In
1638 the Swedish government employed the experience Dutch
explorer, Peter Minuit, to help them establish
a colony in America. Soon afterwards two vessels
owned by the Swedish
West India Company arrived with 50 colonists and established a small
settlement
in Delaware Bay. They named the town Christina in honor of Sweden's
young queen.
The Swedes became involved in the fur and tobacco trades and this
brought them into conflict with Dutch
and English settlers. Peter
Stuyvesant, the governor of the New Netherland colony arrived
in 1655 with a formidable armada and took the Swedish settlement by
force.
It was not until the 19th
century that Swedes began to think again about settling in America.
In Sweden there had always been a shortage of
good land to farm. It was estimated that over 40 per cent of Swedish
soil was unproductive. This situation was made
worse by an increase in population. One of the main reasons for this
was a fall in infant mortality from 21% in 1750 to 15% in 1850.
The situation grew worse in the 1850s when Sweden suffered a succession
of poor harvests. Unemployment grew and wages fell. This led to a
increase in the numbers of people wishing to emigrate. Most of these
were bankrupted farmers and out of work agricultural labourers. Only
about a quarter of all Swedish emigrants came from towns and cities.
The first Swedish colony was established by Gustav
Unonius
in New Upsala, Wisconsin in 1841. The following
year Peter
Cassel founded New Sweden in Jefferson County. Within a few years
there were over
500 Swedish immigrants living in this settlement. Other Swedish colonies
were also formed in Swede Point, Iowa (1846) and Andover, Illinois
(1849). Minnesota was another popular place to settle and there are
over 400 place names of Scandinavian origin in the state.
Organizations based in New York such
as the American Emigrant Company and the Columbia Emigration Company,
placed advertisements in newspapers encouraging people to settle in
the United States. These companies bought and sold land and also arranged
loans. Agents from these companies also visited Swedish villages and
county fairs where they gave talk on the advantages of emigrating
to the United States.
Swedish immigrants often went to America in ships carrying cargoes
of iron to New York. These ships provided cheap passage and would
charge only about $12 per person for a trip that usually took about
seven weeks.
Swedish emigration to the United States was well organised. At New
York Harbour the ship was likely to be met by a representative of
the Bethel Ship Mission, an organization which helped arrange people
to travel west. A report in the New York
Times in July, 1851, described immigrants carrying Swedish
and American flags, while marching in military fashion to the railroad
station.
In his book,
Reminiscences: The Story
of an Emigrant (1892), Hans
Mattson tells how he travelled from New
York to Buffalo by rail, took the lake boat to Toledo, where he
caught a train to Chicago. After a short
stay in the city he went by canal to LaSelle and then by wagon to
Galesburg. Now out of money, Mattson worked as a railroad labourer
for a $1 a day. After two years Mattson had saved enough money to
buy land in Minnesota.
Some of the emigrants found permanent work in the first city they
arrived at. Others worked on the railroads until they had enough capital
to purchase land close to the track. For example, large numbers of
Swedish labourers helped build the Yellowstone division of the Northern
Pacific and then became farmers in the area.
Virtually all the Swedes who arrived in the United States were members
of the Lutheran Church. Swedes were legally born into the State Church
and could only leave it by taking formal action. It is therefore not
surprising that early settlers in the United States soon began building
Lutheran churches. Lars Paul Esbjorn,
who arrived in 1841, started congregations in Illinois at Andover,
Galesburg, Princeton and Moline.
By 1858 the Swedish Lutheran Church had 13 ministers and 28 congregations.
The most important religious figure was Tufve
Nilsson Hasselquist. In 1855 he established the religious journal,
Hemlandet.
Four years later he founded the Swedish
Publication Society in
Chicago and supplied Lutheran churches
with religious works and school textbooks in the Swedish language.
Jons Jonsson, a Baptist who was in conflict
with the Swedish Lutheran Church, decided to emigrate to America in
1865. He joined with other Swedish dissenters to establish a settlement
in Crawford County. In 1872 this settlement was given the name Stockholm.
The Swedish settlers tended to be very opposed to slavery and were
strong supporters of the Republican Party.
The Swedes religious leader, Tufve Nilsson
Hasselquist, was active in the campaign against slavery
and during the Civil War an estimated
4,000 Swedes fought in the Union Army. Hans
Mattson had a successful career as a colonel in the Union
Army and later became Secretary of State for Minnesota (1870-1872).
A survey
carried out in 1890 revealled that one in four Swedes in the United
States were engaged in farming. It was estimated that by the 20th
century they owned over 12,000,000 acres in the United States. This
was a much higher figure that most other immigrant groups. However,
large numbers lived in cities and by 1900 there were 150,000 first
or second generation Swedes living in Chicago.
This was a larger figure than any other town or city in Sweden except
Stockholm.
In 1890 there were large numbers of Swedish
born immigrants in the states of Illinois
(87,000) and Minnesota (100,000).
There were also significant communities in Chicago
(43,000) and Minneapolis (19,000).
During the period 1820 and 1920 over 1,000,000 from Sweden emigrated
to the United States. Only Germany (5,500,000),
Ireland (4,400,000), Italy
(4,190,000), Austria-Hungary (3,700,000),
Russia (3,250,000) and England
(2,500,000) had higher-rates of immigration. Swedish immigrants who
made an important impact on America include John
Ericsson, Birger Sandzen, Carl
Eric Wickman, Greta Garbo, Ingrid
Bergman, Swan Turnblad, Olof
Krans and Nils Johansson.
An investigation carried out in 1978 revealled that since 1820 over
1,272,000 people emigrated to the United States from Sweden. This
amounted to 2.6 per cent of the total foreign immigration during this
period.
Dutch and Swedish settlements in 1655.
(1) Hans
Mattson, Reminiscences: The Story of an Emigrant
(1892)
We put our little emigrant trunk in
father's old cart, and with many tears and the breaking of tender
heart-strings we bade farewell to our brothers and sisters. Mother
went with us as far as to the churchyard, so that we could say that
she had followed us to the grave. When we were a little past the farm
called Branslan, I turned to take a final look at our village, Norrback,
and I felt as if my heart was being torn from my bosom. When we passed
the dear old church, my soul was again stirred to its depths as I
recalled that it was here I had been baptized and confirmed and had
taken part in the worship, and now I would most likely never see it
again.
(2) Hans
Mattson, Reminiscences: The Story of an Emigrant
(1892)
Looking back to those days, I see the
little cabin, often with a sod roof, single room used for domestic
purposes, sometimes crowded almost to suffocation by hospitable entertainments
to newcomers; or the poor immigrant just landed from a steamer, in
his short jacket and other outlandish costume, perhaps seated on a
wooden box, with his wife and a large group of children around him,
and wondering how he shall be able to raise enough means to get himself
ten or twenty miles into the country.
(3)
A Swedish emigrant was shocked when he arrived at the home of relatives
who were living 43 miles south-west of Milwaukee (1843).
Their home was much poorer
than any charcoal hut in Sweden, without floor, without roof, and
with a few stones in a corner which were supposed to be a stove. Such
was the magnificent house which they had written they were building
to receive all the Swedes who would come.
(4) Carl Wittke, We Who
Built America (1939)
The Swedes are generally described
as even-tempered, serious-minded individualists. They have a strong
sense of property ownership and a deep religious sense. The Swedes
are noted for their adaptability to American conditions, for their
ability and willingness to work hard, and for their marvelous physical
stamina. The percentage of home ownership is high among them. Swedes
also have an unsurpassed devotion to education, and send their children
to school; the rate of illiteracy among them is extremely low. Like
other Scandinavians, the Swede has little difficulty in adjusting
himself to the American democratic system of government, for he comes
from a country in which he has already learned the technique of popular
elections.
(5)
John Peter Altgeld, Forum Magazine
(February, 1890)
The
question whether immigration shall be encouraged or restricted, and
whether naturalization shall be made more difficult or not, must be
considered both from the political and from an industrial point of
view; and in each case it is necessary to glance back and see what
have been the character, the conduct, and the political leaning of
the immigrant, and what he has done to develop and enrich our country.
If we look at the political side first, and, as our space is limited,
we will go back to 1860, calling attention, however, to the fact that
up to that time, no matter from what cause, the immigration had been
almost entirely to the Northern and free States, and not to the slave
States. These, when carefully examined in connection with election
returns, will show that but for the assistance of the immigrant the
election of Abraham Lincoln as president of the United States would
have been an impossibility, and the nineteenth century would never
have seen the great free republic we see, and the shadow of millions
of slaves would today darken and curse the continent.
The
Scandinavians have always, nearly to a man, voted the Republican ticket.
The Germans, likewise, were nearly always Republicans. In fact, the
States having either a large Scandinavian or a large German population
have been distinguished as the banner Republican States. Notably is
this true of Iowa, Wisconsin, Minnesota, and Michigan, which has a
large Scandinavian population; and of Illinois, Ohio and Pennsylvania,
which have a very large German population.
(6)
Sinclair
Lewis, The Norse State,
The
Nation (30th
May, 1923)
Good
and bad, the Scandinavians monopolize
Minnesota politics. Of the last nine governors of the state, six have
been Scandinavians. So is Dr. Shipstead, who
defeated Senator Kellogg in the 1922 election; so is Harold Knutson,
Republican whip of the House. Scandinavians make up a large proportion
of the Minnesota state legislature, and while in Santa Fe the Mexican
legislators speak Spanish, while in Quebec the representatives still
debate in French, though for generations they have been citizens of
a British dominion, in Minnesota the politicians who were born abroad
are zealous to speak nothing but Americanese.
(7)
Glenn
Seaborg
wrote about his Swedish background in his autobiography, Life of
Glen Seaborg (1982).
Both of my parents were Swedish. My
mother, Selma Olivia Erickson, was born in Grängesberg, in the
southern Dalarna region of Sweden and came to the United States (Ishpeming)
in 1904, when she was seventeen years old. My father, Herman Theodore
Seaborg, was also born in Ishpeming. His parents came to Ishpeming
in their youth and met and were married there.
Ishpeming had typical sections that were nearly all Swedish and it
was in one of these that we lived. Since my father was fluent in Swedish
and this was my mother's native tongue, the Swedish language was spoken
in my home as it was throughout this community. I learned to speak
and understand Swedish before I did English, but I am afraid that
in the intervening years my facility with the language has declined.
Swedish customs of all kinds prevailed in our home. I remember particularly
well the Swedish food that we enjoyed at our dinner on Julaften, or
Christmas Eve. The fare usually included smörgåsbord, which
featured sil, or pickled herring. One of the mainstays was lutfisk,
which was always served with boiled potatoes and a white sauce. Another
feature always was saffron buns and bread, usually served hot and
made with glacéd fruits. This was part of a large spread of buns
and cakes including gingersnaps made in the form of goblins, piglets,
stars and other patterns. Another component which was almost always
present was the Swedish lingonberries, which I still like so much.
The meal was usually topped off with risgryn, or rice pudding, which
was topped with cinnamon and cream and sugar.
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