Old people I knew/met

[geneius]

This is an interesting thread.

My recollections are 2 gt Aunts, both retired spinster head teachers, one b 1891-1973 retired to a cottage overlooking Coniston, she used to tell us ( late bro & I) about the day Donald Campbell tested then flipped Bluebird
The other sister 1896 - 1982 taught me genealogy, graveyard visits, tea with the Vicar, then looking at the Parish records. One of the original Girl Guide Leaders setting up a Company on the Wirral which is still in existence, then a permanent centre in Lancashire She was a keen photographer all her life, and I now have her photo's. That is another story. Both ladies who made and got the most out of life. As does their last remaining niece.

These 2 gt Aunts and the rest of the siblings did & will have remembered their grandmother ( my 2 x gt) b 1825 as she lived with them when they were small children

At the time , when they regaled us with memories it was here they go again, but now I really appreciate what I learnt.

I had a gr grandfather b 1876 -1958, small guy always wore a flat cap, sometimes lived with Gran, or either of her 3 sisters doors away. He bred Minorca Cocks / hens & pullets, kept at my Gran's. Was instrumental in setting up the 'club' and winning prizes, of which I have one in the loft! When we used to visit form the Midlands ( usually Eater & Xmas) he always gave us 2/6d each which was a lot of pennies in those days.

[janbooth]

My maternal grandfather was born in February 1881 and I was very close to both him and my maternal grandmother, who was born in November 1885, and I remember them vividly and with great affection. Grandad bred racing pigeons, his loft was at the bottom of their garden, and I also remember him growing rows of dahlias and chrysanthemums - there were probably vegetables as well, but they don't stand out in my memory like the rows of dahlias & chrysanths. His youngest son, my uncle Jack, carried on breeding and racing pigeons until he himself died. Fond, fond memories of past times.

Janet

[Sue Mackay]

Three of my grandparents, born in the 1870s, lived with us when I was a child and I have vivid memories of all of them. My great aunt died just short of her 100th birthday, and I remember visiting her in a nursing home with my father in 1973 shortly before she died. At the time I was working as an English language teacher in Sweden and was home on leave. On learning what I did, Aunt Alice exclaimed: "Sweden!!! Well I suppose it's all right there dear. After all, their king married a Connaught!"

I am also extremely lucky to have a written account, from the 1970s, written by a 95 year old cousin who had vivid memories of her grandmother and wrote them down. Thus I have wonderful details of my own 3-great grandmother who emigrated from Wiltshire to the Cape in 1820. This is one reason why I have written down all my memories of my grandparents and what I remember them saying about their parents, no matter how trivial.

[daleaway]

Until I was 16, I stayed almost every weekend with my maternal grandparents and maternal great grandmother. DOB, 1888, 1897 and 1870 respectively, and born in Dartford, Bournemouth and Cawsand.

Great granny enjoyed cooking, and taught me how to make seedy cake, Cornish pasties and much else besides. She had a very robust sense of humour - doubtless due to the fact that she grew up with numerous older brothers - and shared sundry saucy sayings and folk wisdoms, some too broad to be repeated here. Sometimes we have a narrow idea of what "Victorian" means!

And the Dartford grandfather taught me how to say "Forty farsand fevvers on a frush's froat" as though to the manner born. And how to look after chickens, and how to fish.

As for the Bournemouth grandmother, she taught me patience and tolerance. Living with the huge personalities of the other two, she had to draw on great reserves of it, no doubt.

[pwholt]

My paternal grandfather was born in 1867 and so, like his birthplace, Canada, he celebrates 150 years this year. He died in 1958 aged 91. He worked as a baker into his 80s, doing summer relief. As a result of an illness as a child, he was stone deaf but he could play the piano. He told my dad that he used to ride a penny farthing bicycle. pwholt