Saturday, March 11, 2023

Women's History Month 2023: Autograph Books and Birthday Books

Yesterday I wrote about scrapbooks. I made the point that a scrapbook doesn't need to be something your ancestor kept. It could be an artifact kept by a member of her FAN Club.




From Wikipedia: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/47/AutographBook_2pages.png


There are other similar scrapbook-type books. Autograph Books and Birthday Books are such examples. Both types of books have names, dates, and other information. While today an autograph book might hold "famous" autographs, that was not always so. The autograph books of our ancestors contain signatures and names from family, friends, and others in the community. Like any genealogical source, this can place an individual in a specific time and location. Happily, it may also contain other information.

Like the scrapbook, this may not be a home source. This might be something you find in an archive. So once again, search an archival catalog like ArchiveGrid for the place your ancestor lived and see if any autograph books or birthday books survive. 

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