How the site began
In 2008, Catherine “Kate” Sterling assembled a public record from the family papers and materials available after Elizabeth’s death and Arthur’s disappearance.
2008 · Kate’s actions
Kate, born in 1955 and Arthur and Elizabeth’s only daughter, initiated the project. An architect with a career of her own, she arranged the available record with unnamed technical help and set out to make the family’s intellectual and household legacy readable.
The available materials
Her starting point included family papers, available memories, photographs, books, correspondence, notebooks, and descriptions of the household. The record included Arthur’s disappearance on 14 March 1991 and Elizabeth’s death around 1984 without supplying an explanation or a complete inventory.
The first version
The first pages comprised a Foundation statement, biographical records, a shared chronology, and descriptions of the papers and household materials. They established the family record and the purpose of a gradual public catalogue.
Later additions
Later catalogue entries, including the three provisional Elizabeth web records, were added or refined as materials could be described. They remain marked as later work and provisional where appropriate. See the catalogue for the current record.