Fablr

Questions to ask

Questions to Ask Your Grandparents About Their Military Service

Start with the bunkmate, the food and the letters home. Let the heavier stories come only if they want to tell them.

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A grandfather at his dining table shows his grandson a small photo of himself as a young soldier, with a box of old letters between them.

Where the stories hide

Maybe it is a photo in uniform on the hallway wall, or a folded flag in a closet nobody opens. Plenty of grandparents who served said very little about it to their own children. Grandchildren often hear more, because they ask later and more lightly.

Service stories rarely come out in order. They come out through a nickname, a meal, a song on the barracks radio. Start there. Ask about people before events, and treat a long pause as part of the answer.

Before you sit down

  • Bring something to hold: a photo, a patch, a discharge paper, a letter.
  • Pick three or four questions for a first visit. Save the rest for next time.
  • Ask about combat once, gently, and move on if the answer is short.
  • Write down every name they mention. Names open the next conversation.

Joining up

  1. How old were you when you went in, and how did it come about?
  2. Were you drafted, or did you sign up? Where were you when you found out?
  3. What did your mother say when you told her?
  4. What do you remember about the day you left home?
  5. What was the hardest part of basic training? What surprised you?

The people

  1. Who was your closest friend while you served? What were they like?
  2. Did you have a nickname? Who gave it to you?
  3. Who was the funniest person in your unit?
  4. Was there someone in charge you would have followed anywhere? Why?
  5. Who did you stay in touch with after you got out?

Daily life

  1. Where were you stationed? What did it look like, and what did it smell like?
  2. Walk me through an ordinary day, from waking up to lights out.
  3. What did you eat? Was there one meal you looked forward to?
  4. What did you do on a day off?
  5. How did news from home reach you, and who wrote most often?
  6. What did you miss most?

Coming home

  1. What was the first thing you did when you got back?
  2. Was it hard to go back to ordinary life? What helped?
  3. What do you think people back home never understood about it?
  4. How did serving change the way you saw things?
  5. What would you want your great-grandchildren to know about that time?

Some veterans will never talk about the worst of it, and they don’t need to. A story about Eddie from Ohio, or the best meal of a hard year, is worth keeping on its own.

If you would rather not run the interview yourself, Fablr can hold these conversations by voice, follow up the same way, and keep what they say for the family. You might also like these questions to ask grandparents for life advice.

At the kitchen table, a granddaughter scans the printed code on a chapter of an open Fablr hardcover with her phone camera.

If you would rather someone else asked

A biographer who asks the next question.

Fablr holds these conversations by voice, at whatever pace suits them. It follows up the way a good listener does and remembers what they said last time. The stories become a hardcover, with a code on each chapter that plays it in their own voice.

Conversation
15 hours over one year. No schedule.
The book
Full-color 8.5×11 hardcover, included. Free US shipping.
Price
$149, billed once. No auto-renewal.
Give Their Story $149 See how it works

Questions, answered.

Then don’t ask twice. Training, friends, food, letters and the trip home are all part of the story, and many veterans are glad to talk about the people they served with.

Let them bring it up. If they show you one, ask who they were with that day before you ask what it was for.

Yes. Fablr’s conversations happen by voice on a phone, tablet or computer, so family can be anywhere. If you buy it as a gift, you can handle the setup. Your grandparent opens a private link and talks, with no account or password.

Twenty minutes about one friend or one place is plenty. Stop while they still want to say more. It makes the next conversation easier to start.

Give them a year set aside for stories.

$149 billed once. No auto-renewal. 30-day money-back guarantee.

Give Their Story $149