Summer greetings! It’s that fantastic time of year when many get to take off by plane, train and automobile to create lasting vacation memories! I’ve got a trove of family photos that bring some very fond trip-type memories to mind –

But they generate some mysteries too!

A few years back, I wrote about trying to figure out the origin of several pictures from the family “archives” (The Picture (Plu)perfect Bit). While I got to the bottom of a couple, others are stumping me to this day. If you happen to be familiar with historic spots in Illinois, Virginia or DC, perhaps you can recognize something? Or, if you’ve found yourself like I have in the place where a family photo just doesn’t ring bells no matter how much you magnify or zoom, I’m here to say there’s hope!

Afraid I still haven’t caught onto the idea of labeling or tagging photos right out of the gate – which would definitely help when I’m searching through almost 11,000 digital pics for a particular shot…

Technology’s got my back more and more though! My photo app thingy now volunteers to name people and, more recently, places and things! The tool’s getting so thorough that I’m starting to feel like my actual intelligence is becoming kinda…artificial.

But even algorithms have their limits. This picture of dear Mummy in her youth here has been one I couldn’t place:

I don’t curse the photo app gods for not being able to put an address on two random barns – but it does mean I’m left to other of my own “devices” to sort this out. I decided to try channeling my inner Nancy Drew and setting my brain to work in the way it now tends to – circling a target for minutes, hours or days while the mental battleship I’m pursuing refuses to be located and sunk. (On a recent neighborhood stroll, this process caused me to shriek the word “Barry” out of nowhere at the top of my lungs. My walking pals completely understood this was in response to a Bill Hader query from a few blocks back – but it did seem to unsettle some neighbors and birds…)

Anyway, a clue to the Mystery of the Log Cabins turned out to be Mummy’s clothing! Since posting the photo, I matched it with another in which it looks like she’s wearing exactly the same outfit – and I’m thinking it’s a pic from the same day or time:

Drifting out of my brain fog came this thought that the building did look familiar! The summer after my junior year of high school, the folks and I took a trip from California to Maine, stopping at all sorts of landmarks along the way. My April post included a little memento from that trip – the bill from a play we saw in Springfield, Illinois, where we also paused to take a look at Abraham Lincoln’s home:

BARRYYYY!!!

I mean – BULLSEYYYE!!!

So decades apart, Mum and I both visited the same landmark! And just about 20 miles from there is “Lincoln’s New Salem State Historic Site” – the reconstruction of an earlier village where Lincoln lived. I’m not 100% certain, but it sure seems possible that Mum could have grabbed her bandana and made a day of visiting all things Lincoln – including his Springfield and New Salem homes. Someday, I’ll have to go confirm this for myself!

Another pic that I’m edging closer to identifying the details of is this one:

I definitely recognize our family’s Travelall in the back there (can’t quite call it our “trusty” Travelall, but it was still much beloved!). Since by the date I would only have been three, I’ll cut myself some slack for not recalling the moment – but I’m betting the photographer was big brother, Jack, and I’ll even wager the camera he’s got around his neck in this pic is the one he used:

The feature on my phone that analyzes plants, animals and landmarks has declined to weigh in on which monument this might be. But I did discover more photos that appear to be from the same roll, including this one:

Half a dozen of these pics have bits of old tape on the back – and just one offers an additional written clue to the vicinity of our family vacation:

It’s what made me almost choose the title “Throwing up on Monticello” for this post. (An odd bit of clickbait, for sure!) I was tempted because the Mount Vernon clue reminded me that I used to hear tales about a family trip we took back east when I was very little. Sadly, beyond brief clips that play in my memory of being introduced to fireflies and playing “dueling neighs” with a big white horse, nothing specific about this family journey currently comes to mind. (The folks teased me more than once that: “Here we take you to these important places and that’s what you remember..?!”) 

Mum and Dad would tell me about how I was ill on the day we visited Jefferson’s home of Monticello near Charlottesville, Virginia. Thinking it would be bad form to let me barf on some revered piece of American history, Dad drew the assignment of waiting outside with me while the rest of the family took their tour.

I confirmed online that the one picture is correctly marked as George Washington’s home of Mount Vernon near Alexandria, Virginia. And that’s 100ish miles away from Monticello – where they probably never even knew how close they came to disaster…:

The photo tool did come through in identifying this pic from the roll as the Yorktown Victory Monument (in – drumroll, please – Yorktown!):

But the subject of that other monument with our car behind it remains elusive. Is it another Revolutionary War tribute from somewhere in the region we were exploring on that trip? Maybe a Civil War marker? I still aim to figure it out. And if I do, I will write – it – down!

I suppose it’s a fair point that I could be spending my time in more productive ways than playing amateur sleuth with old photos. Maybe I could clean my apartment? Write the Great American Novel? Put up the curtains I bought six months ago? (Although that would involve pretending to be handy, learning to use the drill I bought for the job, finding that little measuring thing with the bubble in it, climbing on a chair, and setting aside a general sense of accident-waiting-to-happen doom over the whole affair…)

But I do so adore these family photos! It delights me to conjure the points in time they represent, and cherish the memories and stories they bring back – even of places I didn’t quite get to go!

The thing is, when I have the melancholy feeling these days that I’ve lost a funny or sweet recollection that I once had and shared with the world (sometimes relentlessly…), I now take a little comfort in the thought that something could spark its return – that, by and by, it might come back to me.

I’m still after making new summer memories. But I’m gonna keep working to preserve the old ones too!

Cheers – and best wishes for creating great summer memories of your own!