What were your grandparents like?

I loved all four, deeply. I liked three quite well, one was a bit prickly. My family were not local to our London Grandparents. I helped through their illnesses whilst caring for our babies.

We went on lovely holidays with our London Grandparents. We cooked, played in the garden and fields, went swimming with our near Grandparents.

We're all of the same Church, when available our Grandparents helped in our religion lessons. I happily remember memory games and singing.

I only ever remember one Grandparent, my mum’s mum. I was the youngest of her 8 grandchildren, 3 lived in Australia, but the rest of us were always at Granny’s house as my dad died when I was 6 and I don’t remember my cousins dad at all. I was especially close to my gran as I was the only girl and continued to help look after her and my aunt until she died at the age 92. She was a very special lady, who was loved by everyone who met her.

I didn’t know my paternal grandparents, my maternal grandfather died when I was I think about 7. I remember sitting on his knee, the coarse feel of the fabric of his trousers, drinking tea(!) and asking him about all the blue marks on his hands and arms.
He was a miner, from Co. Durham, and he said the scars were ‘the coal, it becomes part of you’.
After he died my grandmother would come to London from Durham to stay with us for holidays- my mother was widowed as well- and we would meet her at I’m sure it was Kings Cross Station, but my brother swears it was Liverpool Street.
She would wear her good coat, a little hat and carry a tartan bag
with a flask of tea in it. My mum would collect her case.
I remember her as a little old lady with white permed hair, she would only have been in her early sixties then.

We lived with my maternal parents after my mother’s marriage to a Canadian collapsed and we came back to the uk. I was only two, my sister was four. My grandfather had been sacked from his job as a Midland bank manager for insider dealing and looking back was probably in prison for a time although it was never spoken about. My grandparents had lived a very comfortable life with a cook and house keeper, and were probably horrified at being rehoused by the council in a cottage with no electricity or hot water. She was mostly quite bad tempered, looking back understandably, especially being landed with two energetic toddlers. Of course she had no idea about cooking or anything domestic. My mother needed a well paid full time job to look after us all, and spent her weekends washing and cleaning. My grandmother died at 58 of lung cancer being a huge smoker and I didn’t shed a tear for her. My grandad was just in the background hiding mostly under a newspaper! It all sounds a bit bleak but my mother made what little time she was able to spend with us joyful and we lived for that.

I knew all my grandparents and loved them all especially one grandmother. They were all so kind. They had, of course, all been through 2 world wars. Both of my grandfathers had fought in WW1 - one in Greece and one in Belgium in particular. During WW2 one grandfather was in the Home Guard and the other was a fire watcher in our local city. I miss them all and would give anything to have them back again.

Paternal grandmother I saw little of. I do remember her once heating curling tongs in the stove, curling her hair, putting on her hat, pushing a long hatpin through it and saying Now I'm ready to.go.out.
I lived with my maternal grandmother and mother during the war. Very working class though bright, had been a bookeeper still she had to stop.when she got married. Both born around 1885.
One grandfather in regular army including in 1stk world war, the other an English teacher.

I had two paternal, had to share them with innumerable cousins as my father was the eldest of eleven! However they were kindly and always open doors for everyone. My mother sadly lost her mother in childbirth the saddest thing was th read her birth certificate “mother deceased” brought home to me what she never had.

All 3 were wonderful I was first grandchild on my Dads sideand firat grandaughter on my Mums all of them spent a lot of time wirh me and taught me things I use day and daily even now I was very blessed

I think I was very lucky as I had all 4 grandparents up to my late 20’s, one died in my 30’s and one died last year aged 105. My childhood was spending lots of time with them with family and seperately. Maternal and Paternal GP’s were very very different from one another. But thanks to one side we have loads of documented family times as grandad was very into cameras and video. And I know loads of scottish and irish songs from the other side!

I knew all four grandparents but my paternal grandfather died when I was nine and he was in his late sixties. My other grandparents lived until I was in my thirties - I was very lucky. They were all very loving and kind and l am lucky to have had them. They always seemed elderly and acted in this manner. They wore clothes suitable for “mature” people and all had dentures from a young age, as was all too common at that time. The two grandmothers had regular perms and weekly shampoos and sets. Both grandfathers were as round as they were tall. My paternal grandfather could have doubled as Captain Mainwaring in appearance - thankfully not in his manner - and my maternal grandfather once got stuck on a helterskelter. They were born between 1905 and 1916. Although we loved them and they loved us, the grandparent/grandchild relationship was different from a modern day version. When we visited them, we wore our best clothes and were on our best behaviour - manners were not an optional extra. Indeed, girls were expected to be ladylike. My maternal grandmother was a talented pianist and played the church organ. My maternal grandfather had a beautiful bass baritone singing voice and would sit next to me for hours listening to me playing the piano and was very encouraging. After the war, he worked hard and saved up to buy a newsagents’ shop, which was so successful that he was able to buy another, which my grandmother ran. They eventually sold both shops and bought a sub post office, which they ran until retirement a few years later. When we stayed with my paternal grandparents, we would be encouraged to join them in their bed in the morning, where we would have milk and malted milk biscuits from a special tin while the adults had their cup of tea. My grandfather would then tell us the most amazing stories. He was a scientist and a rep for a well known company that sold scientific instruments. He always had a walking stick and would ask us to hold his hand to help him walk when we were very small. He always seemed to have a pipe in his mouth. My grandmother had not had an easy life as she was orphaned by the time she was four and brought up by her very loving aunt. She was very much the matriarch figure and kept everyone in line. Again, very kind and generous but a disciplinarian when she felt it was needed. We always knew where we stood with her and she was always generous in her praise.

My father's father died in 1897 when my dad was two. The six children were brought up by their mother and her older sister who was a very strict old lady. I was taken there for Sunday dinners when I was maybe one year old. But my grandmother died before I was born. My Dad was mid forties when he married. My mother two decades younger.
My maternal grandfather was an interesting old chap who tinkered with wood and wire making odd inventions and patenting them. He taught my mother how to make a radio in the twenties. He died when I was three. We visited my mothers mother once when I was eight and she was thin, often had headaches. Not a happy person. Because we moved a long way off after the war they were fairly mythical beings to me.

I didn’t know my maternal grandmother very well and I never met my maternal grandfather. My paternal grandparents brought me up. Grandad died when I was eight. I was devastated. Without telling a long story, I thought he died because of me. Which was a lot of guilt for a child to bear. After that it was just me and my nanny. She thought me how to shop. How to choose meat, vegetables etc. then rarely left the house. Looking back she was agoraphobic but I didn’t know that at the time. She became very dependent on me emotionally which wasn’t good for either of us. But I still adored her. She developed dementia in her 70’s sadly. She stopped talking until. Her death bed when she thought my daughter was me and told her she loved her. Despite losing her so long ago I still miss her.

I am enjoying reading about everyone's GPs. It is sad that some of us never got to meet all our GPs. I was lucky in that I lived in the same house where my grandmother had a granny flat and I saw my other grandmother regularly.

My paternal grandparents had died, but I knew my maternal grandparents. They were both doctors, but had divorced when my mother was about 8 or 9. Grandfather had married his glamorous secretary. They were both unloved by their elder daughter, my mother. "Auntie" as the step-grandmother was called, lived until she was 90, still slim and upright, still wore her expensive 1930s clothes and a blonde wig. But she never gave anything away. After grandfather died, my mother had to persuade her to give his watch to her brother, my uncle.
Grandmother was quite different, also unlike other grannies, a psychiatrist who wore patchwork skirts and boots and had straggly grey hair. She tried to teach me to play chess when I was about 7 but obviously found me rather stupid.
(My mother, by contrast, was a wonderful mother and grandmother, daily missed.)

A great thread, fascinating history. Thanks Magenta8.

Both grandfathers died young, one grandmother was trapped behind the iron curtain in Europe and died when I was about 8. I didn’t know her but my mum told me stories about her.

I knew my English nanny who was already about 70 when I was born. She never bought me anything or took me anywhere except occasionally grocery shopping, but she was always kind to me and I felt safe and happy in her house.

Had no knowledge of either Grandparents on either linear line .. what does astonish me is the complete disregard to my feelings and they never told me about my Grandma or Grandpa .. I have one picture of a forbidding older lady in Black ,,, Thats it ...

My Nana and Grandad from Kingston were lovely and Grandad inherited a lot of money and business in 1930 and major Ww1 and Major for Homegaurd WE2 and went to Dunkirk D day .Jarrow grandad walked from Jarrow to London 1930 and settled in Kingston then owned roofing company for steelworks post war in Scunthorpe . My dad’s mother called herself Auntie very glam and was an accountant at the Dorchester Hotel and owned her own tea shop in Kingston on Thames and second marriage to a German Jew from Berlin 22 yrs younger than her and he always said he was Austrian . All of them were special and even knew 2 great parents who died when I was 13 they aged 93 . I was lucky 🍀!

I’ve a feeling I’ve written about my grandparents before! But here goes.

Dad’s dad died in his early 30s during the Second World War in Baghdad from malaria. Dad’s mum was only 20 when Dad was born - my grandfather was 18. Nanny was great and until dad’s two sisters had children I spent a lot of time with her. Nanny remarried when dad was 14 and I also considered Poppop my grandfather - I think he was my godfather too. My daughter and elder son share Nanny’s birthday.

Mum’s parents were a different kettle of fish. Her father was 60 when she was born and died just before I was born. We only saw Nanna once a year as she lived hundreds of miles away. She had umpteen grandchildren and I was just another one!

We saw Dad’s parents nearly every week as they only lived a few miles away. Nanny died when m my daughter was a baby but at least she saw her a couple times. Poppop died when my youngest was two, they all loved him.

Pantglas2

Kind, wise, hospitable, resourceful and hard working til they died in their early 80s.

I learned/absorbed many lessons from my early years with them and so wish I’d appreciated them more instead of being the self centred teenager that I was…

I second this !

I do remember 2 GMs a 1 GD all very old all had died before I was 7, everyone is old at that age they were all around 70 quite good for the times.

My maternal grandmother died when my mother was only 3. My maternal grandfather died 6 months before I was born. My paternal grandparents had other grandchildren, my cousins, they always seemed to favour. I had no contact with them when my parents divorced. There was a lovely elderly lady who lived opposite to us when I had 2 young children and I thought she would have been a lovely grandmother. She didn

My paternal grandfather died when I was 3,but apparently he loved taking me out in my pram. Little Nana came to live with us when he died and looked after us while Mum worked in the shop. Fried leftover mash for lunch every day during the week! She was very fierce and would jab us in the chest to make a point. She died when I was about 16. Mum’s parents lived up the road and we quite often stayed with them overnight. Big Nana made the best teacakes and wouldn’t tell anyone the recipe. Grandad was very quiet and was still riding his bike to do the gardens at a hotel right up until his late 70s. He died when I was on holiday in the Isle of Man with my sister and some friends. I was 18. Then Nana came to live with us. She never made her teacakes again. She was a thorn in my mother’s side! Even her clearing her throat got on her wick. She died when she was 84.

I remember thinking it was rather odd that my maternal G’ma called her friends Mrs so and so, not their first names. It seemed formal to me but they all did the same.

My paternal G’ma was deeply offended when a cousin called her by her first name one day and refused to speak to her again.

My maternal Gpop was a sweetie, scrupulously fair and quite strict but taught me to play draughts with endless patience. He loved a good pun.

I didn’t know my paternal G’pa. He was a horse hair curler at one stage and then an administrator in the post office. Horse hair was curled before being used to stuff sofas to make them springy.

@butterandjam.
I so enjoyed reading your posting, part of which I have posted below. It had me smiling all the way through. Thank you so much.

"My maternal grandmother was a gypsy ( the term she used) and had healing powers; before the NHS she delivered all the local babies (rural area) and locals came to her to be dosed up with herbs. The only thing she ever dosed me with was what she described as "elderberry pop" which caused me and some rowdy cousins to fall asleep for several hours in the middle of the day.. I think we'd exhausted her patience.

She was a very beautiful woman and my mother looked just like her. GF married GM just before he set off to fight in WW1. A year or so later he returned from France, injured, and found Granny heavily pregnant. She called it a mystery pregnancy, known to midwives. He agreed to keep the mystery and raise it, on condition she pretended it was his child,. Which they did by waiting nine months to register the (home) birth of a "newborn" with him as father. Only by then she was pregnant again so they had to fake the second child's birth registration too. That's how two of my aunts spent their entire lives a year older than their birth certificates. They had seven children".
.....etc..