Fred's Diary

I love the theme for today's Mono Monday. It is a keen hobby of mine, when I find the time, to research my family tree. My enthusiasm stems once again from my father. Many many years ago when my maternal grandmother died, it was my parents job to clear her house and finalise her affairs. She had been ill for a number of years, living only downstairs in the house. When my parents eventually got to the job of clearing the attic they found a diary written by my great great grandfather. Bartle is a relatively unusual name and before the birth of the Internet my parents decided to research the history behind the diary and to create a comprehensive Family Tree. It is rather tatty now, that tree that my father drew up on a roll of wallpaper, and all his work and his research has been put into a digital form by myself, following his death in 1998.

I have a lot of the family papers and photos at home now, including Fred's diary. I had lots of photos I could have used for today's blip including photos of Fred and his wife Elizabeth, but it is this diary and autobiography, written in two excercise books that never fails to thrill me. Fred was a great romantic and after Elizabeth died he penned a long poem all about her. There is also a book of his poetry. It is all hand written and I feel honoured to be the custodian.

So, the starting page of Fred's autobiography, started in 1908 is my Ancestory blip.