# Great-great-grandfather climbs the Empire State Building **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [February 7, 2004, 3:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-great-grandfather-climbs-the-empire-state-building/227997 "2004-02-07T15:35:26Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 10\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![pseudotriton\_ruber\_ruber](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/a9a28c/32.png) [@pseudotriton\_ruber\_ruber](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pseudotriton_ruber_ruber)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2004, 3:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-great-grandfather-climbs-the-empire-state-building/227997/1 "2004-02-07T15:35:26Z")
…according to NPR this monring, and cradled his great-great-grandchild in his arms at the top, which got me wondering: is there a case of a person living long enougnto see ha great-great-great-grandchild? What’s the most generations, iow? ---
**Author:** ![Indefatigable](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/9d8465/32.png) [@Indefatigable](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Indefatigable)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2004, 3:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-great-grandfather-climbs-the-empire-state-building/227997/2 "2004-02-07T15:43:00Z")
It wouldn’t be that hard… if I had a kid when I was twenty, and then my kid had my grandkid at twenty (I’d be forty) and my grandkid had my great-grandkid at twenty (I’d be sixty) and my great-grandkid had my great-great-grandkid at twenty (I’d be eighty) and then the great-great-grandkid had my great-great-great-grandkid at twenty… I’d be a hundred-year-old great-great-great-grandmother. Not unheard of for people to live that long. I plan to be at least a hundred when I go. If you think you don’t have that much time, then it’s plausible for the younger generations to have their kids earlier. ---
**Author:** ![Annie-Xmas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ecc23a/32.png) [@Annie-Xmas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Annie-Xmas)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2004, 3:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-great-grandfather-climbs-the-empire-state-building/227997/3 "2004-02-07T15:55:03Z")
A friend’s 102 year old mother recently died. She had two great-great-great grandchildren. I know a woman who became a grandmother at 29! Amusing the trend continued, and she lived to be 100, she’d be a great-great-great-great grandmother. ---
**Author:** ![Ilsa\_Lund](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/a6a055/32.png) [@Ilsa\_Lund](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ilsa_Lund)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2004, 4:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-great-grandfather-climbs-the-empire-state-building/227997/4 "2004-02-07T16:35:13Z")
Well, I’d assume the trend would continue… 😃 ---
**Author:** ![pseudotriton\_ruber\_ruber](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/a9a28c/32.png) [@pseudotriton\_ruber\_ruber](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pseudotriton_ruber_ruber)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2004, 8:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-great-grandfather-climbs-the-empire-state-building/227997/5 "2004-02-07T20:45:13Z")
I got the theoretical concept-- I was wondering more what the actual recorded history has been. I.e., has anyone actually been a great-great-great-great grandchild of a living ancestor, for example? ---
**Author:** ![Walloon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/fbc32d/32.png) [@Walloon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Walloon)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2004, 8:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-great-grandfather-climbs-the-empire-state-building/227997/6 "2004-02-07T20:52:40Z")
According to the _Guinness Book of Records_ (1994 ed.), > [@](#): > > _ **Seven-generation family** _ Augusta Bunge (nee Pagel; b. 13 Oct 1879) of Wisconsin learned that she was a great-great-great-great-grandmother when she received news of her great-great-great-great-grandson, Christopher John Bollig (b. 21 Jan 1989). ---
**Author:** ![Sunspace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sunspace/32/1250_2.png) [@Sunspace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sunspace)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2004, 8:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-great-grandfather-climbs-the-empire-state-building/227997/7 "2004-02-07T20:55:47Z")
Friend of mine was a grandmother at 40… ---
**Author:** ![Cisco](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ccd318/32.png) [@Cisco](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cisco)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2004, 10:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-great-grandfather-climbs-the-empire-state-building/227997/8 "2004-02-07T22:11:30Z")
I met my Great-Great-Grandfather when i was 9 (he was 103 at the time with a full head of hair and all his own teeth.) I never thought about it until this thread but there was a generation beneath me at that point so I guess he was a Great-Great-Great-Grandfather. ---
**Author:** ![Earl\_Snake-Hips\_Tucker](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/earl_snake-hips_tucker/32/3269_2.png) [@Earl\_Snake-Hips\_Tucker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Earl_Snake-Hips_Tucker)\ **Post date:** [February 8, 2004, 2:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-great-grandfather-climbs-the-empire-state-building/227997/9 "2004-02-08T02:36:12Z")
My 95-ish great-grandmother celebrated the arrival of her great-great-great-grandchild around 1965 in North Carolina. Six generations. It made the local (Salisbury) paper, including a picture to show all six generations seated at one time. I used to have a copy of it around somewhere. (I am not in the line that produced the great-great-great-grandchild). ---
**Author:** ![Larry\_Mudd](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/f14d63/32.png) [@Larry\_Mudd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Larry_Mudd)\ **Post date:** [February 8, 2004, 2:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-great-grandfather-climbs-the-empire-state-building/227997/10 "2004-02-08T02:57:53Z")
My sister became a grandmother at forty – and squeezed out another one herself a week after that, so that her poor granddaughter has an uncle that’s a week younger than she is. An out-of-control uterus, is what she’s got. Eesh.