I'm working in reverse from you. Scanned most of our family's old photos back in 2001, for my parent's 50th wedding anniversary. Most of them from about 1920 and up, but a few from earlier--childhood picture of my grandmother, and one from my grandfather, had to be about 1910 or so. It was a LOT of work--I spent the better part of two months doing almost nothing but scanning pictures every single night. But it was SO worth it--made CDs for the rest of the family (which made really nice, CHEAP Christmas presents that year!) and it's so easy now to look through all those old pictures over and over again.
NOW, I have about 300+ of my grandfather's old slides from 1940ish-1950 when he lived and worked in Panama and in the Azores--I've been putting it off, but I gotta get started soon. I really want the finished product, so I'm just gonna have to buckle down and start scanning.