While interviewing one of my cousins for the latest episode of “Strange Family Folklore: Where the Paper Trail Meets the Genetic Trail,” she kept referring to “Anne Swanson.” Nearly a week prior to our interview, I’d discovered a report that detailed Anne Swanson’s extended family, who were my maternal grandfather’s mother’s side of the family.
We came across the report when my sister and I organized the pantry part of our parents’ front closet. As I looked at the family trees contained in the report, I found several different Annes. Not only that, but Anne Swanson had a daughter whose middle name was also “Anne,” which she chose to go by rather than her first name.
Throughout the report, last names were dropped from family trees and people were referred to by their nicknames in some places and their Christian names in others. That alone motivated me to update the report.
As I studied the family trees, I came across a branch I knew the most about: my maternal grandfather and his children, including Mom. To my horror, my aunt who’d died in childhood, was not listed as one of the children. I knew that once I finished the post production of the latest SFF episode, I’d start updating the report.
My usual approach to any project, is to work a little at a time. Before diving into the update, I researched how to create a family tree with the Word doc tools. Next, I researched how to select some pages to appear landscape style while others are portrait.
I read how to do those things for two reasons. First, to know that the program had the capability, and secondly, I wanted to jump into recreating those family trees.
Apparently the Anne who’d put the report together also placed a high priority on the family trees. She’d used graphing paper to neatly organize each family tree and had oriented the paper landscape style to provide more room.
There have been many innovations since 1978 when the report was completed. Once I have retyped and updated what already exists in the report, then I will begin filling out who people were beyond the one-sentence descriptions as found in several places.
This isn’t a criticism of Anne’s work. I appreciate her laying the foundation. According to her own description, she was a very accomplished person who may not have had the time or help to flesh out every family member’s entry.
I’m going to do my best to advance what she put in motion.