The Baton Has Been Passed

When we got home today, a FedEX box addressed to me was waiting.  It contains pages and pages of handwritten and typed--on a typewriter!--records of several branches of my dad's family, some old pictures, and a few other miscellaneous records including my great-grandparents' original marriage certificate.  Absolute gold, for anyone as interested in family history as I.  I feel like a little kid on Christmas morning.  Not sure yet exactly who painstakingly put all of this together--it could have been a joint effort--but these records appear to all be north of 40 years old and contain a level of detail far surpassing anything I've been able to find online, at least in the quick scan through I've managed so far.

The box was sent by my aunt, my dad's older sister.  She's had these records for years, but I've never been successful in getting copies of them from her, so I was very surprised to receive an email the other day indicating that she had just sent me all of her originals.  She had a health scare recently that fortunately came out for the best--maybe that was part of it.  Maybe it's also that I'm the only one of my generation who seems to care one iota about this stuff.  Who knows.

The email I received actually came from my dad, who forwarded it to me at my aunt's request.  Her note to him read, in part:

"I sent her the originals because she is well organized and persistent; therefore a good keeper of the keys."

The new keeper of the keys is duly honored.