Want to give your family one of the most enduring Christmas gifts of their life (and perhaps yours) for very little money?
Then do an oral audio or video “history” of the life of the oldest person in your family. I did an audio history with an elderly grandmother and discovered secrets I would never have known otherwise. Now, generations later, I am still asked for copies of the tape as new generations of the family want to learn of their past. It was one of the best ideas I ever had.
My grandmother lived a life that spanned the 20th Century. She was born in 1900 and died at the end of the century. To do the series of audio interviews, I used a published time line of the century I bought in a bookstore. It featured highlights from each year of dance, music, cooking, inventions — whatever was popular at the time.
When I asked her what dance she did when she was 16, she answered the Cakewalk. “Honey, I was the Cakewalk champion,” she told me. “I ran off and got married after a cakewalk.”
This was news to everyone!