For several months I have been working on transcribing family letters. I have been using ChatGPT to do the transcription and it does a pretty good job. There is much more to learn about it as I have been finding out in several webinars. Besides the interpretation of handwriting, it can summarize the text, pull out names, dates, and organize into tables. I prefer to write the stories in my own words but the summaries help identify significant events.
Our Grandma Anna Johnson was a prolific letter writer and her sister Aunt Gene wrote many letters. These two tell many details about their daily living. Uncle Victor also kept details about his daily life, but didn’t often put them in letters. He wrote the fewest letters. When he was in Panama in 1941-1942, he wrote some detail. There are more stacks of letters to go through. So far I have completed most of the letters up through 1949 and more turn up as I go through stuff. The letters have to be scanned to get the transcription and that is another aspect of preserving the history.
The letters have given some of the background to photos and movies that Uncle Victor took. I will be adding those details to the stories and probably to some of the movies as well.
Some of the family events that we have heard about are documented. E.g. After Jeannette died in 1942, Anna moved to Fort Wayne Indiana. One reason was that this was within about 20 miles of Angola where Leo was going to college at Tri State. Eileen and Kathleen moved with her. Kathleen was still in high school and Eileen had recently graduated. Anna got a job on the railroad and was a car cleaner and hostess on the route between Fort Wayne and Chicago. She has many stories about those trips. Also, this is background for the photo we have seen where Anna is standing with her friend Clara in front of an engine. Eileen had a job and spent her spare time dancing at the USO and local dance halls. Anna talks about Eileen bringing home another boyfriend.
Anyway, it is a journey reading through these letters! I am thinking about ways to share them. Will let you know.