Memories of Farfar

In the front row, left to right, we have Hildegard, Helena Sofia, Ragnar,
Johan August, and Linnea.
In the back row, left to right, stand Ivar, Midi, Thor (Mom's dad) and Folke.
Mom's note on the back says that this was taken around 1912
and that Helena Sofia died about two years after this was taken.

"But maybe I should go back to Dad’s family a bit. There was Farfar (Johan August) and Farmor (Helena Sofia). The first child they had died in infancy. I don’t know if he died at birth or how old he was, but it was a boy and they called him Maximillian. Then there was a girl named Midi; that was dad’s oldest sister. And then there was Dad, and Ivar, and Folke, and Linnea, and Hildegard and Ragnar. They had eight kids in all but seven were alive. They all lived in Kjettestorp. And the year they bought Kjettestorp, I remember my dad saying they didn’t have enough money to buy horses so they plowed the field with oxen. 

Farmor was not well. Farfar took her to all kinds of doctors and tried everything. I’m not sure what was the matter with her, but she died in her 40s. Ragnar was 12 years old when his mother died and that was in 1914. Farmor, of course, I have no memory of because she died before mom and dad were married. When I grew up, Farfar and Midi and Hildegard and Ragnar all lived with us in Kjettestorp.

To tell of the different members of the family now, there was Farfar. He was always dressed in black boots up to the knee and pants tucked inside, some kind of wool pants, and a vest and a pocket watch with a chain attached to a buttonhole and a coat over that and a hat, of course.  

Johan August Boberg and Gurli, around 1930

I remember he loved kids. In summer time, I remember how he was sitting out in the yard watching us kids play, and I remember my little sister Margaretha. The way I saw her, she was such a mama baby. We were playing outside and if she ran and fell down, she would stick her head up and look around and if she saw a grown up, she would start screaming until they came and picked her up. Well, Farfar sat out there and she started screaming because she saw Farfar. Farfar would say, “Come on over here and I’ll pick you up” so Margaretha would get up and go over and lay down at Farfar’s feet, and he picked her up and chuckled and laughed. 

Farfar lived upstairs in a room, Farfar and Ragnar, and he had a radio, a crystal radio with two earmuffs but I can’t remember that more than two children at a time could come up and listen. Well, we were six kids and then there was Folke i Sur too. He was a neighbor kid but he was like one of us; he was always there. There was a children’s program on occasionally and Farfar would let us listen to it, but there were only two earmuffs, so we had to take turns. Just think if the kids today had to take turns to look at TV -- How would that be?  Well, I remember Farfar as a kind, generous man who always seemed to be in a good mood. He was very kind to my mother. He had a cat named Jämmerlund -- otherwise no cats came in the house, they were barn cats -- but Jämmerlund, he came in. Jämmerlund that’s just about like “complaining Smith,” if I was going to translate it.  He was always meowing. When Farfar sat down to eat, then the cat started meowing, and Farfar stuck little bites down to the cat. Even if Farfar was eating an apple, the cat would eat apples. He died when I don’t think he was 70 yet, late 60s. He had a heart problem, and I was 10 years old when he died." 

Notes: There are some people in Mom's stories who are referred to by their first name and then the farm where they lived, like Folke i Sör here. Sör would have been the name of the farm where Folke lived and the letter i is the Swedish word for "in" or here it means "from."  She did this often with some more common first names.