Sorry for your loss. I'm glad you got to speak with him in the time you had.
I recorded my mother telling stories of her childhood, her parents, and grandparents when she was growing up in Oklahoma. I captured some great stories about how my ancestors traded with Native Americans, and when an uprising came, their farm was spared when all others were burned down, how my great grandmother fought off a mountain lion that came in the cabin when she was ironing clothes (she killed it by beating it with an iron, which is a family heirloom now), how my grandmother lost two brothers to the influenza epidemic, how my mother collected milk bottle caps to get tickets to the matinee as a teenager...
So many stories, and I know I barely scratched the surface. If you are reading this, and haven't gotten your family members to tell the stories, not only of their own lives, but of their parents, grandparents, do it now.
I recorded my mother telling stories of her childhood, her parents, and grandparents when she was growing up in Oklahoma. I captured some great stories about how my ancestors traded with Native Americans, and when an uprising came, their farm was spared when all others were burned down, how my great grandmother fought off a mountain lion that came in the cabin when she was ironing clothes (she killed it by beating it with an iron, which is a family heirloom now), how my grandmother lost two brothers to the influenza epidemic, how my mother collected milk bottle caps to get tickets to the matinee as a teenager...
So many stories, and I know I barely scratched the surface. If you are reading this, and haven't gotten your family members to tell the stories, not only of their own lives, but of their parents, grandparents, do it now.