Transcript The Box Project - Computer Science House

The Box Project
By Ethan Feldman
Modern American History
Ms. Edwards
The Box’s Documents
• Out of all the documents in the Box, most
of them were all very helpful, because each
of them, when linked with each other,
helped me piece together a chronological
series of events in the life in times of the
Falat family. Even though they were not
always related to one another, each of them
had a little tiny bit of information that
helped me piece together the history of the
Falat Family.
Examples of Documents
• Like I said before, there were many documents in the box that
were very helpful, here are some examples:
• From certain paycheck documents I learned that Mary and
Nicholas Malinowski both worked at the Plastic Wire & Cable
Corp., in Jewett City, Conn.
• The birth and death dates of all the family members, but in
many cases there were more than one certificate or
documentation of their birth or death, and each document
stated different facts other than the birth or death of that
specific person. Usually they would state who their parents
were, talk about their sons or daughters if any, as well as their
husband or wife, and also would talk about in many cases their
brief life story, where/when they were born/died, when and
where they moved to if they moved to America, and other little
tidbits and facts about their life, and each different certificate
or documentation of this stated different things.
Examples (continued)
• All of the Jewett City Water Company checks. Originally, I didn’t
think these would be that important because I thought they were just a
bunch of random documents, but after reading through all of the
documents in the box, they are actually extremely important. It shows
the dates which John and Victoria Falat used the water services, from
January 1st 1946, until December 31st 1953. These dates by
themselves don’t mean much, but when you take into account other
documents, and link them together, their importance is striking. For
one, John Falat died on July 22 1952, yet Victoria still used the water
services after his death and the checks and envelopes still said the
name John Falat on them, even though he was deceased. Also, there is
a document showing that John Falat became a full fledged American
citizen in 1938, very close to the time when they started paying for the
water service. Also, there is another document showing that they got a
deed from the Ashland Corporation in 1935, and another document
shows auctions for houses from the same corporation in the same year.
Which means they are obviously using the water service for their
house.
Examples (continued)
• The certificates of labor for John Falat show that he has
been working in America since at least 1917 as a factory
worker, but didn’t get his actual American citizenship
until 1938. This is one of the only examples that shows
that he lived in America prior to his citizenship, because
if it weren’t for these documents, plus a few others, I
would have thought he came over to America in 1938,
which is clearly not the case, and just plain untrue.
• Another document that is extremely important is one of
John Falats death documents, which shows both his
birth and death, and linked with other documents helps
glue together when he came over from Poland to
America, when he got his citizenship, and reveals the
maiden name of Victoria Falat, which is Zaklukiewiez.
Why I Listed Those Examples
• I listed those examples to get into the main reason for
my presentation. The presentation was supposed to be
either about what document(s) was most helpful in
writing your paper, or what was least helpful in
writing your paper. I have decided to go with the latter
of the two, because honestly, there are a lot of very
important documents, and I thought that no document
was more important than any other, because they all
helped because all of them linked within each other to
piece together the family history of the Falats.
• But, out of all the documents in the box, I must say,
the one(s) that helped me the least, to nothing at all,
were the Polish letters/documents.
Why Did the Polish
Letters/Documents Not Help?
• The Polish letters/documents did not help my
paper much, if any, at all.
• First of all, because of the language barrier, they
were basically useless to me.
• Second of all, if it hadn’t been for Ms. Edwards’
list of letters, the ones that said dates and who
them were from and who they were to, I
wouldn’t have gotten anything of out them.
• Third of all, what I did get out of them was
minimal, and really didn’t help or not help my
paper in any way, shape, or form.
What Did I Get Out of the Polish
Letters/Documents?
• Like I said before, what I got out of them was minimal, but I did get
something out of them at least. What I did get out of them was
minimal, and it was only because of Ms. Edwards’ list. I got out of her
list a cool thing about immigration, about how when families
immigrate over to America they change their last names. The example
was that the Malinowski family used to be the Malinowska family
before they moved over to America. It is a cool little tidbit about
immigration and I can relate to it because my grandfather changed his
last name when he immigrated to America from Europe, but didn’t
really help me piece together the Falat family history at all.
• Also I did see that the Falat family was a lot bigger than the other
documents make it out to be, but it is such a small and insignificant
piece of the puzzle that it really doesn’t matter at all.
• Also I did learn about Stanislaw Kawa from Ms. Edwards’ list, but it
really doesn’t matter because there are a few other documents about
him that give me more information that the polish letters/documents
do, so I really have no need, if any for it.
Conclusion
• Even though the Polish letters/documents didn’t help me
much, if any, at all, I still got a little bit of information
from them, although the amount that I got out of them
was far less than any of the other documents or letters in
the box. They still did help me along with my paper,
although their importance and what I got out of them
was pretty insignificant.
• I learned from doing this project a lot about being an
actual historian, and that not every single document in a
series is always very helpful, but in doing this has made
me appreciate history more, because now I know the
hard work and the time that goes into it, and that this is a
true history, because most everyday folk don’t keep
documents like these.
The End
Thanks For Listening