50 Questions to Ask Your Grandparents Before It's Too Late

My grandfather spent the war fixing radios on a base he wasn't allowed to name. I know that one sentence and almost nothing else, because by the time I got curious enough to ask, he was gone. That's the thing about your grandparents' stories. They feel permanent right up until the day they aren't.

So ask now. You don't have to do it all in one sitting, and you definitely don't have to fire off all fifty of these like an interrogation. Pick a few, get them talking, write down what they say, and come back another day. Here are the questions, grouped so you can dip in wherever feels natural.

Childhood and the early years

1. Where were you born, and what was the house like?
2. What's the earliest thing you can remember?
3. What did your parents do? What were they like?
4. Did you have brothers or sisters, and did you get along?
5. What did you do for fun before TV ran your evenings?
6. What was school actually like?
7. Who was your best friend, and whatever happened to them?
8. What jobs or chores were yours at home?
9. What's a smell or a sound that drops you straight back into being a kid?
10. Did you ever get in real trouble? What for?

Family and where we come from

1. What do you know about where our family originally came from?
2. Were there traditions in your house that I've never heard about?
3. Who mattered most to you growing up?
4. What do you know about your own grandparents?
5. Is there an object in the family that has a story behind it?
6. What language or dialect was spoken at home?
7. What did your parents drum into you that stuck?

Love and marriage

1. How did you and Grandma/Grandpa actually meet?
2. What did you think of them at first? Honestly.
3. What did you do on your first date?
4. When did you know?
5. What was the wedding day like?
6. After all these years, what do you think keeps two people together?
7. What's a small memory from the early days you still think about?

Work and ambition

1. What was your first job, and what did it pay?
2. What did you want to be when you were young?
3. What work are you proudest of?
4. Who taught you the most about doing it well?
5. What's the worst job you ever had?
6. Did your working life turn out how you pictured it?

The history they actually lived

1. What big events do you remember most clearly?
2. What changed the most in the world over your lifetime?
3. What invention amazed you when it first arrived?
4. What was the hardest stretch your generation went through?
5. How did people around you get through it?

Looking back

1. What are you proudest of?
2. What's the best decision you ever made?
3. Is there one you'd take back?
4. What's something life taught you the hard way?
5. What would you tell your 20-year-old self?
6. What are you most thankful for?
7. How do you hope people remember you?

Just for the fun of it

1. What music did you love when you were young?
2. What's a meal from childhood we could still try to make?
3. What's the most beautiful place you've ever been?
4. What still makes you laugh every time?
5. What's a story about me or my parent you love telling?
6. If you could live one ordinary day over again, which would it be?
7. What's something you've never told anyone in the family?

Keep the answers somewhere they won't get lost

Asking is only half of it. The other half is not losing what they tell you, which is exactly what happened to me. As they talk, jot the stories down and pair each one with a rough date and an old photo if you have it. Laid out in order, a pile of scattered memories turns into something that actually reads like a life. From there you can print it as a keepsake or share it with the rest of the family.

If you want an easy place to put it all, you can start their life story for free. And if you're nervous about the conversation itself, here's how to interview the people you love without it feeling stiff.