My paternal grandmother was born in 1899. Alas, I didn’t often ask her about what her life was like when she was growing up.

My great-grandmother died in 1983 at the age of 96, so she was not only alive in the 1800s, but was 13 when the century ended, so she must have remembered it pretty well.

And I was 13 in 1983, so I remember her pretty well.

Unfortunately, being a kid at the time, I didn't think to ask her what her childhood was like, and I don't know how much she could have told me, as she was deaf and not very lucid by then. Still, I wish I had tried.

My great grandmother was born in 1888 and died in 1987. Traveled to Minnesota by covered wagon when she was young, lived to see the shuttle explode. I have a lot of memories of her, she was a quiet Lutheran farm woman with a strong German accent. I don't remember very much conversation unfortunately, family gatherings were about cooking, eating and being in each other's presence, not a lot of meaningful conversation beyond weather and sports. I was 20 when she passed away and I inherited one of her cookbooks, which was really mostly newspaper clippings of dessert recipes and a few notes about harvests and who helped. On the last page is a remedy: Give an animal a tablespoon of kerosene to cure it of bloat. (Please do not take this advice)

My grandfather was born in the early 1900's. He talked of driving his fathers' horse and buggy team on Sunday's. His father was a minister in rural South Carolina and would do a circuit on Sunday's to visit several churches. He had a few amusing stories about some church members that fancied his father and of the time the horses got into green alfalfa and developed upset stomachs on the way to the next church. Requiring a change of clothes for all the unluckly passengers...
He also told us about visiting the Worlds Fair and having pizza for the first time.

I met and spent some time with both my great grandparents (my mom's paternal grandparents). I was born in 1971, and spent time with them when I was 4 or 5 - they were OLD, to my young eyes. They had a dairy farm near Medford, OR. My great grandfather died when I was still young, but my great grandmother, who I always remembered, was "two years older than the year" made it to the late 80's/early 90's. My great grandfather was a bit older than her.

I met a friend of my grandmother's around 1987. I later discovered that she was a friend of Doris Lessing. My grandmother was born in 1912; her friend, in 1896 - in the territory that would become Zimbabwe, then run by the British South Africa Company and not even named Southern Rhodesia. She had lived through both world wars, the colony's self-governing years, the rise and collapse of the Federation, Ian Smith's UDI in 1965, and the Bush War that followed. In 1980, in her eighties, she saw the country gain independence and take the name Zimbabwe - the entire colonial period, from its beginning to its end. She died the year that Mandela was freed in neighbouring South Africa but not before the abolition of apartheid. It's remarkable to consider the span of her life - the invention and commercialisation of flight to the space age, the atomic age, the computer age. The one thing I envy most is that she would have seen Africa (she had travelled and lived in Namibia, Tanzania, Kenya, Botswana and Mozambique) before the 'Great White Hunters'.

I met this guy named George Saunders who was born in 1898. When I met him, he was dying in a nursing home in Colorado Springs. His wife didn't want many people to visit him. I went in the room with a contingent of DeMolays. I was very involved in the Order of DeMolay (and later the Masonic lodge and the Scottish Rite) and Saunders had been the Grand Secretary of the national DeMolay organization (and the Imperial Recorder for the national Shriners organization) for most of the postwar period. His signature was on millions of certificates and documents. I couldn't believe he was still alive in the mid-90s. He was very frail and thin, bedridden. I'll never forget his wife said "What you are seeing is the ravages of time."

When asked what the greatest invention was in her lifetime, my Grandma, born in 1899 and lived into the 80’s said, without a moment’s hesitation, “That’s so easy. Kleenex.”

Great-grand father, born in 1881 and great-grand-mother as well, born in the 1890s. He died when I was 9 and she died a few years later, but I met both several times as a child visiting them in the East of France when in vacation. His whole family (140+ descendants) celebrated his 100th birthday ! He died a few months later, and my great grand-mother died at 99. He was walking in the mountains several hours a week up until the end. As kids, we would visit them in their room, and I particularly remember her talking about the whole family, aunt this, uncle that, the kids of whoever, etc. Always smiling. He on the other hand was not so much the talkative kind.

I knew, and faintly remember, my great-grand aunt Clara as a child. She was born in 1876. Lived with my grandparents and died when I was 4.

I'm 50 and my maternal great-grandmothers were born in 1890 and 1898 and were both alive when I was a kid. Unfortunately both passed away before I was old enough to have a meaningful conversation with them.