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AFFLILIATIONS:
Association of Personal Historians (USA), Oral History Association (USA), International Biographical Center (UK), The PEN Club (Japan). Legacy Memoirs is an imprint of Breakthrough Seminars, Inc. (Japan)
Updated March 31, 2000
Imagine a Row on Your Bookshelf,
Filled with the Memoirs of Your Relatives
That was the vision I had in the 1980s, when I first realized that my future would be publishing life stories and oral histories. Little did I know it would take a decade to gather the skills needed to realize that vision.
BY THOMAS AINLAY JR., PUBLISHER
My father died at the age of 56, before I had an opportunity to record his personal history. There were all the usual excuses.
� I lived far from his home.
� I was busy.
� Having written a novel and a travel guide, I knew it
could easily take years to finish a full length book.
My grandfather had left us a mimeographed family genealogy compiled in 1954, so we had more knowledge of our lineage than a lot of families. But gathering up and going through old photos, spending hours conducting interviews and transcribing tapes, always seemed like more work than I had time for.
It occurred to me that I might be able to pay someone else to do all that hard work. I knew ghostwriters who would be happy to write a complete autobiography for about ten thousand dollars. That would get me a finished manuscript. But then who would publish it?
I had helped some poets self-publish their work in the 1970s and I knew exactly how difficult it was to create high-quality books in small quantity. Most printing companies would not discuss a project of fewer than 200 copies. I would only need about two dozen hard-cover books for close friends and family members.
Time slips through our fingers so quickly. My father was gone before I ever started the project. When my brother and sister and I finally scattered his ashes in 1987, I once again had the notion of writing his life story as a tribute to be handed down to our own children. But the task seemed even more daunting without him to interview. The only shelf his book would appear on would be that vast "good idea" rack where so many wonderful opportunities are lost, unless....
Legacy Memoirs
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