Elva (Swanson) Earls took the time to type the family history of her parents. I must say it has been somewhat difficult to outline her older siblings' names, and her parents' siblings names and dates, but this transcription has been a good starting point that has helped to make a framework that I could fill in with more details.
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| "Mom & Pa" wedding 1897 in Finland |
Mom's father was a glass cutter. He supplied the panes for many windows in his area. Pa's father was a ship's carpenter and was at sea much of the time. Mom had 7 brothers, while Pa had 5 sisters. They were married May 16, 1896 [1897]. The wedding festivities lasted at least 3 days. There was a band hired for extra music.
Children started filling the cradle early on. By 1901 there had been 4 boys born to the couple. Two had died within 3 months due to scarlet fever.
Financial problems encouraged him to borrow money from her parents to build a boat. Being a carpenter, this had value to it. His father being a ship's carpenter, checked out the results and pointed out the fact that the boat was too small to be used on the seas and too big to serve well on the smaller bodies of water.
Not being able to repay the loan, it was decided that he should go to America, get a job and pay off the debt. So in April of 1901 he left Finland for the U.S.A. The ship docked on the east coast, having passed the Statue of Liberty. For a while he worked in Worchester, Mass. for $1.00 a day. About this time he changed his surname from Svenn to Swanson. (His first suggestion was Svansen but Mom said, "That interprets to TAIL in Swedish and I do not like it as a name".)
In the meantime her brother Reinhold was in San Francisco, Calif. living in a two flat house he owned at 1050 Carolina Street. Before long Pa moved to San Francisco where there was plenty of carpentry work. Being a hard worker he always found a job and kept it until the project was completed. His big problem: - he was a spender, not a saver, so he did not send money regularly to pay off the debt in Finland.
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| Some of the children left in Finland with family. |
Knowing something had to be done Mom left the children in Finland under the supervision of relatives and went to America, possibly by 1904 to manage his income. While she was here a daughter, Linda Viola was born to them. In 1906 they were living in the area of Harrison and 4th Streets when the famous "earthquake and fire" occured. The street in front of their building cracked and there was quite a large opening there. Up until the time of the fire they had 14 men living in their flat paying "room and board". 7 came in for lunch every day and Mom packed lunch bags for the other seven daily. The debt to her parents was paid.
Since their area was so affected by the quake and fire, they all stayed temporarily in Golden Gate Park with hundreds of other homeless persons. After the fire she returned to Finland taking their daughter with her. She was pregnant at the time and their 5th son was born in Finland. One of the older boys had a growth in his throat which the Doctors could not remove; it took his life. One of the boys knowing he was going to die in talking about going to be with Jesus said (in regard to himself), "But it takes so long". He wanted to go to be with the Lord quickly. Linda Viola and the new baby did not live very long after Mom got back to Finland, and with all of those first 6 having died there she left, once again for America in June of 1909.
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Alfonse, Felix & Viking I
(all died in Finland) |
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Alfonse, Felix, Linda Viola & Viking II
(all died in Finland) |
Arriving in San Francisco at Reinhold's flat (where Pa was apparently staying) her greeting from Pa was,"If I knew you were coming, I would have left". It may have been at this time that she went to Oakland where her brother Alfred and his family lived. He had a stonecutting business. Living across the street from a cemetery he made monuments. The dust from cutting the stone finally produced a condition that took his life. It may have been during this visit that he helped Mom get a housekeeper's position at the large Morse home. This was Mr. Morse of the Ferry Seed Morse Company who lived not far from Alfred's home.
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| Carolina Street, San Fransisco |
Eventually Mom and Pa got together again and moved into the upper flat of 1050 Carolina Street. With plenty of work for Pa, and Mom being frugal with his earnings they soon had enough money to buy some property. They settled for a lot 5 spaces to the north of Reinhold's place. Already their family was beginning to grow again. The next step was to borrow money from other Swedes to build a house for them. Mom, being the gentle person that she was, had no problem finding those who would loan her the needed funds. Reinhold, being an architect, drew up the house plans.
Before long that lot was being prepared. A cement retaining wall was poured across the back and part way up the sides of the lot as the hillside was so steep. This made it possible to fill in dirt until the backyard was flat, level with the top of the retaining wall. When the house was finished, it was 2 stories in front and 4 in back.
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| Elva Swanson |
By the time it was far enough along to be moved into, in 1913, there were 3 children again in the family, the youngest being less than 1 year old. The final count was again, 6 children, but this time there were only 2 boys, and 4 girls. Viking, born June 9, 1910, Linda born November 14, 1911, Leopold (Paul) born October 21, 1912, Hilda born January 14, 1914, Elva born October 31, 1916 and Viola born April 27, 1919.
About 1921 Pa was sent to work in Concord building the Bank of America (Bank of Italy then). He liked the area and in that year Mom and the kids moved into a house in Pacheco, 2 miles out of Concord, supposedly for the summer. Pa and the boys had gone there first to clean out the house as "road workers''had used it as a temporary home and the floors had to be cleared of caked dirt. "Summer" stretched into 3 years! Pa continued to live and work in San Francisco, visiting with the family on weekends.
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Mom & Pa with 6 kids and 3 cousins
at 1020 Carolina St. San Fransisco |
Since Mr. Hart, our next door neighbor in San Francisco was in the trucking business he was our mover. Thinking the high schools in the City would be better than the small Mt. Diablo High in Concord, and Viking just graduated from the eighth grade, it was decided that the family should move back to San Francisco, which they did in 1924.
In 1926 Reinhold passed away. His property was turned over to Mom who eventually "paid off" her brothers for their portion of its value, getting a clear title to it. He also left a car, on Oakland, which then gave us a means of transportation. In the summer months, being school vacation, Mom had the kids and herself travel to San Jose where all were involved with picking prunes and cutting apricots, Vike sometimes helping in the fields with pickers. Being old enough to drive, Vike was always the one in charge of the car. We never asked where our earnings went, Mom just took care of everything. The last summer we worked we earned a total of $300.00. There was enough there so Mom made the final payment on the loans to build the house, and Vike to enter Healds College.
Mom was naturalized as an American citizen in San Francisco on February 5, 1940. At that time she dropped her middle name, Sofia and changed her first name to Mary from Maria since most folk called her Mary. I never learned when Pa became an American citizen but it must have been soon after he arrived in America.
After 55 years of marriage, in 1951, Mom having an angina condition, was instructed by Dr. Null to separate herself from Pa if she wanted to continue to live. His verbal abuse was becoming too much for her heart to take. She obtained a "separate maintenance" degree and moved into the then empty lower flat of 1050 Carolina St. In the settlement she was given 1050 and 1016 Carolina St. while he retained 1020 and a lot he had purchased on top of the hill. Some years earlier, Mr. Hart had passed away and Mrs. Hart had offered the house to Mom, payments being interest free, and Mom persuaded Pa to buy 1016. The rental money paid the monthly installments.
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| 1947 Mom & Pa Swanson 50th, with grandkids |
This was 1950 and Elva was living at 1016 with her family. Before long, Mom, in hope of moving out of San Francisco, started looking for a house to buy in Concord. Viola and family were living there as Norman was stationed at Pittsburg. Paul and Fran lived in Martinez, Vike and family lived in Sacramento, Linda and family were in the "Wilson District" south of Yuba City, and Hil and family were in Pendleton, Oregon. Mom learned of a two bedroom house in Concord on Almond Ave, 2509. She fell in love with the little garden house in the back yard. She sold 1016, bought the Almond Ave. house and Elva and her family moved to Concord in September 1f 1952, glad to leave the City.
Later Mom sold 1050 and moved in with Elva's family. It was not all that crowded because behind the detatched garage was a room that served as Bob and Gene's bedroom. Mom had a bathroom added to it so it was quite comfortable out there. When the boys left for Pasadena College she had a large room added to the existing one making it into an apartment into which she moved, herself.
Since moving to Concord Mom went back to San Francisco a few days each month to do Pa's laundry and clean house for him. She said all was well for 2 days, but if she was there for 3 days he started to gripe again. One day we got a phone call from one of the Stones, saying Pa was in the hospital. He had suffered a stroke. Sander often went up to Victor's house, and he always saw Pa sitting in a chair in the front yard. It happened that on this particular day, Sander realized he had not seen Pa so he went in to find if he was well. He found Pa slumped over, half way out of bed, called for an ambulance and later called us in Concord. After recovering, he seemed quite well for some time. Later he had another spell and he was finally moved to a "care home" in Martinez, in 1957. He was there a number of months but did not make any progress.
One day while Paul was visiting Pa, he asked Pa if he wanted to be ready to meet the Lord. By this time Pa could not speak, but motioned "yes". Paul asked if he wanted the Lord to forgive him of his sins, to which Pa motioned "yes". Paul prayed and Pa motioned that he accepted Jesus as his Savior. It was a good day for us. About 10 days later the lady of the "home" realized that Pa was deteriorating quickly so she called us to learn if there was any place to which Pa could be moved. Her "home" was supposed to be for ambulatory cases only, so if Pa died under her care she could have a real bad problem. Pa was brought by ambulance to Mom's apartment where he lay in a bed in her kitchen. The next day Efraim came into our house and said Pa was dying, did I want to go out to see him. I went there immediately, but he was already gone. His forehead had a large red area as from a burst blood vessel. His final stroke! He was buried on his 80th birthday! It was March 27, 1958.
For many years Mom had a migrain headache practically every night. During the daytime she was fine. when these headaches came she would brew a pot of coffee and sit and drink it and finally be able to sleep. Not too long after P died Mom, having one of her head- aches, fixed her coffee. Holding her filled cup, she backed up to sit on a chair, missed it and fell to the floor breaking her hip. She lay on the floor all night and was found the next day about noon. Elva had not checked on her that morning as that routine had been broken when Mom went to visit one of the other children for a while. She was taken to the hospital in Martinez where she underwent surgery. All went quite well and when she was released she stayed with Viola and family until she was able to return to her apartment. At that time Vike had a telephone installed there for her.
She enjoyed living there for some years, being able to see the garden and garden house she loved. She kept busy at her loom weaving rugs, knitting a pair of sox for Loren and various other things. Finally it came to the time she sold the house to Elva. She moved in with Viola and family for a period of time, returned shortly to Elva's and then on to Vike's in Sacramento. After a while she developed an infection in her gall bladder, was taken to the hospital, and in 23 hours the Lord took her home to be with Him. She was 88 years of age when she died, 8 years after Pa. She was buried on March 8, 1966. Both Pa's and Mom's funerals were warm with the presence of the Lord.
*Mom said that about the time for their first child to be born she and Pa had gotten into the habit of drinking Sherry. When she found herself taking a drink each morning, she realized that this was becoming a bad habit and if there was to be any spiritual leader in the home, she had to be that one. She never took another drink.
