General Chat

Granny was born in 1931 and so was old enough to remember the war and other than vitamin B injections for pernicious anemia she doesn’t take any tablets. Granny worked as nurse pre NHS and later a health visitor. Her husband was in the army and so she has lived in different places all over the world. Mr Owl and I have decided that we will think of a series of questions to pose to her which will record so we have a first hand account of different things that we can pass onto future generations.

Can anyone think of what questions we might ask her to find out the information we want as succinctly as possible so we don’t sound drawn out.

Just start her talking!

That might be easier than asking specific questions

Be sure to record what she says, even video-ing on your phone if you can.

You'll find that she just might well wander off topic, but that might well lead to you learning something unexpected or that you had not thought of.

general questions to start her talking might be "When did you go to school, and what was it like?"

You might want to know how she trained as a nurse as the NHS came in in 1947, and she would only have been 16 that year. School leaving age was 14 from secondary school and 16 from grammar school, so how did she train.

My brother was born in 1929, now dead so I can't ask him questions. I am much younger than him, and his schooling, training and upbringing were quite a bit different from mine, but he left school at 14 and trained as a draughtsman ........... it took more than 7 years to do that, including lots of night school. He married at 21 and was still doing some night school courses then.

I have a cousin who was born in 1935, and became a nurse, leaving grammar school at 16 in 1951 (you had to go to school longer if you went to grammar school). She trained at one of the local hospitals and was registered as a nurse in 1957

You may want to ask her how far back she can remember being a child. Does she remember playing with cousins etc or indeed what were her grandparents like on both sides and what jobs they did. Just so that if you are doing a family tree on either side, you will have some good info to work on.


Buy a good book and start recording the different sides of the family. Remember you have 2 parents and 2 grandparents on either side which already will give you loads of rellies.

I made an index of one side of my family and recorded jobs. was hugely interesting as many on that particular side were Tailors or painters and I never knew til I looked into that a bit deeper. Amazing what you will discover.

Let us know when you have finished how you got on.

Florence in the hebrides

Maybe questions of her and her husbands' military experiences/exploits...
school life/talents.

I wish that I had been more inquisitive of my own grand parents' families, great aunts/uncles etc that I never met until their last few days...

any gossip or scandal,? might bring a skeleton or two out of the cupboard?

I would just ask her to start at whatever she remembers the earliest.

Granny is the same age as my Mum, who also trained as a nurse. Sylvia is correct the NHS came in 1947, my Mum was 21 when she started her training.

My Gran was a Nurse too
When she married in 1908
She had to leave been a Nurse Because she got married :-D :-D

Thank you all for your suggestions. Granny is a fascinating person and we don’t want to lose any of the information she can give us. Some of her relatives signed the temperance movement and one of her uncles a minister avoided a speeding fine whilst wearing his collar in dock.

You may want to ask her about life abroad.
How did they travel, what sort of accommodation did they have?
Did they employ local help?
Any special memories of celebrations?

My husband's family remembered ceremonies aboard ship, when they crossed the equator on their way to a foreign posting.

Back in UK, ask about who else was there at family events. I gained information and names about mum's cousins from Herefordshire visiting them in Wales in this way.

What about clothes...were they homemade?
Many mums sewed or knitted for their children. I even had knitted long socks for winter and gloves also knitted on 4 needles.

I agree that these questions might merge as part of a recall of events. eg when thinking of a wedding, a prompt of "Who else was there?"
"What did you wear that day? " might bring better response rather than questions in isolation.

So many things have changed in my lifetime. I remember most, but the detail would be lost to later generations if it isn't recorded somewhere.

LOL smart ploy there!!

dog collar in the dock!

Ask her about how the NHS changed things and what dentistry was like :-D

My grandparents were member of the Temperance Society and grandad was a Baptist Minister. He always wore his collar and his integrity never questioned.

Florence in the hebrides

Even ask about the food they ate, may sound silly but eating habits have changed add into that the rationing in and after the war.

Uncle was speeding at 50mph in a 30mph zone. The judge however said the police claim they caught you speeding at 40mph is this correct. Some would say it was splitting hairs as speeding is speeding however he said no your honour with my hand on the bible I can categorically say I was not speeding at 40mph.

Granny’s father despite never touching a drop of alcohol always kept a bottle of whiskey in the house to offer to guests.

My Mother (born 1909) signed the pledge and never knowingly touched a drop of alcohol. My father didn't sign the pledge (they were both Baptists), but he enjoyed an occasional sherry or whisky.

Aged BIL was born on this day 1928 in Stepney.

Up until a couple of years ago he could recall every family living in his street. The 1939 register confirmed the details.

My friends would sit and listen to him telling stories from his childhood through to the 1950s. Totally enthralled listening to the hardships he endured and how he came to accept leaving his grammar school (scholarship award) to start work as the family needed in extra income.

You cannot beat personal experiences and the emotion expressed in the recollections which follow on one after the other.

Tawney

I am 2 years older than your granny, also started nurse training before the NHS with possibly similar experiences (I stayed with Midwifery not HV) I am still in touch with several of my "set" who started with me.

I do not talk about those times much unless someone "starts me off" so I suggest you just get her going!!! :-)

My Mother-in-law was born in 1911, and my brother-in-law recorded, in total, about 3 hours of her talking.

She talked, with occasional promptings.

However, she did get information wrong, confusing some of the family relationships, so do some research so that you can try and clarify if she is at odds with what you know.

My father said he never had a birthday party (1920's/1930's) - it is little things like that that are fascinating.

I was born in 1937 and remember being an evacuee in sept 1939

I was sent to the local school for two weeks so I could be evacuated with my elder brother and sister from south east London to Tunbridge wells in Kent

I remember sitting on the lap of a lady in the train and have been told she was the headmasters secretary
I had a wonderful billet with a young couple and I absolutely loved them to bits and we stayed in touch and I went on holidays with them after the war until they passed and with their daughter who passed last year


So any memories your granny has is history

My family are very interested in my memories of WW2 and living in London in the blitz and the bombings and spending nights in the local air raid shelter

I was in Kent but was sent back to London in about 1944 for a few months till I was re evacuated to Birmingham

I was home when charlton station was bombed and I was in the outside loo when the bomb hit and the door blew off

Soo am sure auntie wil have memories if you let her talk

Once I start reminiscing the memories flood back

Granny lived in Barton and so remembers seeing the bombing just over the water. Granny and her younger sister were never evacuated and their father was in the home guard.