I’ve interviewed hundreds of people during my career as a reporter, a prosecutor, and a lawyer. I’ve interviewed a sitting vice-president of the United States, an Academy Award-winning actress, and many, many criminals. I once got a criminal defendant to confess during a trial, and I helped win two people’s freedom just by asking some questions that no one apparently had asked before.

Most of the time, I prepare for my interviews by doing some advance research and by writing an outline with some questions that I plan to ask and maybe some objects or documents that I want to ask about.

I use those outlines to help get the interview started, but I do not treat them like a script and am not bound by them.

You can record the interviews using Zoom (or voice memos or even some paper). Keep the recordings for your family, but I encourage you to take a few minutes to put some stories into your own words and to share them with your friends (virtually or in real life). Watching live, unedited interviews usually is not as exciting as it seems on TV, and processing the stories this way will help your understanding of the stories and help you reach more people.

Here are some tips to get started as well as some outlines to cover some specific areas. And if you want some help, email me at slee@ourapaheritage.com - I’d love to help interview some of your parents and grandparents with you!