The lineage
Four generations, each person with their dates, their trade and what a document establishes.
See the lineage
Demonstration archive · fictional family
The Delorme Family
Four generations, 1834 to today.
A documentary family archive.
Saint-Norbert · wheelwrights, then mechanics
About this archive
An ordinary family, documented.
The Delormes invented nothing and governed nothing. They kept a workshop for ninety-four years, then sold it. This is exactly the kind of family whose history vanishes for want of being written down.
What you are reading is a demonstration: the Delorme family is invented, so are the items cited, and the visuals are drawn rather than photographed. Nothing here should be able to pass for a real record.
What is not invented is the method. Every person carries what a document establishes. Every photograph carries its date and provenance. Every uncertainty is written down as one. A family archive that skips this produces a legend, not a memory.
This is the template installed for you: the structure, the layout and the rules. You supply your scans and what you know about them.
Four ways in
Where to start.
A family archive is read in several directions: by people, by dates, by images, by documents.
The timeline
From the 1858 marriage record to the 2026 digitisation, in four periods.
Follow the datesThe photographs
Six images, each with its date and where it comes from. Two were uncaptioned.
Open the galleryThe record
Five documents with their references: a marriage record, a ledger, letters, a deed, notebooks.
Consult the record
Method