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    Filming Family History: How to Save Great Stories for Future Generations
    Filming Family History: How to Save Great Stories for Future Generations
    Filming Family History: How to Save Great Stories for Future Generations
    Ebook68 pages41 minutes

    Filming Family History: How to Save Great Stories for Future Generations

    By Clarence Jones

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    About this ebook

    Before early humans learned how to write, the stories of their history existed only in the memories of the elders. Sitting around a campfire, children listened raptly as their parents and grandparents, uncles and aunts told what it was like the day they killed the mammoth. Or how nearly everyone drowned – generations ago – in the time of the great flood.
    ONLY THE LEGENDS SURVIVED
    As tribal elders died, their memories of family history usually died with them. A few of the stories survived, and evolved into legends. Human memory is flexible. It was hard to determine how much of a legend was true, how much had been embellished as the stories were relayed from one generation to the next.
    IMPORTANCE OF FAMILY STORIES
    Family stories and history have always been extremely important to us as members of the human tribe. They tell us who we are, where we’ve been, how we got here. They can explain some of our physical and personality traits. They can shape the lives of youngsters. But only if the stories survive.
    FRAGILITY OF THE STORIES
    Some famous people write their memoirs, and preserve their personal stories. But for most of us, family stories are just as fragile as they were when we were living in caves.
    THEY WILL SOON BE GONE
    There are wonderful stories, marvelous stories, just sitting there, on the edge of extinction. The aging process, disease and death will soon erase them. With today’s technology, everyone can be a film maker to document their family history. Because virtually every cell phone has a built-in video camera that can shoot remarkably good audio and video.
    CAMERA SHYNESS
    But interviewing older people can be difficult. They’re often camera-shy. They don’t like to see what time has done to them, or hear what the years have done to their voices. They’re often bewildered by – and wary of – all these new, electronic gadgets. So you have to work at making them comfortable with the process. And you will need to guide the conversation as it unfolds.
    I'VE NEVER TOLD ANYONE BEFORE
    There are many memories in families that have never been discussed. Like what happened in combat. Or the grief that followed the death of a child. Sometimes those experiences have never been told because the family member thought nobody cared. Part of the skill in filming family history is convincing older people that you do care. That their lives were - and are - important.
    WHAT IT WAS LIKE TO BE THERE
    This book explains that the key to great story-telling has always been describing what it was like to be there. That is the priceless treasure of filmed stories told by loved ones. That’s what this book is about. It shows you how to set up, conduct, and record those interviews, then organize them into fascinating home movies that tell what it was like to be there in your family’s past. Clarence Jones, the author, was a reporter for 30 years, followed by a second career as an on-camera coach for government and business executives. He shows and tells in this book the secrets he learned that can uncover fascinating stories lurking in the memories of those on camera. “Wow,” they may say, as they finish an anecdote from their childhood. “I hadn’t thought about that in years.”

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherClarence Jones
    Release dateJul 29, 2016
    ISBN9781370484874
    Filming Family History: How to Save Great Stories for Future Generations
    Author

    Clarence Jones

    Clarence Jones is an on-camera coach who teaches media survival skills. He knows what he's talking about. After 30 years of reporting in both newspapers and television, he wrote Winning with the News Media - A Self-Defense Manual When You're the Story. Now in its 9th Edition, many call it "the bible" on news media relations. Then he formed his own media relations firm to (in his words) "teach people like you how to cope with SOBs like me." At WPLG-TV in Miami, he was one of the nation's most-honored reporters. He won four Emmys and became the first reporter for a local station to ever win three duPont-Columbia Awards - TV's equivalent of the Pulitzer Prize. In addition to his day job as a news media consultant, he writes more books and magazine articles. He builds his own computers and invents clever devices to for his sailboat. Nine of his books are now available in both print and e-book formats -- Winning with the News Media, They're Gonna Murder You (his memoirs), Sweetheart Scams - Online Dating's Billion Dollar Swindle, LED Basics - Choosing and Using the Magic Light, Sailboat Projects, More Sailboat Projects, Webcam Savvy for the Job or the News, Webcam Savvy for Telemedicine, and Filming Family History. Clarence started working full-time as a daily newspaper reporter while he was earning his journalism degree at the University of Florida. He was named Capitol correspondent in Tallahassee for the Florida Times-Union one year after graduating from college. Six years later, as one of the nation's most promising young journalists, he was granted a Nieman Fellowship at Harvard University. After Harvard, he was hired by the Miami Herald, where he was part of a year-long investigation that resulted in corruption charges against the sheriff and his top aides. The Herald stories led to a referendum that abolished the office of sheriff. Miami-Dade is the only county in Florida with an appointed public safety director. Clarence covered Martin Luther King's Civil Rights campaign all across the South for the Herald. His last newspaper position was Washington correspondent for the Herald. He then moved to Louisville, Kentucky to work under deep cover for eight months, investigating political and law enforcement corruption for WHAS-TV. Posing as a gambler, he visited illegal bookie joints daily, carrying a hidden camera and tape recorder. His documentaries during a two-year stint in Louisville gained immediate national attention. He returned to Miami in 1972 to become the investigative reporter for WPLG-TV, the ABC affiliate owned by Post-Newsweek Corp. Specializing in organized crime and law enforcement corruption, his work at WPLG earned four Emmys and three duPont-Columbia Awards (television's equivalent of the Pulitzer Prize). He also won the Robert F. Kennedy Award for "The Billion-Dollar Ghetto," a 10-story series that examined the causes of the riots that burned much of Liberty City and killed 18 people in 1980. While he was reporting, he taught broadcast journalism for five years as an adjunct professor at the University of Miami. He lives near the mouth of Tampa Bay, where he sails a 28-foot Catalina, and frequently publishes magazine articles showing how to make gadgets and accessories he invents for his boat. All of his books are available in both print and e-book versions.

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      Book preview

      Filming Family History - Clarence Jones

      Filming

      Family History

      How to Save Great Stories for

      Future Generations

      By Clarence Jones

      Filming Family History - How to Save Great Stories for Future Generations

      ISBN: 9781370484874

      Copyright © 2016 by Clarence Jones

      Published by: Smashwords, Inc.

      Author Contact:

      Clarence Jones

      6907 Vista Bella Drive

      Bradenton, FL 34209

      Voice: 941.779.0242

      e-mail: cjones@winning-newsmedia.com

      All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book, or any portion thereof, in any form, without written permission from the author.

      Registered trademarks carry the ® symbol on first use in this book. On subsequent use, the trademark symbol is assumed.

      This book is licensed for your personal use only, and does not have DRM encoding, which makes it easier to use. If you’d like to share this book with someone, please purchase an additional copy. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, please buy your own copy. Thank you for respecting the work of the author.

      Other Books by Clarence Jones:

      (All are available in both print and e-book versions)

      Winning with the News Media – A Self-Defense Manual When You're the Story (9th Edition)

      They're Gonna Murder You – War Stories From My Life at the News Front (His memoirs)

      Webcam Savvy – For Job or News Interviews

      Sailboat Projects – Clever Ideas and How to Make Them – For a Pittance

      More Sailboat Projects – (A Sequel)

      Preface

      Before early humans learned how to write, the stories of their history existed only in the memories of the elders.

      Sitting around a campfire, children listened raptly as their parents and grandparents, uncles and aunts told what it was like the day they killed the mammoth.

      Or how nearly everyone drowned – generations ago – in the time of the great flood.

      As tribal elders died, their memories of family history usually died with them. A few of the stories survived, and evolved into legends. Human memory is flexible. It was hard to determine how much of a legend was true, how much had been embellished as the stories were relayed from one generation to the next.

      Importance of Family Stories

      Family stories and history have always been extremely important to us as members of the human tribe. They tell us who we are, where we’ve been, how we got here. They can explain some of our physical and personality traits. They can shape the lives of youngsters. But only if the stories survive.

      Fragility of the Stories

      Some famous people write their memoirs, and preserve their personal stories. But for most of us, family stories are just as fragile as they were when we were living in caves.

      They Will Soon Be Gone

      There are wonderful stories, marvelous stories, just sitting there, on the edge of extinction. The aging process, disease and death will soon erase them.

      Many years ago, I was filming my then-mother-in-law. She was in her 70s at the time, very wrinkled and overweight. Nobody would think of her then as sexy. She had grown up in a little town near Atlanta. After high school, she was sent to the big city to go to business school.

      Boarding House Whistles

      In Atlanta, she lived in a boarding house for girls. As I recorded her memory of that time long ago, she told how she would walk to class each morning, passing a boarding house for boys.

      Every morning, the boys sitting on the front porch would whistle at her, she said.

      Good Legs

      You must have had good legs, I said.

      No, no, she replied with a

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