Eighteen and a half minutes and a gap
Friday January 27th 2012, 12:00 am
Filed under: Family,Friends,Politics

First there were the tapes. Family voices from long ago that Richard digitally transcribed for his mom for Christmas. She was absolutely thrilled that she could now share them with her brothers and sister and children rather than having them sit in a drawer. Most. Successful. Present. Ever.

That having worked out so well, a box from his dad showed up two days ago despite our saying we had no such player. Reel-to-reel tapes. Now there’s a reely current technology.

Could we would we?

Uh…

A check of Ebay revealed non-working machines and one listed in the hundreds; Richard remarked that there’s a rubber part that wears out, and at the ages of these…

But the box was here.

Oh and. His dad mentioned that Uncle R had had a machine and had donated it to a tech museum and it was in our town! Maybe we could ask to borrow it back?

Uh…

So I put a note on our ward chat list, feeling like that was our last chance. Someone from church responded almost immediately, saying her husband was determined to hold onto one of every technology that might have family recordings on it, and so, yes, they had a reel-to-reel; would we like to borrow it?

Blessings on Sue and Ken, the problem is solved and now we just have to get started.

(Anyone get that Rose Mary Woods reference in the title?)

p.s. Watched my first Republican debate tonight, transfixed by the political theater. Gingrich wants a lunar colony with hopes for it to be the 51st state by his second term. Really. Maybe they could just aim that $99 billion railroad at the sky.


6 Comments so far
Leave a comment

Oh, yes, got the title! And family memories are a treasure. We have some of my husband’s family’s home movies (8mm?) on DVD now. No voices, but still the images are wonderful. Good luck with the next recording project.

Comment by DebbieR 01.27.12 @ 12:34 am

Oh, boy! Memories there- I remember when I was a kid, my grandparents used to record messages for us on a reel-to-reel recorder, and we’d all gather around to listen when one came in the mail. No idea what happened to them- I expect most of them were taped over with return messages and sent back.

Comment by RobinH 01.27.12 @ 8:17 am

Well do I remember that eighteen-and-a-half-minute gap! That episode and the couple of years preceeding were my baptism into political awareness and activism.

Comment by India 01.27.12 @ 8:25 am

I too, caught the gap. Wonderful memories, but on reel-to -reel? Reely!

Comment by Don Meyer 01.27.12 @ 9:47 am

Rose Mary Woods would be proud no doubt (heh, yeah, I got it — I’m old enough to remember!!)

I guess you should be happy no one had anything recorded on 8-track tapes that you’d need to figure out

the DH got me a piece of equipment for Christmas that will let me put all of my records (33s, 45s and 78s) on to MP3 files that I can then burn to CDs or put on my MP3 player — I’m thrilled! as soon as I’m not spending so much time being nurse and cook I’ll get to that

Comment by Bev 01.27.12 @ 9:59 am

We have a reel-to-reel deck. I also have a tape that belonged to my grandmother, but I have no idea what is on it.We think it may be from Christmases past. Must find out!

Comment by Anne 01.27.12 @ 11:05 am



Leave a comment
Line and paragraph breaks automatic, e-mail address never displayed, HTML allowed: <a href="" title=""> <abbr title=""> <acronym title=""> <b> <blockquote cite=""> <cite> <code> <del datetime=""> <em> <i> <q cite=""> <s> <strike> <strong>

(required)

(required)