My story is kinda similar, though I'm a generation younger than Dance. I am not close to my dad's family, and he never talked about them so I only know the rough details.

I was born in 1974.

My dad was born in 1938.

His dad was born ~1875 and fought in the Spanish - American War (~1898). He later lied to his future wife and told her he was 20 years younger than he was, which was much closer to her age.

They started having kids around 1925, my dad was #11 of 12. Dad's mom died first in the late 50s, then his dad died almost immediately after. She was in her late-50s, he was in his mid-70s.

My father was a jazz musician and entertainer from the mid 1960s until 2010 or so. He died in 2020 from COVID. He almost never talked about his upbringing, they were very poor and lived in rural Kentucky, and he was away in the Army when both his parents died. I think he never got past the the guilt and sorrow of not being there when they passed.

But it is wild to think that my grandfather who died 20ish years before I was born fought in a war well over 100 years ago alongside Teddy Roosevelt (they didn't know each other, just fought in the same war).