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I. Volume 3, August, 2006

An educational newsletter from Peter E. Randall Publisher to assist towns, historical societies and special organizations in publishing history

The best place to start looking for photos of your town is in your town. Reach out to long time residents who are likely to have some shots of how downtown used to look hiding up in their attic that they haven't thought about in years. Or host a photo night at one of the meetings of your town or historical society, where people can bring in photos they want to share.

Richard Scaramelli was very fortunate in his search for photographs of the town of Surry, NH. One resident in town was very much interested in technology. He was the first to have a radio, and the first to have a camera. He photographed the town in his younger years. He later moved out of Surry and became a professional photographer, but came back in his retirement and continued to take photographs of the area. He became a great resource for Scaramelli.

The writing of a town history provides a great excuse for the historical society or the town library to create a photo archive for the community. Residents will be able to see what's happened in the past, who used to live where, what stores have come and gone, and how the town has changed. In the process of doing this, the community will gather far more photos than would ever be used in the book, but ultimately, it would become a resources for people in the town doing research, and if the town is trying to create a historical district.

The town of Surry also opted to hire a professional photographer to capture current pictures of their town. "He photographed things like the town plow and the police cruiser. It's a Crown Victoria, which may seem new now, but 45 years from now it will be very interesting," he said.

You will inevitably gather more photos than you can use. When trying to decide which ones to use, think of the following:

You may only have two or three photos of the mayor of your town from the 1940s, but hundreds of your current major. They're both important. Cherish the older photos.

Once you gather enough photos, or if your historical society already has a photo collection, they need to be formatted in a way that your publisher can handle. Here are some suggestions to get prepared:

• Once it is determined which photos are going to be placed in the book, they should each be numbered. They don't necessarily have to be numbered chronologically, but they should have a number.

• Scan the images at 300 dpi, as 8 x 10s (they need to be large enough for a book format, you may also want to create smaller versions for a database)

• Format them as a .tiff, for best resolution, not as a .giff, which is an image meant for a web site.

• Back-up the files in several places, on CDs or DVDs. Photos and computer files have a way of disappearing.

The numbers used in organizing your photos will now help you in creating a caption list.

"The caption should follow this rule: a photograph is worth a thousand words, but with a caption with ten words could be worth ten thousand," said Peter Randall. There's no length requirement, but you should explain what the picture is if it's ambiguous.

If it's a street scene, you should give the date, and maybe the direction of the street the picture is facing. It's also helpful when writing about locations in town to use the street numbers. Older town histories would refer to things as "next door to Joe Smith's place." Which Joe Smith are they talking about? Whenever possible use a street number, so 100 years from now you can find out where places were.

You don't necessarily want to repeat things in the captions that you already said in the text. When writing captions, you might want to leave some things out to say in the text.

Writer's Tip

Don't get discouraged. "Perseverance. Tomorrow is another day. You may spend five years working on the book. Someone might say, ‘this isn't speaking to me, it isn't good.' You can't worry about those kinds of people. Keep writing," said author Richard Winslow.

Look for more in our next issue about researching your town history.

All of our articles can be found at www.perpublisher.com/enews

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