Waaaahh I lost all my old photos in the flood. A few albums made it and a few that were in water might be viewable. Luckily I had saved those of my mom and dad to my phone.

Raven, that is my fear! To lose my photos to tornado, flood or fire. I've been digitizing too, and keep them on my computer and an external hard drive. I have "bug out" bag, and when we have to bug out for tornadoes, that's in the bag!

This photo is of my hubbys Great-grandmother and her 2 children. (His grandfather)

His great Aunt gave it to me. She had scads of old family photos. She had 1 son & 1 grandson, and none of them gave 2 hoots about the photos or family history. The photos and genealogy info was supposed to come to me, but who knows what happened to it. They didn't even let us know she'd passed. :-(

I'm very grateful to have this one.

Alisande, what program do you use to edit your photos?

I love old photos. I've gotten a few from relatives and have shared them on Ancestry and FindAGrave after I realized most of the rest of the family had never seen these people either. It's so fun to find out what your relatives looked like.

Raven, that's such a shame! It's good that you had some important ones saved on your phone.

Ali, thank you!

Pudgeder, I use Photoshop Elements. I also have an excellent Canon scanner that can handle various sizes of negatives in addition to slides and prints. I'm surprised I haven't worn it out; my dad left so many wonderful pictures taken with good cameras--and he took good care of his negatives. My scanner isn't manufactured anymore (apparently not enough people care about different sizes of negatives), and I've been tempted to buy one of those still on the market to keep as a spare if mine goes.

I can see why you treasure your photo. Here's another version. I left the semi-circle on the mother's blouse because I thought it might belong there.

Alisande, what a treasure trove of photos you have there! In today's world I doubt that family photos will survive very well. Never printed, but lost to old hard drives and discarded phones.

This would be my husbands Grandmother. It would had to have been taken in the 1890's

And not nearly so old, but this is my first grade class picture, That would have been 1947, so pretty old at that. Can yo imagine one teacher (no aides) being responsible for that many 6 year olds today. Interesting to note...there were 3 sets of twins in the class.

These are great! I have an Epson Perfection V3330 Photo flatbed scanner that also does the negatives and slides. I really need to get things scanned in. When my DB and DSIL cleaned out my parents house they had 3 totes. One for each of us. Mom had lots of duplicates, so it was " one for you, one for you, one for me!" And anyone they didn't recognize went into my tote. It's so heavy that I can barely push the tote across the floor. No way can I lift it. I have been going through old cd's with photos on them this morning. These are all family, I think. I know back row standing left to right is my aunt Phyllis, my grandma Ollie, and grandma's Aunt Tean. The rest I have no clue who might be. I would expect that this was taken at a family reunion, most likely.

I have also found an app for my phone, PhotoScan, that works great for those photos that you can't remove from an album. Not good for the old poloroid photos that are fading though. My Epson scanner will do an auto fix for those that looks good. I'll post a couple I just did with the PhotoScan app. The photo of the 2 couples has not been edited at all, but taken with PhotoScan.

This is my great uncle and aunt unedited scanned with Photo Scan

Standing is Great?Aunt Bess, Uncle Bob (dad's brother) Uncle John (grandma's brother) Grandpa, Aunt Mary (Uncle John's wife), unknown, but might be Aunt Bess's daughter. Seated is Grandma and unknown. This is a poloroid that I edited as much as I could with my photo program on the win 10.

I think these are cousins, but I can't tell. This is a poloroid photo, and even in my editing program that came with Win 10, I can't do anything to fix it. It is in one of the old magnetic photo albums, and I can't take it out to use my good scanner.

Maybe these will give everyone an idea as to what the PhotoScan does, in addition to what might be able to be done with them after using it.

I forgot to ask how those who scan their photos to the computer, ect, document the photos in the computer. If I don't know who these people are now, obviously I can't put names on the back of a physical photo. If I know who they are, how do I list the names in the computer with the photo?

Tami, if I have a group photo I give it a title and then list the names in a Word document I have for that purpose. There may be a better way to do it, but I don't know what it is. I hadn't heard of PhotoScan; is it an Apple product?

Yes, your poor Polaroid picture is quite the mess. It almost looks like there was a double exposure going on. Plus early Polaroid prints weren't exactly made to last. I did a few adjustments in PSE. The cousins are a bit easier to see, but that's about it.

Gaz, your husband's grandmother was lovely. Where was she from? And which one are you in the picture?

At first I thought the teacher looks a little old to be handling all those children. But then I remembered women looked a lot older then. She could have been only in her forties. I was two years behind you. :-)

Alisande, yes she was very pretty as were all of her 4 daughters. In the grade school pic, I am the brunette fourth from the left, third row. Next to the platinum blond, lol

I love "old" pictures. So many things to look at in them. I was recently sent this picture of my Grandfather from 1912

My Mom when she was 13My Great Grandfather's Hat Works in Denton UK - my Grandfather and his Uncles are in the picture. This pic was enlarged from a postcardMy wee Scottish GrandmotherMy Grandfather standing and his brother

My Scottish Great Grandparents - never knew them

Gaz she is beautiful and has an extremely tiny waist! Wow I wonder what her measurement was.

Great pictures.

My Grandma Rose when she was 16, at her brother's bakery where she worked for a while.My great great grandmother, who my great grandfather brought over from Denmark.

My mother was a model before I was born; she is the one standing.

Jacob Starkey BROWN & his Children. At this date, Jacob's wife had passed away.

My grandmother is the young woman standing. The date of this photo is circa 1884 in Richland Co., Illinois. Grandmother had wanted to be a school teacher, but Jacob said, "No. I need you to prepare noon meals for my crew.". He was operating a portable saw mill.

My mother at the Calgary Stampede with her reserve grand champion steer circa 1948. She was 14 in this photo and the only girl who raised and showed cattle competitively in the Calgary area during that time.

My daughter's great-grandparents, with her great-uncle. Taken about 1917. Manuela had come from Mexico to Texas in about 1895 I believe. Henry's ancestor had come from England with Cornwallis (yes that Cornwallis) to what is now Canada, then that branch made its way to New York, then the Carolinas, thence to Louisiana, and ended up in Texas.

My great-grandfather. I was able to have a Russian-speaking acquaintance translate the printing which told me this was taken in Siauliai, Lithuania I believe in about 1895.

My mother and aunt in about 1937 with a new car! Both in high school then.

I've just gotten a new computer and it seems a bunch of photos didn't transfer. I'll have to work on that, plus on getting them more organized.

I have so enjoyed looking at all of your photos. The family histories are interesting and so are the fashions, hair styles, furniture and cars. Looking at them is like taking a step back in time.

I could look at pictures like this all day long.

Me too, Rhizo! Thanks so much to everyone who posted your wonderful photos. I love that the families came from all over. These pictures are treasures.

Two of my grandparents were opera singers. Here's my Scottish grandmother, Alice Campbell. She was born in Connecticut, but her parents emigrated from Scotland. The clown on the right is my Jewish grandfather. I don't know if they were married at this point, but he became better known. Very handsome, he caused ladies to swoon in the aisles. Why don't ladies swoon anymore? :-)

My great-uncle Isidore, a well-known composer and pianist (I can still hear him play online, recorded in 1905!) is at top left. The soprano Marguerite Starrell is on the right in the second row. I don't know the others, but look at those hats! The lady at the top looks rather stern, but she is the most hatted of all.

And here's a WWII wedding of family friends. What color is the Matron of Honor's dress? Dark blue, perhaps?

See many obese people in these photos? What's become of us?

Alisande, I hadn't noticed your comment about the age of the teacher in my class photo. I would guess that she was probably mid 40's then. And would you believe that she taught my daughter in first grade 18 years later.

Also Dh's grandmother was born in PA. The family came from Germany

Alisande, thank you for letting me know how you document your photos. And for trying to edit my cousins. It still doesn't help me figure out who is who, though I am pretty sure the tallest is my cousin Frank, who passed away at the end of August.

I am enjoying seeing everyone's photos!

This is my favorite right now. My mom, on the left, born in 1921, and her 2 of her sisters. Probably taken sometime in the 1930's .

This is my grandmothers passport photo.

I'm another who really enjoys the old photos. And, I really need to do something about preserving my collection. My late husband and I have been the 'family historians' on both his and my side of the family, I have photos that date back into the 1800's.

This is my maternal Grandmother, circa late 1890's, I think. She passed away in the 1920's, before I was born.

And here is my paternal Grandmother, circa late 1800's, not sure of exact date of her death, probably between 1900 & 1905 or so.

And here are my paternal grandparents with a baby girl that passed away at a very young age. I believe this picture was taken before my Dad was born in 1900. I had never heard anything about this child, until I came across this photo a few years ago. And of course, it was too late to ask my Dad about it.

Rusty

This is my mother, older brother and I either late 1951 or early 1952.

To: raee_gw zone 5b-6a

Its a small world! I, too, have a connection to the British Army during the Revolutionary War. My connection is Lord Howe's Army who wintered at New York City. My guy is a Scot. He was conscripted in Scotland while in town attending family business. The Brit's nabbed him and said, "You are in the Army now." He was shipped to New York and placed in Lord's Howe's Army. He was wounded and his commanding officer took him to the home of Franklin to recuperate. (The record isn't clear, but it seems these Franklin(s) were remote relatives of the famous Ben Franklin.) When it came time for him to re-enlist, he refused, stayed with the Franklin(s) and married their daughter. This couple is my 4th great grandparents.

Me on the family cannon in 1941

I was looking through my pictures on one of my tablets and came across this old picture. It is my mom and me, my sisters and a niece. Long time ago lol terrible quality.