The world’s media is extensively covering the 100 year anniversary of the 1912 RMS Titanic tragedy. Many of the personal stories that we know today have been kept alive through the years by the descendants of those that perished on what was the ship’s maiden voyage. CBS Sunday Morning did a feature story on some of those families and you can see it here.

One of the lesser-known stories is that of Irish Jesuit priest Father Francis Browne. Known as “Ireland’s greatest photographer.” Father Browne picked up a camera in 1897 at the age of seventeen. Until his death in 1960, Father Browne captured nearly 42,000 prints across four continents. But it wasn’t until 1986 – 25 years after his death – when his vast collection was discovered in a large trunk in Dublin that belonged to Father Browne.

Father Browne traveled to Southampton to document the Titanic on its maiden voyage. He took dozens of photographs of life aboard including its various rooms, passengers and crew. Father Browne befriended an American couple who offered to pay for his continued travel on to New York and back. He telegraphed his superior for permission and received a terse response: GET OFF THAT SHIP – PROVINCIAL. Father Browne disembarked the Titanic in Queenstown, Ireland and returned to Dublin as the ship travelled on towards New York. Brown tucked that life-saving telegram into his pocket for the remainder of his life. You can see the fascinating stories as told through the photos of Father Browne at Titanic Photographs.

StoryCorps is a non-profit with a bold mission to record, preserve, and share the stories of Americans from all backgrounds and beliefs.  StoryCorps is capturing the inspiring stories from everyday Americans and preserving them at the Library of Congress for the benefit of future generations.  More than 30,000 interviews have been recorded and, if you listen to NPR’s Morning Edition, you’ll often hear segments of these interviews.

This holiday season, make it a point to record some of your family’s history. Our modern technology makes it so easy to create recordings and whether you use a mobile phone or digital camera, do it now before it’s too late. Enjoy this touching StoryCorps interview:

Longtime journalist Susan Soper has written a beautiful Memorial Day post about Ryan Means:  Southern People: Rockin’ in the Free World.

I was very fortunate to call Ryan my friend and the intensity in which he lived his life was infectious.  Two-months shy of his 31st birthday he enlisted in the Army out of deep love for both the United States and his best friend lost in the World Trade Center attacks.  He never did anything with less than maximum speed or effort.  He was funny, sarcastic, daring, empathetic, patriotic, intelligent, strong, sincere and reliable.  He was all the things anyone would ever want in a friend.

This is a must-read for Memorial Day and will give you even deeper appreciation for this holiday’s purpose:  to commemorate the men and women who died while in military service to the United States.  Read Susan’s post here.

(second of a two-part post).

In early 2009, in the midst of several consulting projects, I started the initial research into this idea of a web site that preserves family history.  I spent four months thinking through the idea: sketching out a rough draft of the features, what it might look like, the market size, who the competition was, the team I’d need to make it happen, how much money, a brand name, and a lot more.  I openly discussed the idea with friends and fellow entrepreneurs and 100% of them said they liked the idea and thought their family would use this product.

When I looked at what we could create that would separate us from others, there were several aspects that would be unique.  Other companies were focused on four main areas including, researching your ancestors (Ancestry.com, FamilySearch), memorializing loved ones (Legacy.com, Tributes.com), social networking for families (MyHeritage, Geni) and family tree creation (RootsMagic, Family Tree Maker).

No one took a Wikipedia-style approach – a site that is created and edited by the community, truly collaborative, openly accessible, free to use, and meant to endure for future generations.  And no one focused on sharing stories.  Everyone is interested in their family history and genealogy (one’s lineage) is a part of your family history.  But the most compelling parts of one’s family history are the life stories of your ancestors, their pictures and how others were impacted by their life.  If we could start capturing the stories of human-kind this would evolve into an amazing resource for future generations.  This was the void in the market.

In May of 2009, I decided I to focus all of my efforts on developing this idea into a product.  Until I could figure out a name, we called it FamilyWiki.  For the next year, as a student of genealogy and online collaboration, I went to genealogy workshops, visited genealogy libraries, went to a lecture by Jimmy Wales (founder of Wikipedia), had dozens of breakfasts with potential investors, web developers, college professors, other entrepreneurs and read hundreds of magazines, newspapers and blogs.  I fully immersed myself so that I could answer any potential objection or question about the business.

Without the money to hire a team, my highest priority became finding investors that believed in me and my vision.  In 2009, the NASDAQ was near a 7-year low which made raising money a difficult proposition.  But having been involved in many start-up businesses, I knew this is a product that would create enduring value.  The process of raising money is probably worthy a post all its own, but In May of 2010, eight individuals for whom I am most grateful to, provided the investment capital to create GenerationStation.

(l-r) Alan Neal, Mike Dowdle, Amy Bruckman, Travis Parsons (May 25, 2010)

On May 25, 2010 we kicked off our development effort and six months of full development ensued.  The team discussed, debated and obsessed over every word, pixel, and user-flow.  In late November, we invited family and friends to start using the site.  While simultaneously continuing development and inviting more and more people into the private beta, we gained valuable feedback.  We continued to tweak the site and make improvements each day, and by March 2011 it was apparent from the member feedback that the site was ready for public beta.  The void is filled and people are really enjoying GenerationStation.  Seeing their lineage come to life through stories and pictures is proving to be a positive experience.

The esteemed broadcast newsman, Tom Brokaw, called those born in the 1920’s, the Greatest Generation.  These men and women spent their childhood years in the midst of the Great Depression, (25% unemployment and 89% drop in the stock market).  They put their lives on hold and volunteered their services to fight in World War II.  My father, John A. Dowdle was part of the Greatest Generation and now his story is preserved.  I hope you will preserve your family’s story for future generations to discover and enjoy on GenerationStation.

click here for part one of this post.

Lisa Louise Cooke is another industry leader we had the pleasure of meeting at Rootstech.  Lisa is the producer and host of the Genealogy Gems Podcast available on iTunes.  She is also author of the book Genealogy Gems: Ultimate Research Strategies and regularly blogs at Genealogy Gems News. Lisa was very generous to sit down for a product demo and learn more about GenerationStation.  You can find the interview here.

Flickr photo by mmdesignoffice

This morning, we raised the curtain on GenerationStation, an entirely new way to create and preserve your family history.  We developed this product because we couldn’t find anything that would preserve our family history for future generations to enjoy.  Now we’re ready to let you enjoy this free service!

Here are the top 5 things you should know before proceeding:

1. GenerationStation is FREE. In addition to the free service, we will also offer annual subscriptions which give members access to Premium Features for more control over their content.
2. We’re under construction. This is still a beta version so there are still bugs & the site is still in development.
3. Constant feedback is vital. Click the‘feedback’ link from any page to give ius your opinions, issues, suggestions, complaints — we’ll even accept praise!
4. Deceased and Living Profiles are different. There’s a vast difference between profiles for deceased family and living family. We don’t collect information on living persons except for name and links to existing social networks.
5. GenerationStation is transparent. All profiles are open to public view so that you can collaborate. Content that you edit will be attributed to you.

We hope you and your family will enjoy this product as much as we have.  Think of how appreciative members of your family decades from now will be as they visit GenerationStation to see the collection of family stories and media that you have preserved.  Your work will have a profound impact on how future generations look at their ancestors.

At the RootsTech Conference in early February, Curt Witcher who is the manager of the Genealogy Center at the Allen County Library in Fort Wayne Indiana proclaimed, “These are the best of times in genealogy!”  His passionate keynote address touched on how the confluence of historical records that are coming online and the digital savviness of our population (especially the boomer generation) are causing unprecedented interest in genealogy and family history.  Curt is one of the most respected leaders in the industry and his talk hit an emotional chord with the crowd.  You can see reaction from the Twittersphere via Randy Seaver here with more on RootsTech from Ancestry Insider here and Thomas MacEntee here.

Interest in genealogy and family history is expanding beyond the sole individual in a family who would break out the large folded-up papers to update the family tree each Thanksgiving.  It is now attracting and taking ahold of general consumers, young and old, at lightning speed.  The digital tools that are part of our everyday life are creating simplicity to the once mundane task of preserving the life stories of our ancestors and current generations.

Consider the NBC show, “Who Do You Think You Are?”  The network has aired three episodes this season with 6.6m viewers tuning in each week (source: Nielsen).  To compare that in Internet audience terms, Google gets about 5m unique visitors per day (source: Compete.com).

Yesterday, there was even more evidence as Ancestry.com announced their 2010 results.  Revenues were a whopping $300.9 million for the year and their adjusted EBITDA (earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization) were $101 million.  They now have 1,395,000 subscribers paying an average of $17.78 per month.

These may be the best of times in genealogy but I’d argue that we’re only seeing the beginning stages of mainstream interest in genealogy and family history.  With technology’s continual influence on our lives, I think there are even better times ahead of us!

Thanks for visiting GenerationStation!

Our goal is to make family history a collaborative, easy, fun and enriching experience. We’re eager to show the world a product that, we believe, will change the way people share their family history.

"I’ve been able to gather and preserve so many special family keepsakes. GenerationStation could not have made it any easier!"

We are in our private beta stage which means we have limited the usage of our site to a small group of people.  Not to worry, we will be lifting the curtains for the public very shortly.  If you’d like us to notify you when when w open things up, just pop an email to beta [at] generationstation [dot] com (and don’t worry, we don’t spam – spam is for haters).

In the meantime, here are a few things you might like to know about GenerationStation.

1. GenerationStation is FREE. In addition to the free service, we will also offer annual subscriptions which give members access to Premium Features for more control over their content.
2. We’re under construction. This is a beta version so there are still bugs & the site is still in development.
3. Constant feedback is vital. There will be a ‘feedback’ link on every page so that you can send us your opinions, issues, suggestions, complaints — we’ll even accept praise!
4. Deceased and Living Profiles are different. There’s a vast difference between profiles for deceased family and living family. We don’t collect or display  information on living persons, except for names.
5. GenerationStation is transparent. All profiles are open to public view so that you can collaborate. Content that you edit will be attributed to you.
6. Our Goal. Our goal is to be the largest repository of life stories for humankind organized around the family unit.  It is meant for current and future generations.  Where else would your life story be preserved?

GenerationStation is a gift from my father.

On the morning of April 26, 2004, as I silently sat with my entire family in the long wooden pews of our parish church for my father’s funeral, some thoughts came to my mind.  What will future generations know about Dad?  He lived such a meaningful and impactful life but we’re not very good at preserving people’s life story.  Why do we know so little about our own ancestors?  With all of our modern digital technology, can’t we preserve the essence of Dad’s life with stories and photos so that our descendants won’t feel the same frustration?  I added this problem to my “Ideas” file so that I wouldn’t forget the problem amidst the chaos of that week.

Mike and John Dowdle, 1974

I have been in the technology industry since 1995 when I started an interactive agency at the dawn of what would become the Internet boom.  Involved in a variety of start-ups since then, I had always hoped to pursue an idea of my own.  I remained both curious and aware of recent technology trends as part of the discovery process.

While culture had fully embraced computer technology by 2004, it was still before the birth of Facebook and YouTube so the solution to my problem wasn’t completely obvious.  Social media and user generated content were still unchartered territories.  I had the problem, but didn’t know the solution and that seed of an idea stayed with me for the next several years.  While I figured my desire to digitally preserve my family’s history wasn’t unique, I knew the solution had to be something that would be easy for anyone who could access the Internet

In 2007, Dad’s first cousin, Tom Dowdle, whom I’d gotten to know over the past decade, sent me an article on John Dowdle, my great grandfather, from a 1922 Chicago magazine.  The article was written on the occasion of his death and none of our family knew much about him.  It was an article that would make anyone proud to say you were related to him.  It starts out, “Hundreds of Chicago citizens were saddened at the announcement last week of the death of John Dowdle, a pioneer contractor of Chicago and one of the best known and most highly respected citizens of Chicago.”  Wow!  I immediately thought again about how it would be great if there was an easy web site where I could upload this article so that my family could read this, and more importantly, our descendants could enjoy 100 years from now.

Birth of a Start-up

Late 2008, I stumbled upon PB Wiki (now PB Works) which offers open-source collaborative software that makes it super easy to create your own wiki.  I immediately realized that this was the solution: a single collaborative page for every deceased family member where the community could create and maintain a biography, stories and media.  There would be only one page per person and it would link to the rest of the family.  Basically, evolve the family tree way beyond just names, dates and places but tell the tapestry of stories that truly recount someone’s life.  This was the aHa! moment that would push me to finally take action on the idea.   (part 2 of this post is here)