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One of the most special things about photographs is that they freeze a moment in time. A split second that happened, that we will never get back. They can transport us to the past, and give us a glimpse into a time when we were decades younger, or even before we were born.

Photography plays an important role in preserving our family history and legacy. And keeping memories alive. Without photos, we might never really know what our parents, grandparents, or even great-grandparents looked like when they were younger. Or, what everyday life was like for people living 50, 100, or more years ago.

There’s an online community dedicated to sharing photos, scanned documents, articles, and personal anecdotes from the past. It has more than 1.5 million members, and an endless archive of beautiful and fascinating content that conjures up all sorts of warm, fuzzy, nostalgic feelings. We’ve hand-picked our personal favorites. Keep scrolling and enjoy a trip back in time, through a series of real-life images shared by members of The Way We Were. Don’t miss the interesting chat Bored Panda had with Clémence Scouten, a personal historian and founder of Memoirs And Me.

#1 Women Fighting For Healthcare And Abortion Rights In The 1960s

Image credits: Hooverpaul

#2 A Photograph Of A Little Boy Carrying A Newborn Lamb, In Scotland, 1932

Image credits: WorldHub995

#3 My Grandparents Wedding Day In 1968. She’s 15 & He Is 17

Image credits: cherrriiibomb

Clémence Scouten is a personal historian. She’s an expert when it comes to preserving family histories and legacies. As the founder of Memoirs And More, she has a wealth of experience in viewing, selecting, and organizing old photos and using them to tell a captivating story of how people once were—and are. Scouten is a firm believer in the power of photos.

“Photos are a great way to enter family history, like a window into history,” she told Bored Panda when we reached out to her. “We can see before we read. So even a small child can see pictures in an album or book and start to associate that with their family. Once that child gets older, they can read about the family and learn the details a photo can’t convey.”

#4 London Punks And An Interested Gran In Chelsea, 1982

Image credits: Pixxiprincess

#5 Halloween 1977: Me As C-3po, My Sister As R2-D2. We Won Our Elementary School Costume Contest!

Image credits: makinghomemadejam

#6 In 1973, Masahisa Fukase Photographed His Wife, Yōko Wanibe, Leaving For Work Each Day From Their Apartment Window In Tokyo

Image credits: Lepke2011

Scouten says that while it’s important to preserve family history, not everyone wants to. And that’s okay. “There’s a lot of trauma some people want to leave behind, and we never want to force people to talk about that or be confronted with it,” she explained.

Old family photographs can be particularly triggering. Looking at old photos reminds us of who we (and others) once were. “Someone might realize how very young they had been when they experienced a transformative event,” notes Psychology Today. “They might suddenly understand how vulnerable and innocent they had been.”

These reminders could trigger positive or negative emotions. They could change someone’s understanding of how their past played a part in who they are today. They could increase or decrease feelings of anger, guilt, or resentment. Photos—and the feelings associated with viewing them—could even prompt us to forgive. Or sometimes, fall in love all over again.

#7 My Grandmother As A Child, Late 30s-Early 40s, Toronto

Image credits: AntiqueCattle

#8 I Found These Photos While Thrifting And Reunited Them With Family

Image credits: LittleGoldenBearx

#9 My Grandpa With A Friend Of His In 1950, When He Was 21

Image credits: asocial_butterfrei

“There are many benefits to preserving our family history and knowing about other family members’ successes and failures,” Scouten told Bored Panda. “It helps us understand we are part of a structure (love it or hate it!) and that what we experience was probably experienced by someone relatively close to us. It is literally good for us.”

Experts agree that looking at certain old photographs can be good for our mental health. According to Psychology Today, viewing images “associated with specific positive autobiographical memories increased positive mood and helped repair negative mood induced by a sad film clip.”

#10 My Grandma And Grandpa, 1961

Image credits: colieoly

#11 My Grandfather In New Orleans, Late 50’s

Image credits: Amodernhousehusband

#12 My Mom As A Teenager With A Moose Calf In Alaska, 1952

Image credits: Area_49

Scouten says we can get a lot of information from an old photo. “For people who enjoy research, photos give us many clues to when the photo was taken. Clothing fashions and background info (bulidings, cars, etc.) can help place the photo in a timeframe and a place,” revealed Scouten.

“The material the original photo was made out of tells us when it was printed (from metal plates in the 1800s to “calotypes” which are paper negatives to glass pates in the mid-1880s and so on).”

#13 My Dad And His Best Friend. We Think The Picture Was Taken In 1972

Image credits: Present-Arm-6023

#14 My Grandparents Wedding Day, Circa 1964, Los Angeles Ca (1st& 2nd Photo Great-Grandfather And Grandma, 3rd Photo Grandma And Grandpa)

Image credits: Glum_Feed_7780

#15 Child In Her Pedal Car, Ca. 1922

Image credits: Hooverpaul

Scouten says while she loves photographs, there are many other things that reveal how we were once upon a time. “My favorite is correspondence and diaries,” she told Bored Panda. “People tell their stories, and the reader can learn not just what was going on but how the writer FELT about it.”

She explains that while photos, especially formal portraits, capture how a person wants to look, correspondence or diaries often offer a much more intimate window into the subject’s personality.

“In those old photos, no one smiles! But letters/diaries usually tell what’s really going on as well as the mundane details of everyday life: chores, school, travel, work, and family, which you can’t get from a photo.”

#16 My Grandpa Trying To Read The Newspaper With A Kitten Sitting On His Shoulder. Early 1980s

Image credits: rhit06

#17 Together Since 1978. Then And Now

Image credits: IndyScent

#18 A Sweet Photo Of A Brother And Sister. Charlottesville, Va, C. 1916

Image credits: WorldHub995

Old photos can also help jog our memory. Sometimes, we don’t remember things exactly as they were. But, a photograph can correct the inaccurate details of how a person, animal, place, or object looked or even how an incident felt. If you’ve ever looked at a photograph and felt instantly transported back to that moment, you know exactly what we mean.

#19 Kodachrome Slides From A Christmas Diner Party In The 1950s. It Appears The Whole Family Was There

Image credits: Electrical-Aspect-13

#20 My Teenage Mom In The 70s With Her First Horse, One She Paid For By Working Underage At A Movie Theater

Image credits: Pugpickle

#21 A Picture Of 3 Sisters Taken Almost 100 Years Ago

Image credits: jocke75

Scouten says working on your family history is bound to bring back many memories of people and times past, adding that this is something that should be embraced. She suggests taking the opportunity to reach out to a relative you haven’t spoken to in a while to reminisce about a shared experience in your family history.

The expert says many of her clients are surprised by how differently they and someone else remember the same event. And how a conversation can trigger even more memories.