out on a limb
Every family has one: the custodian for all the “stuff” that gets handed down from generation to generation. Because of my day job, I’m quickly becoming that person in my family—but not the only one! I’m fortunate to have a maternal uncle and a paternal cousin who have done years of research on the history of their respective families. Their work has been invaluable to me. But I know someday all the materials that come my way from them and others—papers, photos, heirlooms—will be overwhelming. My grandmother, for example, kept just about every receipt she ever generated. Someone (read: me) will have to sort through those boxes, separating the genealogically important from the irrelevant. In this issue, we cover that oh-so-common problem: what you should do with all the stuff you…