact wording."
Most people I'm sure have uttered similar words.
Your table at the end is fantastic! I'm always looking for new ways to share information, find family patterns, beliefs, behaviors, traumas and sometimes lies and secrets. This is a great way to document it and see it in a different way than just looking at records or your genealogy database!
Thank you!
Well I guess I’ll post it as an actual post, and see if other people can use it.
I'm sure many will find it useful.
Happily it works in reverse also. After receiving my father's WWII military records, I learned he was not eligible for the Navy Good Conduct medal. I assumed the worst. It was only later in reviewing those records on the advice of a retired military officer, I learned my father was ineligible on a technicality only because the war ended a few months two soon. In fact he received a promotion to non commissioned officer during his 18 months of service.
Thanks for sharing your research and what you learned. There are always more layers to things we have to investigate to learn the 'why' of something.
Great points and suggestions Jennifer. Very helpful as I search for records to support a story told many times about my Great Uncle.
Thanks Kathy!