# Did/do your grandparents know each other? **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [September 22, 2017, 12:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-do-your-grandparents-know-each-other/796926 "2017-09-22T00:37:46Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Dr.Girlfriend](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dr.girlfriend/32/193_2.png) [@Dr.Girlfriend](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr.Girlfriend)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2017, 11:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-do-your-grandparents-know-each-other/796926/41 "2017-09-22T23:22:08Z")
Yeah, they all knew each other. They didn’t socialize outside of family gatherings but they were all friendly with each other when we all got together. ---
**Author:** ![Cazzle](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cazzle/32/75_2.png) [@Cazzle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cazzle)\ **Post date:** [September 23, 2017, 12:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-do-your-grandparents-know-each-other/796926/42 "2017-09-23T00:02:49Z")
They did. They all got along on the rare occasions they saw each other. ---
**Author:** ![Kent\_Clark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kent_clark/32/105_2.png) [@Kent\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kent_Clark)\ **Post date:** [September 23, 2017, 1:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-do-your-grandparents-know-each-other/796926/43 "2017-09-23T01:17:47Z")
My mother’s parents lived on a farm in the Ozarks, and didn’t travel much. I’m damn sure my father’s parents never went to the Ozarks, and I doubt they ever met face to face. Unlike some of the posters above, all my grandparents lived for at least 35 years after my parents married, so they had time to meet, if not the opportunity. ---
**Author:** ![dropzone](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dropzone/32/7515_2.png) [@dropzone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dropzone)\ **Post date:** [September 23, 2017, 4:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-do-your-grandparents-know-each-other/796926/44 "2017-09-23T04:34:26Z")
[anthro degree] This is so charming! There is no other science where “charm” counts than Physics. ---
**Author:** ![P-man](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/p-man/32/3606_2.png) [@P-man](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/P-man)\ **Post date:** [September 23, 2017, 2:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-do-your-grandparents-know-each-other/796926/45 "2017-09-23T14:58:28Z")
Both sets of grandparents lived in the same small community. My Dad’s mother was a teacher at the local school, so most of the community knew her. ---
**Author:** ![UncaStuart](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/uncastuart/32/404_2.png) [@UncaStuart](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/UncaStuart)\ **Post date:** [September 23, 2017, 7:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-do-your-grandparents-know-each-other/796926/46 "2017-09-23T19:04:38Z")
Both sets of grandparents were from orchardist families in Santa Clara Valley before it changed from The Valley of Heart’s Delight to Silicon Valley. My dad’s paternal grandfather bought some of the water for his orchards from the springs on my mom’s paternal grandfather’s land. I have a newspaper clipping from 1919 about a hill-climb car race in the town my mother’s family is from, with my maternal grandfather taking first place and my paternal grandfather coming in second. This was a year before my parents were born. Much later, after I and my sibs and cousins came around in the 40s and 50s, there were many family events where the grandparents (and any remaining GGPs) mingled. ---
**Author:** ![Skywatcher](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/skywatcher/32/254_2.png) [@Skywatcher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skywatcher)\ **Post date:** [September 23, 2017, 7:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-do-your-grandparents-know-each-other/796926/47 "2017-09-23T19:29:13Z")
Doubtful. All we ever really knew about maternal grandfather is a name on a birth certificate and Census records show the other three never living near each other. ---
**Author:** ![astorian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ad7895/32.png) [@astorian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/astorian)\ **Post date:** [September 24, 2017, 10:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-do-your-grandparents-know-each-other/796926/48 "2017-09-24T22:26:33Z")
Sure, they knew each other. They just didn’t see each other more than once a year, since my Dad’s parents lived with us in Queens while my Mom’s parents retired to Florida. ---
**Author:** ![cmkeller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cmkeller/32/118_2.png) [@cmkeller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cmkeller)\ **Post date:** [September 24, 2017, 10:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-do-your-grandparents-know-each-other/796926/49 "2017-09-24T22:58:42Z")
Absolutely. I had all four of my grandparents until I was 15 years old, and there were ample family events at which they were all together. They got along very well, as far as I know. ---
**Author:** ![RivkahChaya](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rivkahchaya/32/8919_2.png) [@RivkahChaya](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RivkahChaya)\ **Post date:** [September 24, 2017, 11:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-do-your-grandparents-know-each-other/796926/50 "2017-09-24T23:35:31Z")
> [@Dr.Girlfriend](#): > > Yeah, they all knew each other. They didn’t socialize outside of family gatherings but they were all friendly with each other when we all got together. This is my family. My grandparents met only because their children married. They were always very cordial, but they saw one another only at bar and bat mitzvahs, upsharens, the occasional seder, and soforth. My father’s father died in 1982, and then his mother had a stroke in 1986, and moved into a nursing home in Indiana (near one of her sons), and never traveled more than a day’s trip by car after that. Just as a side note, my mother’s parents and my father’s in-laws had a lot of contact when I was growing up. Unlike my father’s parents, my father’s in-laws and my mother’s parents all spoke Yiddish. They all got along swimmingly too. I have really been very lucky with a large extended family, with no big conflicts, and no people unwilling to put aside little ones for the sake of family on occasions where someone else is center-stage (you know, 13-year-old Ori’s bar mitzvah is not the time for his mother’s cousins to renew a squabble over who gets their mother’s china). We even have family sing-a-longs where my cousin Chava Leah plays her guitar, and if there is a piano, her BIL can play that too. I knew a family, totally unrelated to me-- I worked with them, but this is unrelated to my client, so I can tell the story as long as I don’t use names. Shortest version I can manage: two new grandmothers of the same newborn girl traveled together from Indiana to Texas to visit the new arrival. They went as traveling companions, sat together on the plane, etc., and when someone commented upon it being nice for the little girl to have grandmas who were friends, one of the grandmas said, “Well, we both love each other’s children.” It’s the kind of thing that brightens your day, even though you aren’t part of it. ---
**Author:** ![Loach](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/loach/32/350_2.png) [@Loach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Loach)\ **Post date:** [September 25, 2017, 12:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-do-your-grandparents-know-each-other/796926/51 "2017-09-25T00:35:49Z")
3 out of 4 did. My paternal grandmother died when my father was 12. More bizarre is the coincidence between my grandparents and my ex-wife’s grandparents. I told this story once before. By the time we got married all of her grandparents were dead. My grandmother lived until well after the divorce. She was 104. When we were at the burial I noticed the name on the gravestone facing my grandparents plot. It was the same name as my ex’s brother. He is a third. Doing some quick detective work I figured out that my children’s great grandparents were buried across from each other by random chance. ---
**Author:** ![Siam\_Sam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/d78d45/32.png) [@Siam\_Sam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Siam_Sam)\ **Post date:** [September 25, 2017, 4:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-do-your-grandparents-know-each-other/796926/52 "2017-09-25T04:55:02Z")
> [@Siam\_Sam](#): > > My paternal grandfather died before my parents met, but my paternal grandmother and my other set of grandparents all attended the wedding. It was the only time they met, living in different parts of the country as they did. I should probably add that while my paternal grandfather died before I was born, I have it on good authority that he knew my paternal grandmother. And I know for a fact that my maternal grandfather knew my maternal grandmother. 😉 ---
**Author:** ![TokyoBayer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tokyobayer/32/13989_2.png) [@TokyoBayer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TokyoBayer)\ **Post date:** [September 25, 2017, 5:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-do-your-grandparents-know-each-other/796926/53 "2017-09-25T05:12:27Z")
> [@Siam\_Sam](#): > > I should probably add that while my paternal grandfather died before I was born, I have it on good authority that he knew my paternal grandmother. And I know for a fact that my maternal grandfather knew my maternal grandmother. With DNA testing, it’s not all that certain. :eek: My paternal grandfather bailed on the family when my father was 5 to 7. He moved to California and I only met him once for about 20 minutes when he stopped by our house. He didn’t come to my parents wedding or anything. My father visited him once in all the years as well. My paternal grandmother could neither hear nor speak. She and my father had a complicated relationship. She split time between living in California and a property my parents had purchased for her in Salt Lake City, where we lived. She lived with my family for a year after I was born (as the forth child in three years and 8 months) so she must have met my maternal grandparents, but she was never at any of the events where they were also. For my kids, my mother has met my wife’s mother in Tokyo when Beta-chan was born. They couldn’t communicate, so I know if you can say that they “know” each other, but they have met once. My father is already quite dead and my FIL didn’t go to Tokyo that time. ---
**Author:** ![kaylasdad99](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kaylasdad99/32/3398_2.png) [@kaylasdad99](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kaylasdad99)\ **Post date:** [September 25, 2017, 6:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-do-your-grandparents-know-each-other/796926/54 "2017-09-25T06:06:08Z")
Darrell and Ruth had a daughter, Marjorie, and two sons, Darrell, Jr. and Lloyd. Darrell, Sr. died from acute appendicitis when Lloyd was three, and Ruth never remarried. Meanwhile, up in San Francisco, Harry and Nellie had five daughters (Sheila, Dorothy, Kathleen, Maureen, and Bernadette), and two sons, (Mike and Bob). Ruth traveled to San Francisco for the weddings of both Darrell, Jr. to Dorothy; and Lloyd to Kathleen. She remained on good terms with Harry and Nellie, and they were all ptresent at a number of baptisms (Dorothy and Kathleen each gave birth a dozen times. So did Marjorie, but Harry and Nellie weren’t involved, so I don’t think they traveled to the SFV for those). ---
**Author:** ![Olentzero](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/90ced4/32.png) [@Olentzero](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Olentzero)\ **Post date:** [September 26, 2017, 3:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-do-your-grandparents-know-each-other/796926/55 "2017-09-26T15:19:49Z")
> [@LSLGuy](#): > > My Mom’s surviving mother :eek: How many mothers did your mom _have_?! And what happened to the other ones? ---
**Author:** ![Dendarii\_Dame](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/bbce88/32.png) [@Dendarii\_Dame](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dendarii_Dame)\ **Post date:** [September 26, 2017, 6:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-do-your-grandparents-know-each-other/796926/56 "2017-09-26T18:14:52Z")
My paternal grandmother met my maternal grandfather when their children got engaged. ---
**Author:** ![chrisk](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/6de8d8/32.png) [@chrisk](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/chrisk)\ **Post date:** [September 26, 2017, 6:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-do-your-grandparents-know-each-other/796926/57 "2017-09-26T18:49:05Z")
> [@chrisk](#): > > I don’t think there were any meetings involving my grandfathers; they both died early and were on opposite sides of the Atlantic. > > I do remember my grandmothers meeting; Granny from England came over and joined us on a family trip involving the train to Sault St Marie, the Agawa Canyon, and the Tobermory ferry. She and my other grandmother apparently didn’t get along because each was used to being the boss. 😉 Minor update: I was talking about family history with my Mom a few days ago, and she said that her mother came along on a trip to England before her father-in-law died, so that makes 3 grandparents who met. ---
**Author:** ![N9IWP](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/n9iwp/32/3154_2.png) [@N9IWP](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/N9IWP)\ **Post date:** [September 26, 2017, 9:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-do-your-grandparents-know-each-other/796926/58 "2017-09-26T21:47:16Z")
Well, they lived in the same town, but my father’s parents lived on the north side, and my mother’s on the south. Same religion but different churches. My parents met in high school, which was at the time on an island in the river between the north and south sides. They may have known OF each other, but they didn’t hang out to my knowledge. Both my grandfathers died before I was born. My maternal grandmother didn’t drive (at least not when I knew her) Brian ---
**Author:** ![gigi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/a587f6/32.png) [@gigi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gigi)\ **Post date:** [September 26, 2017, 10:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-do-your-grandparents-know-each-other/796926/59 "2017-09-26T22:49:44Z")
My parents knew each other from third grade, so the g-parents would have supposedly been in the same room together at some point. When my parents starting dating, my father’s parents did not approve of Mom and her family but they would have at least met up for important occasions. When we visited we stayed with Gma and Gpa and visited Nana and Gdad separately. ---
**Author:** ![Clothahump](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/51bf81/32.png) [@Clothahump](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Clothahump)\ **Post date:** [September 27, 2017, 2:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-do-your-grandparents-know-each-other/796926/60 "2017-09-27T02:43:29Z")
I know my grandmothers did, as I remember them both in the house at the same time on several different occasions as I was growing up. I know my paternal grandfather died two months before dad was born, so the grandfathers did not meet. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-do-your-grandparents-know-each-other/796926.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-do-your-grandparents-know-each-other/796926.md?page=4)