I don't want to keep old family pictures

[Sweetener12]

So the other day I was doing a big cleaning around the house and found a bunch or very old photo albums that belong to my father's family. My father passed away several years ago and these albums are full of his grandparent's photos, I've never knew these people and I'm not even interested, so I wanted to get rid of them but my DM is strongly against. She says this is the memory, even though she's never knew her DH's grandparents and aunts, etc. She doesn't want me to get rid of them and keeps telling I have to digitize these pics and save them somehow. I find this to be completely senseless, tho.
What do you think? AIBU to not wanting to keep the photos of the people I've never met?

[whatistheworld]

I would imagine that cousins would be interested in seeing these too as they are not just your family but also family to people you maybe don't know. I have found some amazing photos of my 3 x great gramdparents on ancestry. They are priceless.

[MashedHead]

I thought you were being unreasonable at first but then I read that neither of you even know the people's names or how they link to your dad!

I love old photos but only if I know something about the person in them (even as little as whose relation they are).

How old are these photos? I think war time photos and older deserve to be kept regardless because they are a record of history BEFORE photos because incredibly common.

I couldn't bin the photos myself. But no, I wouldn't want to store them either.

[mrsmuddlepies]

It is very easy to digitise with your phone. Take a photo of each page of the album (or individual photos if you can be bothered). To take photos of each page of the four albums will only take an hour. Store them in the cloud in a file called miscellaneous family members, fathers side. Share the album link with your mother and then you can get rid of the physical albums with a clear conscience

[ArgumentativeAardvaark]

@whatistheworld

I would imagine that cousins would be interested in seeing these too as they are not just your family but also family to people you maybe don't know. I have found some amazing photos of my 3 x great gramdparents on ancestry. They are priceless.

She says her father was an only. So the likely candidates are: siblings of OP’s grandparents (OP’s great aunts/uncles) or their offspring. Alternatively OP’s siblings (if any).

[FishHasDied]

I think it would be both sad and selfish to throw the photos away without at least trying to pass them on to other, maybe distant, family members.
Would your mother (or you) feel up to creating a family tree online using any knowledge of the family that she has? She could then scan (or just take photos of the photos using a mobile phone/iPad etc) and upload them to the tree - it’s easy to do. It doesn’t matter if she doesn’t know the names of the some of the individuals in the photos - just add them as part of the ‘Smith’ family.
Once the tree is online interested family members will have access to the photos and other contents.
I’m not totally sure about the following statements so am happy to be corrected but:

• I use Ancestry.co.uk and it’s free to create a tree, you just have to pay if you want to carry out searches.
  
• Once the tree is created it doesn’t have to be maintained and it and the photos are there for posterity.

[BarbaraofSeville]

But the DM could spend that hour doing that if she's that interested in the photos.

If it was the OPs DH who wanted the OP to take this task on, everyone would be pushing it back onto him. Why would it be different here?

[coasterboaster]

Stashing them in the loft is just forcing your clutter on to someone else. At some point, someone will have to clear the loft. It's just selfish to keep crap assuming someone else will do the hard stuff (chucking away) down the line.

[DustyMaiden]

I have hundreds of photos of people I never knew. I didn’t feel I could throw them away but it does annoy me they are taking up space. I boxed them up and put them in the loft.

[oceanbreezy]

You should keep them! My parents who are in their 50/60s don’t even have photos to hem as a child let alone their parents. It is a part of history and how things used to look and be. I would digitalise them so they don’t take up any space that way you won’t regret throwing away. Perhaps there are people in the photos who would like them or their relatives who don’t have any pictures of them?

[DustyMaiden]

@coasterboaster I’m sure my D.C. can manage to take a couple of boxes out of the loft, they get to keep the house.

[waltzingparrot]

I would at least save a couple of photos of every relative for future reference. Take a photo of the pile of albums left and email to all known relatives and ask if anyone wants them before you dispose of them (they will be able to see and understand the space issue). Digitise those you've saved and let relatives know they can always get a copy from you in the future.

[coasterboaster]

@DustyMaiden What if your house is sold to fund the care you need?

I think expecting your kids to do your chores is selfish. Sort out your own loft-crap.

[WhatHaveIFound]

I've spent lockdown scanning my dad's old photos, some of which were taken before I was born. There are loads of photos that i've never seen before and my kids are loving looking at them.

It'd be a shame for you to throw away the photos, can't you at least digitise them first?

[BiBabbles]

I think a middle ground can be found, maybe not digitizing or keeping all of them but not just dumping them all in the bin.

I helped my MIL go through piles of old photos and paintings left behind after her mother and then her husband died. I digitised a small stack that were the most meaningful and then FIL's photos went to his sons and her mother's watercolours went I think to her sisters. When she died, we took some of their photos and paintings and will likely do the same - though it's been over a year, it's just taken a while to work up going through them.

[TressiliansStone]

@Sweetener12

Photos with names on are much easier to deal with, but honestly they're still valuable social and family history without them.

I've spent a lot of time identifying people in unnamed old photographs, and deriving other information from them.

If you're serious about sending the albums to "someone on the internet" you can absolutely send them to me, especially if you include the family details you do know (names, DoB, DoD, marriages) and contact info for your mother, since she's the one who wants the history kept.

Or you can just PM me some of those details right now, eg your grandparents and gt-grandparents. I have an Ancestry sub and can go off and see if there is someone already researching your family, who might be personally interested.

They might also recognise some of the people in your photos, from their own photos!

[Cadent]

I have the reverse, sibling has taken all family pics from family home. We're NC so I'm sad that I may never see them again.

[DishingOutDone]

I am adopted, and both my adoptive parents are dead, so when I am looking at our large collection of old photos, its not really even my complete strangers i am looking at, if that makes sense! I've given a few away to my remaining 2 cousins and the rest have gone in the bin. Initially I felt bad but I am glad now because I was the only one who had any clue which side of which family these people were related to and when I go I'd hate my kids to have to look through all this and think hmm, should I throw this away, were these people important to our mum - because no, they weren't really - its just anecdotes that mean nothing now.

[whiteroseredrose]

Please dont

There may be other family members, cousins, who are looking at family history who may be desperate for old photos.

[Heartthecake]

That's your family history. If you don't want them can anyone else take them.

My grandad and Grandma died before I was born. My dad has grandads war case and all his photos, cards etc. My grandma's photos and cards too. I have already said i would like to inherit them. Because I care about the family history and family tree. It's sad that you simply dont care. They are people your dad loved. So you should care for that reason. But I get you don't want the clutter in your case
Who else could have them? Can your mum take them?

[MrsSchadenfreude]

When my Dad died, my Mum threw our all the old photos of his family “as they weren’t her family.” But they were mine! I knew virtually nothing about my Dad’s family and they would have been nice to have.

[Starwind74]

I don’t understand why the photos are in your possession and not your mother’s anyway, unless your parents were separated. As others have said, if your mother wants them give them to her. Surely it is up to her what possessions she has/keeps. Even if you live together she could keep them in her own room.

[Whenwillthisbeover]

I was 53 before I became interested in family history, now I would love to put faces to the names and occupations and history I have of these relatives.

Save them somehow, if not for you, for your children or their children.

[stealm]

Do not bin them.
You might not be interested in them now but you might in the future and then they will have been lost. Or if you have children they might be interested too.
I find it fascinating to look at photos of my ancestors and see how they lived their lives and also to see what they looked liked. I appreciate not everyone is interested and that's fair enough but to chuck them would be a mistake I feel.
Do you have siblings or did your father have brothers and sisters? If he did, I'd start with them and see if one of them would like them or if you have cousins, then one of them might like them. It's their family too.
Failing that give them to your mother for safe-keeping for now.
If you're an only child and Dad was an only child (that's like my situation), then ask your mother to take them for safe-keeping. When she dies (hopefully not for a long time), you can reassess the situation because they'll be returned to you at that point. Your family situation might have changed and you might at that point be glad to have them.

[Graffitiqueen]

YABVU

[Graffitiqueen]

YABVU