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Any Swedes here?

Ultradog MN

Ultradog MN

Well-known Member
Location
Twin Cities
Besides Mr. Lund?
Minnesota saw a huge influx of folks from all of Scandinavia from the 1880s till the 1930s or so.
Lots of Swedes, Norweigians, Finlanders, a few Danes.
I suppose because our cold didn't scare them off.
Still a lot of Scandinavian festivals in the summer and groups of folks interested in preserving their heritage here.
The Swedes are well represented.
There is a place called the American Swedish Institute here in Minneapolis.
Kind of a hoity toity museum now days.
Was built in a huge old mansion near downtown.
King Carl XVI Gustaf of Sweden always drops by there for a visit when he's in town.
Anyway, they have a Swedish fiddle music group called a Spelmanslag that's affiliated with the museum.
They put on concerts here and there and a few times a year they put on free concerts.
My wife has been a member of the fiddle group for at least 25 years so I went to their free concert this afternoon.
There were only about 20 players today as this was a small offsite concert in a local church.
The full group has about 35 or 40 fiddlers.
But you get even 20 fiddle players all bending their bows at the same time (plus a guest guitarist and a couple of other instruments that sat in for a couple of tunes) and boy oh boy does that fill a room with sound.
Waltzes, Mazurkas, Polkas, most of them lively, some of them haunting, all of them sure get you to tapping your toes.
Them Swedes are ok in my book.
Here's a couple of them playing for a promotional video.
Gives you an idea of their sound.


<iframe width="560" height="315" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/aeho2xLIKpI" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>
 
My mom is Swedish. She grew up just outside of Duluth. My grandpa came over on the boat as a young child in, I believe, 1901. We visited there probably 15 years ago as kids for a family vacation. What used to be farmland when mom was growing up was all wooded now. It took her some time to recognize her father's old farm since everything was so grown up. The family name was Lund.
 
Oh,you said anybody but me didn't you? LOL
Ya,they came over in 1881.
I'm probably the only one on here who likes ABBA.
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Less chance of getting homesick if you bring home with you I guess. The two old gals in the front row center are twins. My Great Grandmother and her twin sister.
 
I"m Swedish, my Mother"s family came over when she was two years old and my father was 1st generation here. Does anyone else out there have a bit of the Viking that wants to come out once in a while.
 
Great sound. I'd love to see them some time. We're going to see a group from Ireland Thursday night,but I guess us poor folks here in Michigan can't afford a good Swedish group like that. lol
 
Now you sound like Thoger. He said if Sweden was a bigger country they'd rule the world (again). lol
 
Well I am mostly German but have a tad bit of Swede in me. My dads family moved from Germany to MN way back when. Bittener and Marg are 2 of the family names and last I knew there where a number of both still in MN
 
Not Swedish, but I did enjoy the music Jerry.
I'd love to see them play in person!

Randy, for some reason you just don't strike me as a Dancing Queen LOL
 
Yep, 3/4's Swede. Both grandfathers left Sweden at age 18. I've wore out 3 Volvos, working on the fourth. Palt and pickled herring are favourites of mine.
 
My mother was born in Sweden in an area about 40 miles south of Gotenburg near the western coast of Sweden in 1924. Her father had already emmigrated to US and worked hard as a brick tender in Chicago to make enough money to pay for the passage of his 2 children and wife. They came through Ellis Island in 1926 (a horrible experience for them). My Grandmother could not speak any English and they pulled all of her teeth at Ellis Island (so called medical necessity). She travelled alone with a 2 year old and a 4 year old on the trains to Chicago in a very hurting state to move into a cramped apartment in Chicago with other relatives. During the depression, Grandpa became the custodian for a number of apartment buildings, a job that required shoveling snow from all decks and staircases and sidewalks, and tending all the coal fired boilers (no stokers), removing garbage and vacuuming all hallways and fixing everything that needed fixing. For that he got a small 1 bedroom apt next to the boiler room of one unit and a small amount of pay. But they considered this a good life compared to the extreme poverty of relatives who stayed in Sweden. Too many crops had failed in Sweden and people were dying of starvation.

In 2002, my wife and I visited the home area of Sweden and with help of a great aunt, I was able to walk on the farm lands of both great grandfathers. Our cousin Lars was reconstructing the house my mother was born in, and I was treated to a complete tour including the attic. I was given some of the tools GG built the house with.

My mother was a member of the S.I. and had made the full holiday dress costume, and participated in the holiday events. She passed away in 2001.

Paul in MN
 
My Grandpa on Mom's side Ole Nesvold came from Norway, He farmed in North Dakota, around Minot. Mom would tell me how cold it was on the farm in the winter. Dad's side, great grand father came from Germany. Never met my grand pa on mom's side, he died in ND. My grand pa on Dad's side left the family,and moved on, when Dad was young. only seen him a few times. Both grand mothers lived in separate houses on the farm. Stan
 
My mother was Swedish....She grew up 4 miles from Lindsborg,Kansas which is the most Swedish town in the state.....She passed away in January 2007 just short of her 99th birthday....Quite often at family reunions her brothers and sisters would all sing in Swedish....They are all gone now except for one aunt whom is 96..
 
No Swedish here, mostly Austrian-German on Dad's side and pure English on Mom's. Dad's family came over about 1760 and Mom's around 1600. But I loved the music and the traditions--keep it going!
 
My grandfather was from Norway, if I remember correctly he came over to the US when he was a young man, fought in WW1 and became a citizen after that. He always used to count on his fingers in Norwegian...of course to a little kid, that sounded neat.
 
I was once asked by a neighbor what nationality I was and I had to think about all of them for a minute and then I reply. I am German-French-Irish and Norwegian. He replied THANK GOD your not SWEDE. In my wifes' family they had to shoot one to start a graveyard.
 
Depends how you want to look at it. Any history related to me by Dad's side indicates German pretty far back. One time a cousin received one of those solicitations by mail on genealogy and what the cousin was told was that one branch came down from Sweden after one of the plagues during the Middle Ages by invitation as the local Germans were looking for "stock" to help repopulate. I am not too sure if that was a story cooked up by the service to make sure "we got out money's worth" or if there is some validity to it. I'll admit by looking at Dad and pictures of Grandpa that they have that look in terms of eyes and forehead or maybe just my imagination is working overtime. Anybody else get a similar report as their ancestors immigrated southward?
 
A Swede, a Dane and a Norwegian comitted a horiffic crime, moral turpitude. They were caught and sentenced to death. They were given 1 last wish. The Swede said he wanted to give a speech, the longest one he ever gave ,about everything he has expertese in. The Norwegian wanted lutefisk as his last meal. The Dane's request was that he be killed before the Swede started to talk and the Norwegian started to eat.
 
Mom spoke Finnish, but to my surprise, after her death my Belgian dad said he felt she was a Finn speaking Swede, Isaacson.
 
My Mom and Dad were both born in Sweden. He in '99 and she in '06. Came over in the early 20's to the Chicago area, met and married, and raised 3 sons.
 
Dog, Actually the US government put out flyers advertising homesteading in MN. The typical 160 land grants and in the flyers described MN winters as "brisk". So they lied to get people to settle up here. It happened at a time when a large number of immigrants were coming from the Scandinavian countries and the Germany/Poland and Romanian areas. It was about the only land grants going on at the time. My family wound up in WI and the New Prague MN areas from the Bavarian/Bohemia area. YA, Swedes, Norskies, Fins, Luger heads (German) Poles and more up here. My last name is Bohemian and my Grand Father's family came to the US when he was 3. He was 1/2 Bohemian and 1/2 German.

Rick
 
Small percentage of Swede... mostly Kraut - with enough other stuff mixed in to officially make us mutts. LOL.

Nice music... envisioned my parents dancing to that while I listened. The always loved to dance to a Waltz or a Polka.
 
Very neat music. Play violin myself at kind of an ameture level. Never got into playing swedish folk music though. However I am about 1/2 swede. been here 4 generations on dads side, and farther back on my moms side. Great grandpa was born in 1851, came on the boat in 79, and finally settled on his own farm in 1890. Still live on the same place and own part of it. Was alot of swedes settled locally on farms, but fewer and fewer swedes remain in my area today.
 
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