Above: A few of my classmates walking in or out. If we don't have roses in our hands the photo was Sunday afternoon, we had the roses for Graduation night. We had a baccalaureate service on Sunday (the afternoon after prom I might add, what were they thinking!) Of course, that was in the days when prayer was legal at school events, it's nuts to think prayer can't be included now! Graduation followed on Wednesday evening.Kids didn't attend other classmates parties, they were busy at their own! It was a time for family and friends. Graduating in the Bicentennial year, we were thick into the red, white, and blue. We just had to work in red into the blue robes and white caps and did that with red tipped white roses. Mothers all tried to work in blue to the lunch, cake or punch. If I remember right we had cake with red roses on top, frozen fruit cups, macaroni salad, sandwiches, mints, nuts and punch at my open house. We alternated the napkins blue and white.
Sunday, May 17, 2009
Graduation Time
Our Seniors are done with school and the open house graduation parties are in full swing but they don't have graduation exercises until next Sunday. Made me think back to my own graduation, back in 1976 from good ole West Lyon High School of Inwood, IA. It was a tradition to wear the school choir robes which were blue and purchase our motar boards/hats. Girls got a graduation dress and guys usually got a suit for graduation. Our class was short money for big bouquets of flowers for the stage and I remember making tissue paper roses in the art room which we put in two huge bouquets on the stage. We were so proud no one in the crowd at a distance knew they were fake.
Above: A few of my classmates walking in or out. If we don't have roses in our hands the photo was Sunday afternoon, we had the roses for Graduation night. We had a baccalaureate service on Sunday (the afternoon after prom I might add, what were they thinking!) Of course, that was in the days when prayer was legal at school events, it's nuts to think prayer can't be included now! Graduation followed on Wednesday evening.Kids didn't attend other classmates parties, they were busy at their own! It was a time for family and friends. Graduating in the Bicentennial year, we were thick into the red, white, and blue. We just had to work in red into the blue robes and white caps and did that with red tipped white roses. Mothers all tried to work in blue to the lunch, cake or punch. If I remember right we had cake with red roses on top, frozen fruit cups, macaroni salad, sandwiches, mints, nuts and punch at my open house. We alternated the napkins blue and white.
Above: A few of my classmates walking in or out. If we don't have roses in our hands the photo was Sunday afternoon, we had the roses for Graduation night. We had a baccalaureate service on Sunday (the afternoon after prom I might add, what were they thinking!) Of course, that was in the days when prayer was legal at school events, it's nuts to think prayer can't be included now! Graduation followed on Wednesday evening.Kids didn't attend other classmates parties, they were busy at their own! It was a time for family and friends. Graduating in the Bicentennial year, we were thick into the red, white, and blue. We just had to work in red into the blue robes and white caps and did that with red tipped white roses. Mothers all tried to work in blue to the lunch, cake or punch. If I remember right we had cake with red roses on top, frozen fruit cups, macaroni salad, sandwiches, mints, nuts and punch at my open house. We alternated the napkins blue and white.
Friday, May 15, 2009
Denver, Iowa
I took my photography students downtown in April to take some photos. We stood in one spot and then took photos in a 180 degree view from one spot. I choose to take photos of some of the older buildings in town. It looks very spread out but these buildings are actually much closer together. I took 27 pictures to make up this one view at the intersection of Main St. and Logan Ave.
Check out our class blog, Digital Intentions, to see some of the students work.
Check out our class blog, Digital Intentions, to see some of the students work.
Tuesday, May 12, 2009
Great Great Grandma Carolina
Piecing together family history comes from many sources. I find it interesting to gather little tidbits of information to make a person from the past come to life to those of us who never met them.
This is a lamp of my Great Great Grandma Carolina (Gustafsdotter) Swanson's that I have. My Great Uncle Elmer Swanson told Dad he remembered her softening wax by the heat of that lamp to put on her feet, supposedly to protect corns or sore spots on her feet.
Their first winter on the Dakota prairie her husband Karl went to work chopping wood thirty miles south of Sioux City and left his family with half a sack of flour and a little corn. It was Carolina and four children, ranging in ages of an infant under one to my Great Grandfather Charley age 8. They used corn soup to live on. The earth from the sod had sunk down from the roof and Indians would come peering down into the sod house. Carolina kept an ax beside her bed. The Indians never hurt them. I imagine they were mostly curious.
Imagine the cramped cold dugout that winter, alone with the children and her thoughts of what had they gotten themselves into.
Carolina suggested to her husband, tying a rope from the log house to the barn, as a guideline so he could find and feed his livestock during blinding blizzards.
Granddaughter Helen (of Wheaton, IL) remembered in a letter to her cousin Mabel Swanson, "Grandma would get out her pipe and pull all the shades then I would curl up at her feet and she would talk and talk about those days. My only regret now is that I hadn't encouraged more of it." (referring to stories in a booklet written by her grandchildren about her son, my Great Grandfather Charley Swanson, "C.T.S. Pioneer Days")
In these days it's hard to believe a woman pulling out a pipe to smoke, but one can only wonder when she started smoking and how often. Oh to have heard those stories of this Swedish immigrant/pioneer.
Grandma Carolina was living with Mrs. Andrew Anderson in Rowena, SD when the Andersons got their first radio. While getting supper one evening Carolina was serious when she thought Mrs. Anderson should feed that man in the box too! (as told by Melvin Swanson)
Oh what would she think if our lives now!
Here is her obituary:
PIONEER DIES AT AGE OF 92
Dayton Township Woman Came to County in 1871; Funeral at Sioux Falls
DAYTON - (Special to The News) - Mrs. Caroline Swanson, age 92, who settled in Dayton township in 1871, died at the Andrew Anderson home near Rowena, S.D., on Wednesday night where she had been residing the past year. (Died Mar 16, 1932)
Mrs. Swanson was born and married in Sweden, coming to the United States in 1869. In 1871 they traveled by boat down the Mississippi at Lansing, IA and there began a westward journey by team, ultimately terminating in Lincoln County of Dakota Territory. For several years after arriving in this section, they dwelt in a sod house and withstood the many other hardships which were common to the pioneers.
Mr. Swanson died 41 years ago and five children preceded Mrs. Swanson in death. Surviving are four children, Charles T. of Granite, Ia.; Mrs. Phillip Jacobson of Rowena; Mrs. August Westling of Sioux Falls and August Swanson of Dayton Township; 28 grand children and 22 great grand children.
The funeral services were held on Saturday at Sioux Falls, officiated by the Rev. J.H. Ford of Beaver Valley church. Interment was at the Lutheran cemetery northeast of Canton, beside her other loved ones. Six grandsons acted as pall bearers. Mrs. Swanson left Dayton homestead a number of years ago living for a while in Canton before moving to Sioux Falls where she spent a number of years. To the writer’s knowledge she was the last of the very oldest pioneers who settled these parts.
Funeral services will be held at 2 o’clock Saturday afternoon.
This is a lamp of my Great Great Grandma Carolina (Gustafsdotter) Swanson's that I have. My Great Uncle Elmer Swanson told Dad he remembered her softening wax by the heat of that lamp to put on her feet, supposedly to protect corns or sore spots on her feet.
Their first winter on the Dakota prairie her husband Karl went to work chopping wood thirty miles south of Sioux City and left his family with half a sack of flour and a little corn. It was Carolina and four children, ranging in ages of an infant under one to my Great Grandfather Charley age 8. They used corn soup to live on. The earth from the sod had sunk down from the roof and Indians would come peering down into the sod house. Carolina kept an ax beside her bed. The Indians never hurt them. I imagine they were mostly curious.
Imagine the cramped cold dugout that winter, alone with the children and her thoughts of what had they gotten themselves into.
Carolina suggested to her husband, tying a rope from the log house to the barn, as a guideline so he could find and feed his livestock during blinding blizzards.
Granddaughter Helen (of Wheaton, IL) remembered in a letter to her cousin Mabel Swanson, "Grandma would get out her pipe and pull all the shades then I would curl up at her feet and she would talk and talk about those days. My only regret now is that I hadn't encouraged more of it." (referring to stories in a booklet written by her grandchildren about her son, my Great Grandfather Charley Swanson, "C.T.S. Pioneer Days")In these days it's hard to believe a woman pulling out a pipe to smoke, but one can only wonder when she started smoking and how often. Oh to have heard those stories of this Swedish immigrant/pioneer.
Grandma Carolina was living with Mrs. Andrew Anderson in Rowena, SD when the Andersons got their first radio. While getting supper one evening Carolina was serious when she thought Mrs. Anderson should feed that man in the box too! (as told by Melvin Swanson)
Oh what would she think if our lives now!
Here is her obituary:
PIONEER DIES AT AGE OF 92
Dayton Township Woman Came to County in 1871; Funeral at Sioux Falls
DAYTON - (Special to The News) - Mrs. Caroline Swanson, age 92, who settled in Dayton township in 1871, died at the Andrew Anderson home near Rowena, S.D., on Wednesday night where she had been residing the past year. (Died Mar 16, 1932)
Mrs. Swanson was born and married in Sweden, coming to the United States in 1869. In 1871 they traveled by boat down the Mississippi at Lansing, IA and there began a westward journey by team, ultimately terminating in Lincoln County of Dakota Territory. For several years after arriving in this section, they dwelt in a sod house and withstood the many other hardships which were common to the pioneers.
Mr. Swanson died 41 years ago and five children preceded Mrs. Swanson in death. Surviving are four children, Charles T. of Granite, Ia.; Mrs. Phillip Jacobson of Rowena; Mrs. August Westling of Sioux Falls and August Swanson of Dayton Township; 28 grand children and 22 great grand children.
The funeral services were held on Saturday at Sioux Falls, officiated by the Rev. J.H. Ford of Beaver Valley church. Interment was at the Lutheran cemetery northeast of Canton, beside her other loved ones. Six grandsons acted as pall bearers. Mrs. Swanson left Dayton homestead a number of years ago living for a while in Canton before moving to Sioux Falls where she spent a number of years. To the writer’s knowledge she was the last of the very oldest pioneers who settled these parts.
Funeral services will be held at 2 o’clock Saturday afternoon.
Saturday, May 9, 2009
Happy Mother's Day
Thursday, May 7, 2009
Quotes to Ponder
I love quotes... A friend passed these quotes on to me today.
The single biggest problem with communication is the illusion that it has taken place. George Bernard Shaw
Everything that works at (insert your school, business, organization name here) is because of the relationships of those involved. Everything that doesn't work at (insert the same school, business, organization name here) is because of the relationships of those involved.
Makes you think... communication and relationship building are so important yet they are often the things we take for granted, until they aren't there.
The single biggest problem with communication is the illusion that it has taken place. George Bernard ShawEverything that works at (insert your school, business, organization name here) is because of the relationships of those involved. Everything that doesn't work at (insert the same school, business, organization name here) is because of the relationships of those involved.
Makes you think... communication and relationship building are so important yet they are often the things we take for granted, until they aren't there.
Monday, May 4, 2009
Johnson Reunion 2009
Descendants of Andrew and Albertina Johnson (Anders and Albertina Jönsson) met this weekend in Monroe, South Dakota. I didn't get to attend, but here are some photos from the gathering shared with me by cousins Shirley and Teresa. I don't know all of these people, but in my genealogy program, so may need some help with names on a few.
Left: Karen & Paul Hildring & granddaughter Tashley.Right: Calvin & Darlene Johnson
Left: Gil & Iola HauganRight: Kay Langin, Sharon Schwartz, & Luella (Haugan) Lacey
Left: Paul & Karen HildringRight: Lyle & Sharon (Berg) Schwartz
Left: The hosts Gene & Pat BergRight: Ed Langin
Left: Shirley Scott, Kay L., Gil H., & Luella L.Right: Berg Sisters; Judy P., Granddaughter Cassie, Sharon S., Teresa Berg
Left: Amy (Pietz) Moncur, Cassie Jo & CarrieRight: Mike Larsen and Judy (Berg) Pietz
Left: Eunice & Ray HauganRight: Linda (Langin) Langner, Mike Larsen, Jackie (Larsen) Newcomb
Above: Jackie Newcomb and Viola HauganSaturday, May 2, 2009
Unknowns from Sweden
These photos were found in my Great Grandparents Charley and Anna Swanson's home. They both immigrated from Ljung, Östergötland, Sweden, in 1869 and 1887 respectively. Some of the photos are of the same people, so one can only guess they were close family or friends. Since my farmor far Charley emigrated at the age of 6 and farmor mor Anna Svensson emigrated at the age of 23, 
I imagine these photos were brought from Sweden by her. Then again, they could have been sent to Charley's mother Carolina Gustafsdotter Svensson, who was born in Stjärnorp, Östergötland. I know it's a longshot but does anyone, passing by my blog, recognize anyone?
I tried to post them to the Swedish site Rötter but ran into some trouble. Maybe I'll try again at a later date.
I imagine these photos were brought from Sweden by her. Then again, they could have been sent to Charley's mother Carolina Gustafsdotter Svensson, who was born in Stjärnorp, Östergötland. I know it's a longshot but does anyone, passing by my blog, recognize anyone?I tried to post them to the Swedish site Rötter but ran into some trouble. Maybe I'll try again at a later date.
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