ABOUT 

“There are only two lasting bequests we can give our children - one is roots, and the other, wings.”

Hodding S. Carter

“A man who thinks too much about his ancestors is like a potato - the best part of him is underground.”

Henry S.F. Cooper

And that is the rub, eh? How do we give our children wings and preserve their roots at the same time, without us all turning into potatoes? This website is my best attempt at solving that riddle. The intent is not to over-glorify our past or obsessively document our lineage. It is a landing place for artifacts of our family’s history. Think of it like a museum or a gallery with a number of different exhibit halls. Some may interest you, some may not. Stay for a few hours or just breeze in and take a look around.

What this is not is an archive dedicate to the Emme Family alone. All families in the “tribe” are welcome to contribute. Where possible artifacts and documents will be indexed and searchable so visitors can look at it all or focus in on an area of special interest. At its simplest, this website is a visual file cabinet, an organized place to keep things to share that define our family’s roots. Hopefully we will stay clear of the potatoes.

Tom Emme - January 1, 2019

PHOTOS - All photographic images. Some may be organized as booklets, some may be galleries. Where possible, higher res images are attached. This page is password protected.

OBJECTS - All objects and artifacts. Some sacred, some not so much. This could be necklaces, family bibles, journals, dolls and furniture. Anything that exists in the 3D world. Typically the owner of the item will be identified. Where possible some facts will be included to tell the story about the object itself. This page is password protected.

DOCUMENTS - All flat documents. This could be vintage birth certificates, marriage certificates or letters. It could also be sketches, paintings, recipes or newspaper clippings. This is the place for sharing genealogy documents as well. This page is password protected.

RECORDINGS - All audio and video recordings. There are not a lot of these, but there are some. These are all stored on a Vimeo Account and linked into the Archive. This page is password protected.

BLOG - The place for announcements when new content has been added or for family conversation about the archive itself. This page is password protected.

JACK - A project to create a “soldier’s scrapbook” for Jack Emme, my father’s brother who was killed in action in Normandy in 1944.