About Us
About Us
At WeAre.xyz, we are all about making it simple and delightful to make an online archive of anything that floats your boat. We’ve started with two areas of personal passion: family history, and ‘one place study’ history (a house, a village, a national park, any heritage site...).
We are also constantly asking the question of how to ensure what we create survives and thrives for generations to come. And we have come to a solid conclusion on this; whatever nostalgia and history you are into, make time to generate and include a record of yourself. The next generation, above all, will want to remember you. But in the process of inspecting your own life record, those who start to share your family or other nostalgic history passion will find the treasure trove you have left them.
But enough philosophy, I’d like to share where my personal passion for family history and nostalgia began…
In the beginning...
One evening, my father handed me a stiff covered notebook, about 9 by 5 inches. In it were the exquisitely handwritten financial accounts for a Welsh border farm between the years 1861 to 1876. Half way into the book, the columns of figures abruptly gave way to a scrawled message addressed directly to me over 100 years ago:
“Feb 3rd 1900 being kept in the house under the Doctor, with influenza, I have copied out in this book some of the events that concerned me and my friends in a quick Farmers Life also the year and dates of them. As some Descendent in years to come may look them over and think about old farmers. Thomas Poole Aston on Clun”
I showed my father who promptly left the room, returning with this huge portrait photograph of big old Thomas Poole himself… my Great Great Grandfather.
The rest of the book is a fascinating frolic through his pre-married life from 1857 up to his autumn years in the mid 1890’s.
I was hooked and drank in every word before setting out into the fascinating and wider world of genealogy. My history of the Poole family now stretches back to 1679 and I have roamed the fields and byways of Wales imagining their lives and locating the last physical shreds of their existence (including actually digging up a grave).
But... having pursued and devoured my ancestral origins (Poole, Davies, Walmsley, Langford, Riley, Peter, Jones, Blake, Nightingale, Chelmick, Holland, Vaughan…), I reached a point at which I was exploding with the need to share all the backstories I had uncovered. My family weren’t very excited by my sprawling tree and official records, so I built a website. But it was hard, expensive and lacked interactivity; there was no real way for my relatives to functionally join in.
And so we built WeAre.xyz to showcase lives and capture memories, to share with relatives and invite them to fill in the gaps. It is truly ‘our’ online family archive; each family member who logs in becomes the central person of the site.
In a family, most generations have one individual who is known as “the one who knows all about family history stuff”. In my generation it’s me, and from the previous generation it is my Dad’s cousin. Together, she and I have provided a critical mass of content (ancient photo albums, diaries, letters, wills… treasured objects). Now it is open to everyone else to add as much or as little as they choose. Without fail, it has stimulated cousins, uncles, aunts to have a rummage; wonderful photos and recollections have been, and continue to be forthcoming.
I hope you have as much fascinating fun as I continue to have.
author: Simon Davies, founder WeAre.xyz