What is Holy Cats? Where am I? Who are you? Why am I here? Holy Cats is my blog. I collect antique diaries, journals and letters and have begun to transcribe them into a somewhat more readable form. I also throw in a random old photograph from time to time to break up the monontony.
Where am I? You are at Holy Cats.
Who are you? I'm Melanie, writer and obsessive collector of old things.
Why am I here? I think you need to lie down. Here's a pillow.
Where do you find all this stuff? One word--eBay. Well, two or three more words...antique stores and estate sales but mostly eBay. You'd be surprised at how much history is for up for sale.
What's the point? Well, it's history. I sort of feel that in some small way I'm contributing to the greater good by keeping a record of these rare first-hand accounts. These people were eye witnesses to history. That's my well thought out intelligent answer. Now here's the other one. I just like old stuff and when I found out other people like it as much as me, I decided to share it.
Why isn't the 1904 Diary in chronological order? Because I initially intended only to post a few pages on the Something Awful thread but it soon turned into something much bigger. I plan to eventually scan and transcribe the entire 365 page diary and put it in chronological order.
The diaries/letters are hard to read. Can you make them bigger or easier to read? There's a translation underneath each scan. Or there should be. If there isn't, let me know. And sorry, no, I cannot make them easier to read. Unless you've got a spare Delorean and flux capacitor I can borrow.
Can I submit something for you to transcribe and post? I know I might regret this later on, but sure. Email's at the bottom of the page.
What does "Holy Cats" mean? Heck if I know. But apparently it was the "Holy crap!" of its time. My guess would be (aided by Google) that it's a nicer less blasphemous way of saying "Holy Christ!" when you stubbed your toe. Kind of like "Gosh darn it!".
Are cats actually holy? If you own a cat I think you know the answer to that.
