Historians discuss this exact issue a lot! I study early American history (mostly 18th century, but I range a bit before and after that), and those documents can be tricky enough for those of us who do know how to read and write cursive. For generations who come after us, it might be like learning a second language, and I wonder how many will be willing to do it.
My own handwriting is an increasingly illegible blend of cursive and printing like you described, but at least I can read a wide variety of script.
Definitely! We are doing research on H’s ancestors. I found a copy of a will from the 1790s. It is extremely difficult to read even if you can read cursive and English. And the one from 1711 in Scotland? I can only hope at least part of that is Gaelic! I can make out names and a few words. But even reading my grandfather’s letter in the 1940s is cool. It’s so formal sounding, especially strange since he grew up in a rural tiny town in PA to Eastern European immigrants and he never finished high school.
P.S. when I get more time, I’d love to PM you about H’s relative to see if you have any idea about how to track down his arrival here or his burial site. He was at the Treaty of Lancaster and I’ve also found correspondence between him and George Washington about the sale of land. From what I’ve gathered and research, I think I found the property that didn’t sell and my guess is he is buried there. Unfortunately most of it is now under a man made lake. But it is still just a guess.
Off topic but related…I hear this a lot from my friends in IT. They find their younger employees are great at programming, design at “the top” of the solution but don’t have an appreciation for the foundation. In some cases can’t do the foundational work because they’ve never had to do it. Drives him crazy because he gets pulled in to fix things when his subordinates couldn’t identify lower level problems (that cause higher level problems),
My daughter was big on writing (sorry - actually: typing up) her own, elaborate study guides, religiously. In fact, they were popular among friends.
The interesting thing was, before some big exam, I had seen her notes and commented on her now still needing to spend time on the actual “studying” part.
Her response was, that usually the process of actively engaging with the material, having to locate/research/identify all that key information, and organizing/formulating it into “her” guides, boosted her retention. Sure, she might briefly look over a few bullets one more time - but essentially she was “done”.
Sure, feel free to PM me! I think I’d need a bit more information, and these things are not always easy to track down, but maybe I can give you some ideas. (Off-topic, but burials for elites – sounds like he could have been elite if he was corresponding with George Washington about property – could take place either on their private property or at their churches, so if you have any information about which church he belonged to, that could help.)
Your daughter is absolutely right – it’s the process. My son makes (online) flash-card review games for himself and his friends in his science classes. I think he benefits more than his friends do, because studying with the digital flash cards is a much more passive process than actually creating them. Recently, I’ve begun to allow my students to bring in a double-sided page of notes for their exams. The exams have improved (predictably) under the new policy – but I think it’s only partly because they have the notes available to them. I think the process is more important. Why? Students have to turn in their notes, so I see what they did. Some have notes that look copied-and-pasted from either Wikipedia or ChatGPT or something – those exams tend to be pretty mediocre. But the students who either handwrite their notes, or at least type up notes that clearly show their own work do better. It’s the process of active learning that makes the difference.
My kids know how to read cursive. My oldest was taught cursive in private school in 3rd and 4th grade. My youngest left the private school before those years and wasn’t taught how to read or write cursive in school. My oldest says they never write in cursive and my youngest writes in it when she wants to do something artistic, but it’s not her usual handwriting. She taught herself and there are some letters that I don’t think are quite how I would do them, but it’s legible.
OT, but there’s a Reddit subreddit r/Cursive dedicated to cursive handwriting. Lot of requests for interpretation of old documents and some folks showing off their own cursive but I think more of that is in the r/PenmanshipPorn.
