Hello! I'll be expanding what I offer here in the future, but for now this is where you can come to listen to me read out of old diaries I've found on eBay. I have a lovely collection I look forward to sharing with you.

When I was in school, I remember driving past very old graveyards in my school bus. Some only consisted of a few worn out stones by the road. I used to wonder who these people were, and if anybody knew they were there. Did anybody know their names or their stories? These people who had lives so distant from ours. I didn't like the idea that they were simply forgotten, after everything they had experienced.

Last year I discovered that people were selling old diaries on eBay, and I was intrigued. The first one I bought was by a woman in Kentucky in 1929, and I grew attached to her as I read her words, and eventually learned her name and even saw her face. I started buying more diaries, and peeking into the lives of these people who had died decades ago, these people who had lived lives so different from mine - and yet so similar. I really want to bring them back to life in a way, to make sure they are remembered just a little while longer.

But here's where it gets more interesting - as I began to piece things together, learning names and details about the authors' lives, I thought "Wait. Perhaps they still have some living relatives who would want these diaries." They weren't sold to me by family members. In fact, information on where they came from is quite slim, some being last purchased over 30 years ago. So this has become my mission, and with your help - researching and financial support - I think we can facilitate some reunions. I hope you'll join us!

For now, this page will be mainly The Lost Diary Project, but eventually you'll probably see art, or photography, or things like that here as well. :-)

Marcus Marquard 1931 Travel Diary