Family Albums

Background

These pages stem from my desire to preserve my grandfather’s family albums. He meticulously collected and put together albums of photos and important documents about the family. His oldest photo is of his Irish great grandmother, who lived from 1823 to 1902.

My work began with digitizing his albums. In doing so, many questions arose—the “whos,” “wheres,” and sometimes even the “whys.” In 2013 and 2014, I made a pilgrimage of sorts to find out where my mother’s parents and their parents spent their lives in and around Albany and Troy, New York.

Because my grandfather and his parents lived in a historically significant house, much remains today at the landmarked Schuyler Flatts except, unfortunately, the house, which burned down in 1962, about 12 years after my great grandfather sold it. But, the site is now a park with historical signs and, many of the places that were relevant to the family still stand today in Watervliet and Troy.