A 90-minute class · The Family History Writing Studio

Put one ancestor on the page.

 

Write the stories behind your family history. In about ninety minutes, 

learn to turn one dry paragraph into a story your family will actually read.

 

Three short modules. One finished paragraph.

 

 

You've spent years on the research. You want your family to read it. 

And you can feel it on the page — this is the kind of writing they won't open.

Names. Dates. Places. A list of what happened. It's accurate. 

It's careful. It's also the reason the binder sits closed on the shelf.

That's how most of us wrote first. It's also fixable.

Two kinds of writing

 

There are two ways to write about an ancestor.

You can describe her — from the outside, in summary, at a distance. The reader is told about her.

Or you can put her on the page — where we can see her, hear what she did, stand in the room beside her. The reader is with her.

The difference isn't talent, and it isn't more research. It's a handful of moves you can learn in an afternoon.

See it for yourself

 

Here is the same woman, written both ways. Same facts. Same research. Different writing.

 

The dry version:

Margaret McKinnon was a widow with three young children. She kept the family farm in Carrick Township after her husband died. She raised her children alone and managed the farm for many years.

 

The alive version:

After John died, Margaret kept the farm. Donald was thirteen and took on the calves. Catherine learned to bring the kettle to the table without being asked. James asked once where his father had gone, and after that he did not.

 

Nothing was invented. Every fact is the same. But now we can see her children. We can hear what they did.         We're in the kitchen, not the encyclopedia.

 

What you'll do

 

Records to Real People is three short modules — about thirty minutes each, ninety minutes in all — with a workbook to write in as you go. You don't watch and nod. You write. By the end you'll have one finished paragraph: an ancestor brought to the page, in your own words.

 

Module 1 — Hearing the Difference Learn to hear what separates a paragraph that describes your ancestor from one that puts her on the page — first in examples, then in your own writing, read aloud.

 

Module 2 — Three Moves That Make a Person Real 

The three concrete moves, named and demonstrated: something specific they did, a place we can see, one particular only they would have. Then you practice each one.

 

Module 3 — Your Finished Paragraph

Put the three moves together and write the paragraph through. You finish with one true paragraph of your ancestor — and the skill to do it again for the next one.

What you walk away with

 

You leave with more than a lesson. You leave with a paragraph — one you wrote, one you'd be glad to show your family. And you leave knowing how you did it, so the next ancestor, and the one after that, come to the page the same way.

 

Who it's for

 

This is for the writer with a binder full of research and the quiet worry that none of it reads like a story. For the one who has thought, more than once, I don't even know where to start. Perhaps you.

 

It asks for nothing you don't already have. You don't need to be a writer. You don't need a finished manuscript, or a plan for the whole book, or even a clear idea of which story is yours. You need one ancestor and ninety minutes.

 

Start small. Start close. One paragraph is enough to begin.

Records to Real People is $27 — yours to keep, to work through at your own pace, 

and to return to whenever you sit down with a new ancestor.

You've carried these stories for years. This is ninety minutes toward setting one of them down.

The natural next step - When you've brought one paragraph to life, you may find you want to do it for a whole ancestor — a full profile, from research to page. That's where the Ancestor Profile Blueprint picks up. But that's later. For now, one paragraph. Start there.

GOT QUESTIONS?

FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS

Do I need to be a writer?

How long does it take?

Do I need writing already done to bring?

What will I have at the end?

Is this a subscription?

What if I want more after this?

Many writers go on to the Ancestor Profile Blueprint to write a full profile, and from there into Story Foundations. There's no need to decide that now.

You have spent years gathering these lives — the names, the dates, 

the places they came from and the places they went.

 

That work matters. It deserves to be read. This is where the reading begins. 

One ancestor. One paragraph. The first time your family leans in.

I'll meet you on the page.