What were your parents like?

Why this question works

It reaches back a full generation further than you could ever get on your own. Your grandparent is likely the last person who can tell you how your great-grandmother laughed, what your great-grandfather did with his hands when he was thinking, and what the two of them were like together. One good answer here adds decades to what your family knows about itself.

It also helps you understand your grandparent. People are shaped by the parents they had, sometimes by copying them and sometimes by choosing a different way. When your grandpa describes a father who never wasted a word, his own quiet steadiness starts to make sense. Asking for a few words about each parent keeps it simple, and a few words nearly always turn into a story.

How to ask it

A photograph helps. If there is a picture of the great-grandparents anywhere in the house, bring it to the table and ask your grandparent to tell you who you are looking at. Ask about one parent at a time, so each of them gets a full turn.

Keep your tone warm and unhurried. This is a question about people your grandparent loved, and the feelings may be mixed, as they are in every family. You are not asking for a verdict, only a portrait. If a memory is tender, let it be, and follow where they want to go. A simple "tell me more about her" is usually all the encouragement that is needed.

Other ways to word it

• How would you describe your mother in three words? And your father?
• What did your parents do all day when you were small?
• Which of your parents are you more like?
• What is a saying your mother or father repeated all the time?

Follow-up ideas

• What did your father do for work, and what did your mother's days look like?
• What made each of them laugh?
• What were they strict about, and what did they let slide?
• How did they show they loved you?
• What did their voices sound like?
• What is one thing each of them taught you to do?
• Do you know how the two of them met?

An example answer

This is an invented example, written to show the kind of detail to listen for. Your grandpa’s answer will be his own.

"My father was quiet, fair and stubborn. He was a machinist, and he could look at an engine and tell you what was wrong by the sound. He did not say much, but if he put his hand on your shoulder you knew you had done well. He whistled when he was content, always the same four notes."

"My mother was the opposite. Quick, funny and never still. She sang while she cooked and talked to everyone on the street. She kept a jar of buttons on the windowsill and could find a match for anything. When I think of the two of them, I see him reading the paper and her reading it over his shoulder, telling him what she thought of the news."

What to write down

Record both great-grandparents' full names, including your great-grandmother's maiden name, and where each of them came from. Write down the few words your grandparent chose for each parent before anything else, then the stories that followed. Capture a saying, a habit and what each of them did for work. If there is a photograph, write the names and the year on the back in pencil.

In the Tell Me Your Story journals for grandparents, a question like this one sits in the first chapter, and the family tree pages give those great-grandparents a place by name. Written in your grandparent's own hand, the portrait stays with the family.

See the Tell Me Your Story, Grandpa journal or the Tell Me Your Story, Grandma journal. For more ideas, read questions to ask your grandparents or browse childhood questions.