Since you are enjoying the images on Footnote, you are probably like me.  You have a box or boxes full of photos and old documents somewhere in your home.  You keep them because you either love them or can’t bear to throw them away.   Again, you are probably like me and LOVE them.

Recently, while looking through a box of old photos that I inherited from my mother, I realized that I had treasure in my hands.  Of course, the old photos are ‘treasure’ when they are of my family and ancestors, but many of them are yet-to-be-discovered ‘treasures’ by the living families of the folks in the old photos.  I only needed a way to share the images with those families too.

Footnote!  Of course!   Many of the photos have writing on the backs giving the names of the people in the images.  Some have no names, only a print date and location.  All have a common thread though.  They belonged to my mother, her parents and grandparents and none of them lived farther than six miles from the location they were born, so I know approximately where the photos were taken.  When the date they were taken is unknown, I can compare the style of clothes with other photos on the box that have dates and determine an approximate date it was taken.

After scanning the photos and saving them to my hard drive with meaningful names rather a string of numbers and characters, I upload them to my member account on Footnote.  In most cases I Annotate the images with the names of the people on the photos and / or with the location and date or approximate date information and Spotlight the ones that seem to beg to be spotlighted.

Spotlighting allows them to immediately be seen by the Footnote community.  Additionally, Google indexes Footnote and hence, the odds of someone finding ‘treasure’ in the old photos is even greater.

Post your old ‘treasure’ photos to your member account on Footnote.   Share their wealth with the Footnote community and by extension, with the world.

The FBI files, one of the original titles we launched with on Footnote back in January 2007,  include tales of espionage during World War I, case files for German aliens who were politically suspect, records pertaining to Mexican neutrality, and reports dealing with alleged violations of Federal laws. While doing some digging in these file, our expert content specialist Beau Sharbrough uncovered some valuable gems that can be found there—The Application for Exception from Classification of Enemy Alien.

Today, I’ve resolved to tell you about one kind of record in the FBI Case Files. That record is an “Application for Exception from Classification of Enemy Alien.” It’s a mouthful.           

Read all about Beau’s discovery of Exceptional Records in the FBI Case Files from his blog.

We would like to wish you a happy Independence Day from the Footnote Team! We recognize our ancestor’s sacrifice for this country and we are grateful that we have so many of these historic documents that made this day possible. Spend some time looking at some of our historic collections, for instance the American Milestone Documents, Constitutional Convention Records, and Continental Congress Papers—all Free to view. Do you have an ancestor that fought in the Revolutionary War? See if you can find their pension record. In leaving, be sure to check out these spotlights below. One spotlighting the Transcript journals from the Continental Congress and the other highlighting the original image of the signers of the Declaration of Independence. Their signatures may be fading but we won’t forget them.

You can easily embed any spotlight on your website.

Last night we added a new feature to the site that will help you get more from Footnote without doing more work.

When you find something on the site that you are interested in, look for a  button and click it.  The item will be added to your “Watch List” in Your Account and we’ll send  you an email whenever that item is updated.

Watching Searches and Titles
Each month we add millions of new images to the site and Footnote Members upload images and annotate thousands of names, dates and places on images they find on the site.

Now you can use Watches to know when something you’ve been looking for has arrived at Footnote.

To set up a Search Watch:
Search for something, for example, Ralph Waldo Emerson

Click the Watch button on the Search results page, we’ll add a Watch with your search terms and let you know when a new match is appears on the site.

If there’s a Title that you are interested in, you can add a Watch and we’ll notify you when new images are added.

Watching Images, Story Pages and Spotlights
You can add a Watch for any image, Story Page or Spotlight and we’ll let you know when they are updated, annotated, commented on, etc.  It might give you the opportunity to learn something surprising or meet someone who shares your research interests.

Watching Members
If you find a Footnote Member who is doing interesting things, you can add a Watch from their Profile page and be notified when they add something new.

Watching Your Own Contributions
By default, we’ll add a Watch to images, Story Pages or Spotlights you add to Footnote.

If you’ve added things in the past and would like to watch them, visit this page and click the button.

Managing Watches
You’ll find your Watch List in Your Account.  There you can see everything you are watching and remove a Watch if you are no longer interested in it.  You can choose how often you’d like to receive your email notifications on the right side of the Watch List page.