First, I am not sure if you counted me in the maternal grandfather column and not paternal grandfather…
I am not really surprised a the results for females. However, the strong influence of grandmothers on the males stands out to me. I really assumed, I don’t know why, that the males would more likely vote for grandfathers.
I have made no manual adjustments to the numbers (so far) so I’ve just summarized what’s shown at the top of the thread. You’re not alone in voting for the wrong grandparent, so I hope that “misvote” aspect of this exercise comes out in the wash. Besides, unless we get hundreds of replies/votes the validity of such a poll is suspect at best.
As to your reaction to the men-grandfathers issue, I agree that I would expect more guy-guy influence than is apparent. The gal-gal thing is no surprise to me, either.
Grandmothers may be more influential simply because women tend to live longer than men, and women tend to be roughly the same age as or somewhat younger than their husbands. So people are more likely to know grandmothers for longer than they do grandfathers.
Long before my parents were married, my father’s mother and my mother’s father were both widowed. But they knew each other through my parents . . . and a few years after my parents were married, the two grandparents married each other. They were the only grandparents I ever knew.
#1 PGM. She was awesome, the matriarch of my dad’s family. All holidays were at her house where there was always ham and home made candy. First adult who ever swore around me.
#2 MGM. Cunt on wheels. Only counts so high because:
#3 MGF. Died of Alzheimer’s when I was 13. Only saw him and MGM once or twice a year anyway.
#4 PGF. Died years before my parents met. Sounded like a great guy.
My paternal grandfather, Richard H. Popkin. As an author, academic, and philosopher, he did a great deal to broaden my horizons in the intellectual world, while also helping me to not take everything too seriously.
My paternal grandmother, Julie, is still alive. While I’ve known her and spent farm ore time with her than any other grandparents, we’ve never connected the same way I did with Grandpa.
My other grandparents on my mother’s side I rarely met, since they lived on another continent.
I’d certainly have expected the maternal grandmother to be most popular, simply because, given general marriage patterns, she’s the grandparent most likely to have the greatest number of years of exposure to her grandchildren.
Am I missing something? MGM was the most popular in each breakdown. :dubious:
I don’t get the surprise.
I’m not surprised. As I said, it’s what I would have expected.
Okay. Your quote of my
must be what confused me.
No sweat. I see your point.
Female: Maternal Grandmother.
She was definitely the biggest influence on me, but in a how-not-to-be way. She reminded a lot of people of Edith Bunker, had the same annoying voice, but she was much less competent than Edith and much needier. She had a hard life and I get why she ended up that way now. Every so often I can hear a little bit of her whininess sneak in to my voice and I’m horrified.
The best way to get my mother to stop any annoying behavior is to tell her she’s acting like her mother, but I’m rarely willing to stoop that low.
It’s an interesting question. Genetically I don’t look like any particular one, just a mashup of all their features.
I definitely liked my paternal grandfather the most, even though he died first (I was ten) and I spent the least time with him. He had a big personality and he liked children (or at least he liked me!) I think I get my adventurousness from him and my disregard for what other people think.
Male…PGM.
She was quite wonderful in many ways, and we always got along very well, except briefly when I was in my teens (more my issue than hers). She took me seriously in ways that most other adults did not.
However, I should note that she didn’t have much competition. Though I am the oldest child of two oldest children, and was produced when my parents were in their very early twenties, the other 3 grandparents were all dead by the time I hit 5.
Maternal grandmother, without a doubt. She’s the only one I really knew. Was active into her old age and lived until just before her 90th birthday in 1995. The family and then myself alone used to visit her at least once a year in Arkansas.
PGF was born in 1876 and died before I was even born, although by only a small margin. (He died and I was born in the 1950s.) MGM I saw only two or three times but remember only once by the time she died when I was 8. MGF I saw a lot, but he was a sick old man and even comatose for several years before he died while I was a teenager. I do remember he was very kind when he was still lucid, but I can’t say he had much of an influence.
It’s neat how this has stalled out at 95 votes!
Hard to say, it is a tie betweeen my MGF and my MGM. Gramps taught me to play checkers, told me not to get tattoos (which he had), and how to smack roll caps with a hammer. Nana taught me how to peel an orange, about the joy of home canned fruit and pickles, and about the power of hugs. A toss-up.
For me it’s an easy choice. Both my grandfathers died before I was born. My maternal grandmother lived across town, my paternal grandmother in another state. MGM all the way for me, because she was the only one I saw regularly.
The maternal grandmother who (as a math teacher with 50 years of experience) futilely tried to “cure” my phobia of math. I got straight As in everything else except math in school, which I failed twice. She told me before she died that I was her greatest challenge, and her greatest disappointment.
Here’s the 100-Voter snapshot:
Which Grandparent has been the biggest influence on you?
M - PGF 9 9.00%
M - PGM 16 16.00%
M - MGF 12 12.00%
M - MGM 18 18.00%
F - PGF 3 3.00%
F - PGM 5 5.00%
F - MGF 5 5.00%
F - MGM 32 32.00%
Voters: 100.
Men as a group
M - PGF 9 16.36%
M - PGM 16 29.09%
M - MGF 12 21.82%
M - MGM 18 32.73%
55
Women as a group
F - PGF 3 6.67%
F - PGM 5 11.11%
F - MGF 5 11.11%
F - MGM 32 71.11%
45
Genders disregarded
PGF 12 12.00%
PGM 21 21.00%
MGF 17 17.00%
MGM 50 50.00%
100
Here’s a side question for those who qualify: How do these statistics apply to you as a grandparent?
Do you fit the pattern or go against it?
I often consider my moms dad more of a father figure than my dad was, so I said him.
Paternal grandfather, but more in a negative sense than a positive one. He was an alcoholic bar-jumper, not a nasty drunk by any stretch, and was perfectly personable when not on the sauce, and he and I got along fine, we had fun with his trainset (until he died when I was 9). After watching his hijinks I vowed never to let alcohol pass my lips (and when my dad-also an alcoholic-had me taste beer when I was 12, the awful taste pretty much clinched it).