76-year-old Scottish woman Cath Bowie has 20,000 followers on Twitch, where she mainly plays Fortnite. The grandmother loves her community, but says she faced a lot of negativity, especially in the beginning.
What kind of streamer is this? The 76-year-old Scottish Cath Bowie is on YouTube and Twitch as GrumpyGran1948. On the streaming platform she shows almost exclusively Fortnite, where an average of around 80 people watched her in September 2024, and in August at the peak even 3,000 people tuned in at the same time (via SullyGnome).
In an interview with Independent, Bowie spoke about her passion and the dark side of Twitch.
GrumpyGran1948 isn’t the only sprightly pensioner on Twitch:
Twitch: 92-year-old plays substitute grandma for you, reads fairy tales and tells stories
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“I will never forget this day”
How did the love for Fortnite come about? Even before Fortnite, Bowie was a real gaming grandmother and played popular games like Mario Kart, FIFA and Minecraft with her grandchildren. However, when her grandson Lewis showed her the then brand new Fortnite in 2017, the now 76-year-old was done for:
I went into my grandson’s room where he was playing on his PS4 and I saw Fortnite. Of course I didn’t know what it was back then, he had to explain to me, and people talk about love at first sight. Well, that’s really it for me.
Cath Bowie via Independent
The Twitch streamer says she was completely fascinated by the game from the first moment. When she’s old, says the 76-year-old, she will fondly remember her Fortnite game. That was a day that she will never forget.
Afterwards, Bowie took every opportunity to play on her grandson’s account before buying a PS4 and creating her own. She eventually started showing her gameplay on her Twitch channel, where she now has 20,000 followers.
Here you can see GrumpyGran1948 in action:
Fortnite grandma loves her community, but was surprised by toxicity on Twitch
What experiences did she have on Twitch? Bowie is proud of the community she has built on Twitch. There is constant conversation there and everyone is friendly to each other. “Aside from my husband, this is my life,” said the Fortnite grandma.
I’ve had people join me who didn’t know each other, and now they’re playing together after I finish my stream, or before. They are fantastic, I just love my community.
What I really like is, some people have really, really bad days in their lives. Some people are not doing so well, they may have problems, and there is always someone there to support them.
But things weren’t always so loving. As Bowie reports, she was surprised by the “toxicity” that hit her, especially at the beginning. However, she now has people who look after her and moderate content so that her community remains a pleasant place.
GrumpyGran1948’s latest prank is a partnership with Ikea for their Brännboll gaming collection. Now she has a room completely furnished with the Swedish furniture store’s gaming furniture. She’s sure her grandson will be green with envy when he sees all of his grandma’s cool stuff for Christmas.
Shirley Curry, affectionately called “Skyrim grandma” by fans, also showed that you can still have fun gaming even at an older age. But after 9 years on YouTube and over 2,000 videos, it was over: 88-year-old says goodbye to a million fans on YouTube and the role-playing game Skyrim: “Tired and bored”