When the Telephone came to Kjettestorp

Elin and Thor, 1926 or 27

"My dad decided that he wanted a telephone. Mama had been sick. I don’t remember what was the matter, but she was in the hospital in Linköping, and Papa couldn’t take time every day to go down to the store to call and ask how she was doing. One day he sent Henrik and me to call, and Farbror Anders was going to help us. It happened that Mama was up and walking around when the call came and the nurse called her over, so she talked to Farbror Anders first and then Henrik and then she wanted to talk to me. I could hear that that was Mama’s voice but where was she? I just couldn’t understand it and I got completely tongue-tied. I couldn’t speak. I was maybe five, six, seven. Farbror Anders sat down on a chair and pulled me up on his lap and he told me what to say. That was the first time I talked on the phone. So anyway, this was part of the reason that dad decided he wanted to have a phone in our house. I know I sure didn’t do a very good job reporting back to him about how Mama was doing. He wanted to be able to call for himself.

Then it happened that one night I woke up when someone knocked on Mom and Dad’s bedroom window. Farfar was in the hospital in Kisa, and the

Thor and Elin and

Birgitta, 1948

knocking was Farbror Anders from the store. He said that the hospital had called and said that Farfar was going down hill fast. If they wanted to see him alive again, they should come as soon as possible. Well, Farbror Anders was the only person around there who had a car at that time. He needed one to go and get provisions for the store because there were no delivery trucks at that time. He had driven his car to Kjettestorp and said he would wait and take them to the hospital, if they wanted to come now. I think if they had had to go by horse and buggy, they wouldn’t have made it on time. If I remember right, they all went, Dad, Midi, Hildegard and Ragnar, and they made it on time. Farfar died that night.

Well, that got Dad even more decided to have a phone put in. People around thought, “Oh now Thor in Kjettestorp has gone completely nuts. Now he wants a phone!” One person said, “I would never have one of those things in my house! Such crazy stuff!” But Torsten and Ingrid Davidsson came from Vimmerby and Södra Vi, and they were used to having both electricity and a telephone. They were young, up-to-date people. There finally Dad had an ally; they didn’t think he was crazy for having a phone in his house. The phone

Torsten Davidsson and Thor, late 40s or early 50s

was already installed in our house when they arrived, and it didn’t take long before they wanted to come and borrow the phone to call the relatives and their parents. Pretty soon here came Lisa i Sör and wanted to borrow the telephone, and before you knew it Grässviderna had come to borrow the telephone. It was closer to come to our house than to go to the store. Well, it didn’t take long before they all wanted one of those things in their house.

And to think that now, here I sit, with a phone in my pocket. I can open it up and tell the woman in the phone, “Call Sara Home” and it does! How much things have changed in my lifetime. I think that’s another good change."