[Commons-l] Photographs by our grand-parents

[Rama Rama]

Greetings,

I am under the impression that there are plenty of photographs taken
by elderly people which are presently sleeping in drawers.

I came to realise the matter while searching for photographs of ships
of the 1930s and 1960s, and noticed that a significant number of
website do feature such images, credited to individuals (typically
sailors from these ships).

These images are usually
* of fairly good quality
* represent things of which we cannot make photographs ourselves

The people who made the photographs are usually
* difficult to reach
* not educated in Free software
* probably by default relatively well-disposed towards us  :
** they like to share their knowledge of the subject
** they do not expect to become rich from these photos
(these two points of infered from the publication of the images on websites).

I would like to ask
1) Whether anyone has experience in talking family members or friends into
 publishing such images
2) Whether someone has experience in contacting unknown people, in the
perspective of crafting an example message which would be concise,
clear and reasonably extensive on the matter of Free licences.