Interviewing The Elderly

[LT04]

My grandmother-in-law (I don't think there is such a title but there should be its very descriptive) celebrates her 90th birthday this week. She and I have set up times for me to interview her about her life stories, acomplishments, and other various things that she recalls.

What I have found works the best is is giving her a context and letting her go to town filling in her piece of the pie as to what her role to that was.

I have been trying to find a list of major events of the past 100 years some where on the internet and I'm meeting with stiff resistance. I sure if I sat down and thought about it I could make one my self, but I don't see a need to reinvent the wheel if its already out there.

A lot of the events I have now are all depression, WWII, what it was like in the cold war era and so on. Well I think all these things are depressing didn't any good milestones of the human race occur and I just missed them. Any input you may have I would be very thankful for,

-LT04

[rosie321]

My grandmother-in-law (I don't think there is such a title but there should be its very descriptive) celebrates her 90th birthday this week. She and I have set up times for me to interview her about her life stories, acomplishments, and other various things that she recalls.

What I have found works the best is is giving her a context and letting her go to town filling in her piece of the pie as to what her role to that was.

I have been trying to find a list of major events of the past 100 years some where on the internet and I'm meeting with stiff resistance. I sure if I sat down and thought about it I could make one my self, but I don't see a need to reinvent the wheel if its already out there.

A lot of the events I have now are all depression, WWII, what it was like in the cold war era and so on. Well I think all these things are depressing didn't any good milestones of the human race occur and I just missed them. Any input you may have I would be very thankful for,

-LT04
[/b]

People are usually quicker to remember the depressing times more. Probably because it does such a great job shaping them.

Have you covered various family members and life events such as birth, marriages, reunions, parties and such things that happened over the years? What about friends? What stories can she tell about them?

Was she involved with a church or some organizations? What things did she do there? What kind of people did she meet?

Where has she lived? How have things changed? What might have been there that is no longer?

Don't know if you've talked about any of those yet..........

[LT04]

Yeah thanks for the advice, we have covered a lot of ground so far. I have also found that when I ask questions when her and her older sister are together they tend to remember things off each other. I got hours of tape to compile about her life stories, but I feel complied to get every tid-bit of knowledge out of her. We both seem to enjoy the time together, for me its b/c I'm a FHC worker and an amateur historian, for her she enjoys the time with some one to talk to. (she has been getting lonely).

What I was more specifically looking for were major events in history like DEC 7, 1941 Pearl Harbor, JUN 6, 1944 D-Day. Events that are well known on a national scale. I have already covered things like graduations, weddings, those kinds of things.

-LT04