Many people want to preserve more than their wealth. They also want to save – and pass on – their family history.
Some would love to be able to hear a grandfather or great-grandmother’s story, but it might be too late. Or they would like to pass on to future generations the stories of their lives.
Acknowledge Media has created a product to help carry out these desires. The company produces family legacy films that preserve the lives and thoughts of an older generation for younger family members and for generations to come.
“I’ve always been inspired by the human narrative,” says Rich Polt, who founded Acknowledge Media in June after 24 years in public relations, most recently for Foundation Source, an organization that helps people set up private foundations.
He and Eric Brotman, president and managing partner of Brotman Financial Group based in the Baltimore area, launched a collaboration Tuesday to provide legacy films to Brotman Financial Group clients. They already have created a legacy film of Brotman’s father and have several other people signed up.
The family legacy film is based on interviews with a family member, usually an older couple or an older, single man or woman, who wants to preserve the stories about how they grew up and the significant things that happened in their lives.
The interview is combined with up to 100 family pictures, plus other souvenirs or keepsakes from a lifetime of living, set to a musical background that tells the story of the family.
“I would give anything to hear my grandfather’s voice right now and to revive his wisdom,” Brotman says. “My daughter will never know my grandparents. Legacy family films are a way to change that.”
Brotman says to understand where a family came from, more than a family tree is necessary. More is needed than the facts; more than the whats, wheres and whens. A descendent wants to know the whys, he says.
The process for completing a legacy film involves having an initial conversation with Polt to determine the goal of the person being interviewed and to set out the parameters of the conversation.