Week 5 Far Away

Week Five Far Away

My father left home in Sweden when he was 16.  I was born when he was 51.  By then, any
remembrances of his home, parents or siblings  were long buried in the recesses of his mind.  I was the last child born to a generation of  six siblings, three of whom came to American, three who stayed home. My oldest cousin was born in 1904; I was born in 1945, a 44 year spread.

I grew up hearing a few vague family stories, but my perception of them, or where they were was remote.  I didn't take a plane trip until I was in college, and I had no concept of where
Sweden was, or what it took to get there.  And frankly, it didn't occur to me at the time to wonder.
What I heard were just stories, not attached to real people.

The same was true of the two other  brothers who came to the United States. One of my uncles in the States died in 1931, long before I was born.    The  oldest uncle lived so far away, we never saw him.  And his children, my cousins, left home in the 1930's.  So, growing up, it was my father, mother, three much older sisters, one aunt and my maternal grandparents. Eight people in the universe that was my family.

It wasn't until 1993, when my mother was ill that she told me of a box containing papers of my father's she had left in the attic of the family home.  It had been 26 years since she had moved from that house, but when I contacted the owners, the box was still there!   In it were six letters from
Sweden.  All were written in Swedish. After my father left in 1909, the language was somewhat
standardized to the point that letters written in the 1930's and 1950's were not easy to translate.  I
had a stroke of luck when I took them to the House of Sweden in Balboa Park in San Diego and found an elderly lady who made the translations.

Two were from my grandparents, written in the 1930's.  And three were from my Uncle Edvin, who was six years old when my father immigrated.  In those letters, he included pictures of his children and wife and begged my father to come visit.  Reading those letters build a fire in my soul.  Who could I find,  who was still living?  How would I find them?  Would anyone even know who we were?

The letters had postmarks on them. I bought a huge map of Sweden, got out my magnifying glass, and began to look at every little village name.  Fortunately, I started in the south on the map,  since there are tens of thousands of little hamlets, some with only one house in them.  I soon came across the name of the town on the postmarks!  Now what?

I took a genealogy course and soon learned that the country is divided into provinces.  And the province my father came from was Skane.  I found out how to address a letter, and in the early fall of 1993,  wrote a letter to the church in Hammenhog Sweden, only asking if my grandparents were buried there.

Coming home a few weeks later from a Thanksgiving trip, I got the mail---- and there was a letter from Sweden!  I sat and stared at it for a long time, almost afraid to open it.  Inside was a note from a relative, the only relative who still went to that church!  It had been 95 years since my oldest uncle had left for American, 85 since my father and other uncle left.  I wanted to rush to the airport and
leave right then!

The trip actually did happen, in the summer of 1994.  The relative who wrote to me began to reach out to others she thought she was related to.  I went for Midsommer, the celebration of the longest
day of the year.  And I met fourteen living first cousins, most of whom were in their 80's!  One of
the first ones I met was in a nursing home.  As I approached him, he looked at me wonderingly, and
said, "what took you so long?"   It was then I realized I had never been that far away all along.    I fact, I was home!


My grandparents - Wilhelm and Kristine Akerberg