Henrietta Amelia Hansson

I have a copy of a book with 144 pages related to that history all in Swedish. One relative Gude Axelson Giedde whose father dates to the late 1400’s from Trondheim Norway, was a pupil of Martin Luther, later military officer to King Kristan III of Denmark, a member of the Swedish Riksdag (Parliament), and brought the reformation doctrine to Kville, Sweden. We were told the story while visiting the church of one minister in our linage at the Naverstad church that when one of his daughter had become pregnant out of wedlock, in a harsh and puritanical manner he instructed his daughter (with infant?) to walk into nearby Lake Bullaren and not come back. In her fear of the wrath of God and obedience she walked into the lake and drowned. Ministers were ritualistically strict and harshly authoritarian. This was in part due to their religious moralistic belief and legal authority in their jurisdiction as also seen at the same time in early Massachusetts colonies.

In that church the list of their names is prominently listed on a board, as we saw on a visit, with multiple different spellings all listing the same family linage – Giedde, Gedda, Giette, Giädde, and etc. Her mother was Fanny Gedda and when she married Hans Trulsson as told by my mother, she was essentially ostracized from the family by her minister father when she married a man outside their approved family stature. Grandma led a spartan life on a farm as she grew up in a family of four sisters and three brothers but one brother and one sister died during their first year of life.

She talked many times about skating as a girl on the lake in the winter and swimming in and across the lake in the summer. It is a beautiful and picturesque lake for which we have several pictures. She came to America on 29 May, 1896 on the Cunard Lines SS Lucania arriving on May 29, 1896 together with three more girls from Bullaren and stated she was going to Chicago. Grandma worked as a domestic to a wealthy family in the Chicago area before getting married. She apparently met Otto in a Swedish social club or circle in the area. Emma married another Swedish immigrant Gilbert ? Johnson and lived thereafter in Joliet Illinois. She retained contact a visits with her sister and family during most of her life.

I spent more time with my mother’s parents and knew them better than my father’s parents. My grandfather was born Otto Wilhelm Wahlberg on 24 February 1874 in an area between the two large lakes of southern Sweden in a village called Fullösa. He died on 10 August 1949 in a hospital in Mora Minnesota and is buried Otto and Amelia were married on 31 November 1900 or 1901 in Joliet Illinois. Their first home was there and my mother was born there on 19 May 1902. Clinton was born on 01 May 1906 also during the years they lived in Joliet Illinois.

Grandfather had some health difficulties perhaps from working in the fumes or dust of a steel mill. Word of other opportunities abounded so when my mother was seven years old, the family packed up and headed for Littleton Colorado near Denver. A newspaper announcing the death of Amelia Wahlberg on Nov 12, 1964 had them moving to Colorado in 1909 and to Redtop in 1913.[1]

There they added to their family two boys Clarence on 6 July 1909 and Grant on 12 July 1912 - more on my uncles elsewhere herein. On a small plot of land in Littleton they raised navy beans for a military market and perhaps other cash crops.

The first year was good but mother said my grandfather developed what was called Saint Vitus dance manifested by severe shakiness. This illness is a feature of acute rheumatic fever and in a complete syndrome or developed case is characterized by a strep sore throat, weakness, swollen and tender large joints, shaking and fever. I suspect this illness limited his working ability. This is significant in that in his later years he easily became fatigued and short of breath on exertion. In his final illness he was found to have severe rheumatic valvular disease with mitral stenosis and an enlarged left atrium.
In that era a major cause of valvular heart disease was earlier bouts of acute rheumatic fever often in childhood or as a young adult. As I put together his demise, from this he presumably developed mural blood clots in the left atrium, as a well known complication of mitral stenosis. Some clots broke off and embolized to the mesenteric arteries supplying his small intestines. This cut off the blood supply and created gangrene in a segment of his bowel. Surgery in Mora Hospital was a last ditch effort to save him.

He died following complications of surgical resection of the gangrenous segment of his small intestines which is usually an infection with sepsis shock. His demise fit this very well. I now postulate that he had rheumatic fever which is often recurrent while possibly in Joliet steel mills, most certainly while in Colorado or more probably both. His symptoms may have prompted their move to the clean air of Colorado. This illness resulted in his heart valvular disease of mitral stenosis that progressed during his lifetime. The valvular disease eventually lead to his demise with the mitral stenosis causing enlargement of his left atrium leading to mural thrombi and embolized mesenteric thrombosis and infarction.

During their last three or four years in Colorado their cash bean crop was hailed out and prospects became bleak. So they searched for better opportunities.
With word of sections of land for sale by the government near Redtop Minnesota, they again packed up all they could take and went by train to Redtop about seven miles northeast of Isle Minnesota in 1913. At that time Grant was less than one year old and my mother as the oldest was nine. Redtop is now an almost disserted community. Redtop at that time was a very prosperous potato farming community on marginal farmland that had to be cleared for farming.

They first stayed in the third floor attic upstairs of a private either Hagberg or Kallberg home in Redtop until a section of land was purchased and a small house could be built. My mother remembers that their family of six was crowded together in a small upstairs space. He started on 80 acres raising predominantly potatoes. The land was cut on the northwest corner by the railroad and 40 acres were added to the south.
Their new land and home was one mile southwest of Redtop and adjacent to the railroad tracks that ran through Isle and Redtop to Duluth Minnesota. At the time my mother left home, their home had no front porch and was covered by black tar paper before it was finally stuccoed. As money was earned the home was enlarged and improved in stages over the years. He was never known to have a loan or owe anyone anything. It eventually became an impressive well appointed good size farm house that would be a proud farm home today.

Henrietta´s husband Otto Wahlberg

It had three upstairs bedrooms, a master bedroom downstairs off a large parlor, a large kitchen, a separate dinning room, back entry area with an icebox and wood bin, a space under the stairs that became a bath room, and a large glassed in front porch across the entire front of the house. The basement had a root cellar and cistern into which rain water was collected. When I was a boy the farm included a large magnificent large classical barn with hayloft, large adjacent silo, and separate milk room and granary, a chicken coup, machinery shed, windmill, well and ice house. The farm had 160 acres of which half were fields for crops or pasture and half woods or swamp land. One hay field called the south 40 was through the woods to the southeast quadrant. My cousin Wallace remembers him as exquisitely proud of his land and would even on a Sunday afternoon walk the perimeter of his land.

Land ownership created a sense of pride and self worth as it does for many today.

The first phase of the house was built in the summer of 1913. [2] The majestic farm my grandparents created basically from a wooded section of land is a tribute to their remarkable life of work and dedication to family and survival. My grandmother in latter life expressed her pride in her life and the farm that she and grandfather built. She was amazed by all the new conveniences as they came along such as electric lights, washing machines, gas stoves, refrigerators, freezers and electric appliances – all we now take for granted. She was also proud of her children and grandchildren without any exceptions. She believed that God had been good to her and was prayerfully grateful.

The information about Henrietta Amelia have we received from her grandson, Maynard Jacobson.
Thank you so much Maynard, for letting us know about Henrietta´s life in America.