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You sit down at your computer and open your word processor. A large, blank page glares at you-- daring you to blacken it with your keystrokes. Assessing the challenge, you enthusiastically begin typing. A single word, "Birth", appears on the screen. "So far, so good," you think to yourself. With a little less certainty, your fingers manage to type in a date, a place, and a few names. "Now what?" you ask yourself.

Sound familiar? If so, you're not alone. Many people want to write a personal history about themselves or a family member but they just become lost or overwhelmed by the size and complexity of the project. That's where Personal Historian comes in.



Buy Personal Historian >>

System Requirements for Personal Historian >>

Writing a Life History is broken into small manageable tasks.



Personal Historian breaks the history down
into small, manageable "topics"-- each with
its own title, date, written text, and even
pictures. Topics make it easy to work on your
history whenever you have the time—whether you
have 10 minutes or 10 hours. Personal Historian
automatically saves your work and makes it easy
to start where you left off.

The main screen displays all of the topics
in the project. If a topic has a date,
Personal Historian also displays the individual's
age on that date. On the main screen, it is
easy to sort and filter your topics. "Back",
"Forward", "Home", and "Favorites" buttons
behave much like your own web-browser, making
it easy to apply, remove, and reapply filters.

Gathering Information


There is no need to start from scratch
when you use Personal Historian as the
software can bring in events, stories,
pictures, and documents from a variety
of sources.

Personal Historian imports names, dates,
and even notes from your favorite
genealogical software and places them
into your timeline.Formats that can be
imported are from PAF5, Legacy, RootsMagic or a GEDCOM.

Personal Historian also imports your
word processor documents and photographs
so that your existing work can be
effortlessly incorporated into your histories.

LifeCapsules



The software also includes an extensive
library of "LifeCapsules" on a variety of
subjects. LifeCapsules contain timelines,
historical facts, cultural trivia, and
memory triggers that give color, context,
and interest to the history.

Write ideas as you think of them and organize them easily later on




With Personal Historian, you don't need
a "start from the beginning" approach to
writing a life history. You can choose
any topic from the main screen (or add
a new, blank topic), work as much as you
like on it, and save it for later.

The "Organizer" tool allows you to write
down ideas as they come to you. Using the
mouse or keyboard, you can easily move the
ideas into coherent groups and logical
orders until you have a working outline
for your topic.


Writing Your History


When you're ready to actually write about a topic, Personal Historian contains a built-in word processor that not only makes it easy to write, but makes it easy to write well. The built-in spell check and thesaurus are just the beginning. The readability check lets you know how readable and interesting your writing will be to others. It lets you know if your sentences are too long, too short-- if your words are too simple or too complex, and even if you're writing in the passive voice instead of the active voice.

Personal Historian Instructional Video


There is an instructional video for Personal Historian. It is a very large file (about 70 Meg). You need to have a high-speed Internet connection to view or download this file. It is self contained, you do not need any specific program to view the video. If you want to be able to view this video more than once or to stop and start it, while viewing, it is better to save it to your computer instead of running it online.

View or download the Personal Historian Instructional Video >>

Trial Version of Personal Historian

  • The trial version will run for 30 days from the first time you run it.
  • All features are functional with the exception of printing and exporting of data.
  • These projects will not be lost when you update to the full version by purchasing a license

    • Download Personal Historian to begin the free 30 day trial >>

    To change the trial version of Personal Historian into the full version, purchase the Personal Historian license and enter it into the trial version.

    System Requirements for Personal Historian

  • Windows 95, 98, NT, ME, 2000, XP, or 2003
  • 32 MB of RAM
  • 20 MB Hard Drive Space
  • Internet Explorer 4.0 or greater

    Personal Historian by Booth Associates, LLC
    Easy to install and use.
    For IBM and compatible computers with Windows 95 or higher

    $29.95 for the downloadable version

    Personal Historian is also available on CD. The CD version includes the video on using Personal Historian.

    Buy Personal Historian >>

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