NO smoking, NO drinking, NO swearing, NO dancing, NO card playing, NO movies, NO fooling around, NO NO NO NO NO

My family had some very very conservative Christian beliefs. We attended a fundamentalist Bible church that preached the  literal translation of the Bible.  I mean literal as in the earth was created in six 24 hr days. I think I from a very early age had a problem with some of the preaching. I remember distinctly our minister saying  "there were no dinosaurs" and the church would not hire a woman pastor nor have a woman on the board or as a deacon or in any position of power. Really? Some educated and Godly women of the church actually left over that belief. My Mom, who was raised Pentacostal had an even tighter view of the world. You know, "the world" that evil place that we are just passing through on our way to heaven. I remember lots of don'ts and no's. NO smoking, NO drinking, NO drugs, NO swearing, NO dancing, NO card playing, NO movies, NO NO NO. To be fair I do understand the concept of and truly believe that God gave us this one body, the temple if you will, and we are responsible for it. Even in the 50's and 60's it was obvious to most everyone with a brain that smoking and drugs were bad for you and sensible people would avoid them. The same thing with excess drinking, but didn't Jesus turn the water into wine? It always amazed me that all the teatotaling, non smoking Christians had no problem with lining up at the buffet table and eating themselves into heart attack city. I guess a fat temple is okay with the Lord. NO dancing? or movies or card playing? My Dad threw my boyfriend and me out of the house once for playing UNO. My Mom sent me with a note to the school that for religious reasons I was not allowed to dance in gym class. It was square dancing with girls for Pete's sake! I spent lots of time reading my Bible in those early days and never did find a passage that prohibited square dancing.. And boy, did I look and look.

As a teenager my boyfriend took me to the movies. The first movie I ever saw was "Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid" and I think I was already 18. Loved it! But an upbringing of NO NO NO does leave you with a bit of guilt. I remember a friend of my parents who was a psychiatrist once said, "Just because you feel guilty doesn't mean you are'". None the less I kept a record of the movies I had seen on an index card in my purse with the intention of eventually coming clean with my mother. Finally the day came that I had had enough of this silliness. I confronted my Mom."Mom, I want you to explain to me exactly what is wrong  with going to a movie? I will give you that there is a lot of junk out there but there is also lots of good wholesome entertainment.". I made her a deal. "Mom, I want to take you to a good movie of my choice. You watch it with an open mind and if you truly think it is evil I will not go to any more movies as long as I live under your roof." I took her to see "The Sound of Music" on the wide screen.

Dear Mom, of course not only was she convinced........she started crying "it looks just like Norway."
After that the younger ones actually got treated to Charlie Brown movies. It was a big step for Mom who had lived a very very sheltered life. She's been gone over 40 years now but I still can see her eyes well up as she watched the beautiful scenery and Julie Andrews singing and dancing through the birch trees on the mountain.

I never did smoke, do drugs, get into gambling and never went to prom  (so I still can't do even one required slow dance at a wedding). It is probably best though that Mom would never know that I do enjoy a glass of wine now and again. Preferably German Riesling. I think God and Maria von Trapp would approve.

National Ellis Island Family HIstory Day

Today, April 17 has been designated as National Ellis Island Family History Day.

In 1890 then president Benjamin Harrison designated Ellis Island as the first Federal Immigration station. From 1892 to 1954, over twelve million immigrants entered the United States through the portal of Ellis Island, including some of our Swedish ancestors.

CLICK HERE  to view the history of Ellis Island and 

see how our immigrant ancestors entered their new life in the United States

Pop's Place

Our family summer vacations tended to be camping or visiting other family members. We never got much farther than a state away from Chicago. One place I remember distinctly was Pop's Place. It was a small resort in the Wisconsin Dells. Individual cabins sans air conditioning on a small beach. With inflatable inner tubes around our waists Dad would lift us up and throw us in the water or we would go down the big slide into the water.

kids all geared up to fight "injuns"

The late fifties and early sixties were definitely the pre-politically correct era. We would go into the Dells for stores that sold taffy and fudge and where you saw, and of course could buy, all sorts of "Real, Original, Savage Indian Memorabilia". Stores offered feather headdresses, drums, rubber spears and moccasins. We went to shows to see Native Americas in "authentic" full war gear and war paint dance around us in their buckskins. Every little boy wanted a Davey Crockett coonskin cap and even the girls could get a cowboy hat and pair of child size six shooters (cap guns) to pretend we were shooting "Injuns". Wow, that was a time and place far far away. 

We also would go to the large Wisconsin Dells garbage dump where from your car you watched the bears fight over the open garbage. That was a thrill not to be missed. My favorite place was "Storybook Land", a park with fairy tale houses and small childrens rides. Pee Wee golf was another favorite as was riding the Wisconsin Ducks, old WWII amphibious vehicles that toured the Wisconsin river and beautiful Dells scenery.  That was about the extent of the Dells at the time. The fancy, high tech amusement and hugh water parks did not come to the Wisconsin Dells until much later. 

To a city kid, staying at Pop's Place was the big time. Who could ask for anything more?

Dad and we kids at Pop's Place in the early 1960's

Mom and her cats

My Mom was not a typical "crazy cat lady". I don't think she ever had more than one cat at a time. I don't think she ever went looking for cats either. It just seemed that pitiful cats gravitated to her, sensing that she was too kindhearted to turn them away. Mainly sick, hungry flea bitten strays found their way to Mom's door. I remember her washing out gross oozy gunk from the eyes of a kitty. She once pulled over on the expressway because she saw a cat peeking out of a cardboard box on the side of the road. It seems they disappeared just as quickly as they showed up. Feral Cats most likely, who after a good meal and a bath chose to hit the road again. I hated those cats. In our apartment they hid under the dining room table jumping out to bite me in the feet as I passed. I fell asleep some nights tightly holding my covers down as it seemed they chose me to climb under my blankets and sleep with. Why Me? Mom thought maybe because they were independent spirits and did not like the younger kids pulling, petting and carrying them around. So they came to me? She must have got confused with the number of cats because she named almost all of them Susie. Susie #1, Susie #2, Susie #3 and so on. 

My Dad had spent a little time on a farm and had a very different feeling about pets. He felt they did not belong in the house, period. I'm sure he was the one responsible for occasionally "accidentally" opening the screen door and "accidentally" letting one of the Susies out. I remember Mom once convinced my Dad to go the vet with one of the Susies. He just sat with this confused and disgusted look on his face viewing all these folks with their assortment of  animals that they stroked and cooed to. The receptionist came out and called "Susie Kallman, Susie Kallman, you're next". My Dad flipped out,. "This animal is NOT my child do NOT call her Susie Kallman."

Mom with one of her Susies

Only one cat lasted more than a short while. Perhaps Mom broke the losing streak by giving it a name other than Susie. She named him Tico, which was the name of one of our aunts boyfriends. Why? we will never know. I just know that my little brother, then about 4 or 5 adored that fat cat and carried him around the house constantly. Tico didn't seem to mind.

I have never owned a cat (and never will) but both of my sisters are cat people. In fact I am allergic to most cats.......very allergic. I guess it worked to my favor that I never liked them, so refused to handle them and none stayed long enough to start me sniffling. But thinking of all those Susie's now and again does remind me of what a dear kind-hearted mother I once had.

Death of Hanna Matea Gunuldsdatter

Eidanger, Telemark, Norway
This parish page records the death of my second great grandmother Hanna Matea Gunuldsdatter. In the mother to daughter to daughter to daughter link, it was she who passed unto me the mitochondrial haplotype V1. The haplotype that my daughter and grand daughter now carry.
Hanna Matea was born 22 August 1848 in Eidanger. She and my second great grandfather Ole Helleksen had nine children. Gunhild Marie Olsdatter, their third child, was my great grandmother.
Hanna Matea died 3 November 1902. She was 54 years old. Her cause of death was "tæring" or Tuberculosis, a very common cause of death before the advent of antibiotics and still a major illness in the third world. Many, many of my ancestors succumbed to Tuberculosis, some of them much younger than Hanna Matea.

Eidanger, Telemark, Norway deaths 1902

Hanna Matea Gunuldsdatter→Gunhild Marie Olsdatter→Dagmar Gundersen→Grace Sevald→ME

my Great Great Grandmother

Hanna Matea Gunuldsdatter

b. 22 Aug 1848 Eidanger, Telemark, Norway

d. 03 Nov 1902 Eidanger, Telemark, Norway

**click on document to enlarge for easier viewing**
**click HERE to see the document on the Digitalarkivet**

Norwegian Sweaters

My grandmother Dagmar was very talented at knitting and crochet. I still own an afghan than she made for us shortly after we married. Not a dropped stitch. My granddaughters also play with a dolly afghan that their great great grandmother made for my daughter when she was their age. Grandma's true passion however was knitting. Anytime she sat down those needles would be clicking furiously. She could be watching television or talking but she never slowed her pace, never missed her always even stitches. Her item of choice was the traditional Norwegian Sweater. You know the type, they sell them at the Norway Pavilion at Disney World (for an unbelievable sum of money).  All the older gals can be seen wearing one at the "Sons of Norway Lodge" or Syttende Mai (May 17th, Norwegian Constitution Day) festivities in some of the Midwestern States where their Norwegian immigrant ancestors found their new homes as Americans. Grandma's works were traditionally designed, perfectly executed and truly more beautiful than any store-bought version today. In fact, after making sure each of her family had a current version she knit sweaters which were sold at Marshall Field ( a now defunct high-end Chicago department store). She did all the traditional Scandinavian designs, snowflakes, reindeer, etc., in many colors but mainly the traditional red, white, blue and black combinations. I am ashamed to say now that I HATED THOSE SWEATERS.  We each periodically got a new sweater when we outgrew the old and wore them as you would wear a light jacket. Spring and fall we wore our Norwegian Sweaters. Look at the photos below. My mother is wearing hers at the beach. AT THE BEACH! What is that all about? 

Me, my brother, my sister and Mom, in sweaters made with love by Grandma.

I hated those sweaters and to my young eyes felt it made me look like a foreigner. Back in the day parents did not drive their kids the three or four blocks to school, or even accompany them for that matter. When I was in the third and fourth grade I would now and again, after leaving home, take off my sweater and stuff it under a  bush at the Grossinger's house, down the block. On the way home I would dig it out and put it back on. I don't believe Mrs. Grossinger ever told on me either, although she surely noticed. Better to be cold than have the world think you were "off the boat".

When I visited my grandmother, in my thirties, she insisted on teaching me the skill of the Norwegian sweater. I did have a bit more appreciation for them but mainly I wanted to please the grandma I loved. Although I fumbled through (she fixed my too tight stitches and errors) and produced sweaters for my two kids, if I was honest I have to say they were not near the quality of Grandma's and I just found no pleasure in the process. It doesn't help that to this day my now grown kids laugh at those sweaters and the photo I had taken of them in those sweaters to send home to grandma.

Don't care what THEY say, I think they look cute

I am turning 65 this month. I can't deny any longer that I am a sentimental senior just like the old gals at the "Sons of Norway" lodge. I long for one of her sweaters now, itching my neck and warming these old bones. This summer my hubby and I are taking a couple of our grandkids to Disney World so I guess I could pick up one at the Norway pavilion at Epcot Center. I have also seen them online and I could afford it if I really wanted to. But I don't.

It wouldn't have been made by Grandma.