Questions to ask your grandfather
Many grandfathers answer questions about facts and avoid questions about feelings. These start where he is comfortable — work, places, machines — and move, one visit at a time, toward the rest.
Every guide in this family works the same way: ask slowly, one question at a time, and write down the year you asked. The related guides — questions to ask your grandparents, how to record family stories, and the full guide index — cover the rest of the method.
Work and the early years
- What was your first real job, and what did a day of it actually look like?
- How much did you make, and what did it buy?
- What did you think you would do with your life at seventeen?
- What was the best boss you ever had, and the worst?
Places and machines
- What is the first car you remember driving — and what happened in it?
- What places did you go that nobody in the family has been back to?
- What can you fix that most people throw away now?
- What did you build, plant, or dig that is still standing?
The years nobody asks about
- What were the hardest years, and what got you up on the bad mornings?
- What was happening the year Dad/Mom was born that they never knew about?
- What did you and Grandma go through together that made you a team?
- What are you proud of that never got announced anywhere?
The advice he has been saving
- What do you know about money that took you too long to learn?
- What should I not do that you did?
- What do you say at funerals that you actually believe?
- If you had one story to leave this family, which one is it?
The one-rule method: talk while doing something side by side — a drive, a workshop, a game on TV. Grandfathers who go quiet across a table will talk for an hour over a hood of an engine. Record it (see how to record family stories) and date every answer.