by Pam Pacelli Cooper, Verissima Productions Memories of July 4th, 2020: Masked and cautious, we went to our local supermarket to buy corn for two, a small package of hamburger, and pre-sliced watermelon. In three different houses across town, the friends we had joined for years in a celebration of the “glorious Fourth “did much[Read More]
Family History
Memory and Place: Your Childhood Geography Map
How often do we think about where we grew up and the geography of our neighborhoods? Do we consider how much geography shaped our family history narrative? Recently, I took some time to think about those questions and to reflect upon my childhood geography map. My Childhood Geography I was looking at a picture of[Read More]
Ancestoring™:* Becoming Good at It
A woman records nine hours of her oral history. Born in the late 1930’s, she wants her 10 year old granddaughter to know what life was like in a world without cellphones and the internet, a world where girls couldn’t wear pants to school, and where school segregation was an accepted fact. What she has[Read More]
Creating an Archive of Your Family’s Voting History
by Pam Pacelli Cooper October is American Archives Month. As the leaves fall and we turn our energies indoors, we can begin to think about the archives in our own homes: troves of letters never read or catalogued; memories not yet recorded; years of photos cached in disorganized files on multiple computers, thrown into shoeboxes,[Read More]
Bearing Witness by Preserving Stories
The past week has brought a constant stream of stories of people whose lives will have been forever changed by a policy that is ripping apart the families and children of asylum seekers…but this is not the first time actions taken by a government have had a dramatic impact on the personal histories of an[Read More]
Carrying Two Hundred Years of Memories: The Blessings of Longevity
by Pam Pacelli Cooper President, Verissima Productions I was born less than 70 years ago. What if I were to tell you that I carry with me memories that are 200 years old? Read on to find out how that became possible. Two weeks ago, I responded to Amy Johnson Crow’s challenge to write about[Read More]
Preserving Family Stories
If you’re gathering with family this holiday season, there is likely to be discussion about what to do with those old cassette tapes of grandma telling family stories, or whether to keep the VHS tapes of your college graduation. We think this podcast, originally published in December of 2016 will provide valuable information and help[Read More]
A Simple Kindness That Saves Lives
by Pam Pacelli Cooper President, Verissima Productions I’ve been wracking my brain for the last few weeks, trying to think about what to write for my December blog. There are thousands of excellent blogs about gift giving and personal history including more “Listicles” than I can count. I don’t have any better ideas that those[Read More]
Why Bother to Seize the Moment? A Reminder for the Holiday Season
“Procrastination is the thief of time,” was one of my great grandmother’s favorite sayings. She would trot it out when she wanted me to finish a task for her, complete a homework assignment, or write a long neglected thank you note to an elderly relative. I ignored her quite often, and no dire results ensued.[Read More]
The Hubble Telescope and Family History Month
by Pam Pacelli Cooper President, Verissima Productions Memoirists in Video, Audio and Print Last week I watched an Episode of “60 Minutes” in which two female astronomers described the astounding amount of information coming back to us on Earth through the Hubble Telescope from the myriad of stars and galaxies in outer space. “Light comes[Read More]
