Stories About Grandpa Sture

The other day I rediscovered some stories about my grandpa, Sture Nels Wallin, that my father wrote down many years ago.  I don’t remember much about Grandpa Wallin; he mostly watched baseball with my dad when we visited them.  So it’s nice to get to know him better through these stories, written down by his oldest son...

“Dad got a job as a hired hand when he was young, and was considered a very good one.  He was not big—about  5’8” and 160 pounds—but he was very strong and a great athlete.

The youthful pranks of his day were funnier and less destructive than now.  Once he and a friend named Freeman Larson made a big batch of pancake batter and fried several about half an inch thick and the size of the frying pan.  They used them with frosting to make a layer cake and sneaked it into the kitchen of the church party.  They found a vantage point to watch as a lady cut the cake, looked puzzled, tasted it, and called a friend over.  More women gathered, and he said the ladies ate almost the whole cake as each of them tasted it and tried to find out who had brought it.

(Pictured:  Jack Phelps, Carl Peterson, Sture Wallin)

Sara Elizabeth Peterson (his future wife) came to Hordeville to work in the bank, which is how they came to meet at a church social.  Must have been love at first sight, as on the way home Mom asked a girlfriend, “Who was that smart-aleck with Agdie Samuelson?” 

Once when we were small one of us asked Dad if Mom could run fast when she was young.  “I'll say she could,” Dad answered.  “I chased her for seven years before I caught her.”  Much of this was caused by WWI, as Dad enlisted the day after war was declared in 1917 and did not get back from Europe until late 1919.

In the summer of 1942 the hired man and I were struggling to load 100-pound sacks of fertilizer into a box wagon whose top was about 6 feet above the ground.  Dad came over, picked a bag off the ground with one hand, and in one motion one-armed it straight over his head and handed it to Butch, who was in the wagon.  He would have been 49 years old at that time.  He walked away without a word, and we quit griping.

Dad really abhorred pettiness and tiny revenges for fancied wrongs.  On the other hand, he took no abuse.  Once in 1913 when the railroad was being built, he took exception to a remark some lout on the crew made as he was escorting Mom past the drug store. He took her to her rooming house, came back and decked the guy—rendering him unconscious and knocking out some teeth in the process.  The next day the sheriff phoned and said he had a warrant for him and he could save some fees if he went to the courthouse in Aurora without being fetched—so he did.  The judge heard all the testimony and arrived at his decision:  “Guilty.  That will be a dollar and costs, and there won't be any costs.”   

Grandpa, I feel like I know you a little better now!

Sara's Letters to Her Soldier Boy

A few years ago I was able to borrow my grandma Sara Peterson’s letters to her sweetheart and future husband, Sture Wallin, written while he was in the army during WWI and she worked at a bank at home in Nebraska.  Here are some excerpts:

“Honestly, Sture, I just can’t get to feeling enthusiastic about my job down here—and if one doesn’t like your work, what is there to it?  I’d be ready to leave tomorrow—if it wasn’t war times…  Help is so scarce.  I ought to be glad I can do something, even if I don’t like it.”

“Don’t know if we can send a Christmas package.  Of course I can see where with between 1-2 million soldiers in France and everybody wanting to send them something they have to have a limit.  But I feel you are the only ones that need Christmas presents this year.”

“Dear, though I was glad as long as you were in this country, I’m glad you got your chance to go across, when you have been waiting to go for so long.  I wonder where you are—somewhere on the Atlantic.  But you must be almost across by this time...”

“Just as I got through writing the other letter to you, one of the men came in with the mail.  “Did I want a letter from overseas?” he asked.  Did I!  I’d had that letter if I’d had to knock him down to get it.  This was the first letter you had written—dated November 3.  So you did really get to France.  You can think that at least if you can’t be home this Christmas, next Christmas we’ll be sure to see you back here.”

The war ended before Sture saw any action.  But it was eight more months before he came home.

“Seems rather quiet in town today after all the excitement of yesterday.  The message came over the wires yesterday noon that Germany had surrendered.  Of course the town went wild and I guess they did all over the U.S.  They had parades and bands and the home guards out…” 

“News came this week of the death of Ernest Post.  Also James Richardson.  Also a couple of Aurora boys.  Seems so terrible at this time.  The people here all have been rejoicing at the thought of it all being ended.  But so many never gave a thought to that the casualty lists would be coming in for weeks.”

“Christmas Eve!  And such a way to spend it!  My soldier boy way across the Atlantic in France.  If I could see your dear face tonight, this would be a truly wonderful Christmas after all.  I’ve got your picture up on my dresser where I can look at it all the time... ”

“I found the place you were before on the map yesterday.  You were quite a way in France, weren’t you?  And not so far from Paris.  Perhaps you’ll have a chance to go there before you come back.”

“Do you think you will be back with the rest of Co. H?  Each of the boys that write back home seem to have a different opinion as to when they will be sent back.  They surely are sending them right along, but 2 some million are quite a few men and it took Uncle Sam several months to send them over and I guess ‘twill take just as long to come back.”

“Don’t think I’ve changed a great deal as to outward appearances.  I know I have otherwise.  What the last two years brought certainly would make some difference…” 

“The other Co. H boys came home 2 weeks ago…  Elmer said it took them 12 days to come across.  In that case if you left June 20^th you would be in NY about July 2^nd…  Just now all I can think of is that you will soon be here.  And I can’t tell you in words what that all means to me.  I’ll be the happiest girl in the world when you come back.”

The Wallin Siblings: Blazing a Path

“We grew up together in the same Nebraska town…. buried in wheat and corn… burning summers when the world lies green and billowy beneath a brilliant sky… blustery winters with little snow, when the whole country is stripped bare and gray as sheet-iron.  We agreed that no one who had not grown up in a little prairie town could know anything about it.”  ―Willa Cather, My Antonia

I recently wrote about my great-grandfather Frederick (F.I.) Wallin and his wife Christina, my Swedish “gateway ancestors” on the Wallin branch of the family tree.  Here is the family in Nebraska around 1903.  In the back are Aurora, Ray, Isador, Ithel, and Inez; my grandfather Sture Nels is standing in the middle; and great-grandpa Frederick, young Leonard, and great-grandma Christina are seated in front.  Such fine Swedish names!

Unlike the Peterson branch of the family, the Wallins all lived to adulthood to marry and, in most cases, have families of their own...

Isidor Hilmer (1879-1977) was called “Ike.”  He and his sister Inez were born when the family was still in Chautauqua County, New York, before they went west to Nebraska.  Ike was married twice and had five children with first wife, Selma Nyberg.  It is said he lived long enough to see six generations.  He died in Idaho at age 98.

Inez Christine (1884-1960) was married three times, the first time at age 16.  Her second husband, John Wade, was a steam railroad bridge builder.  Inez had two daughters, and she died in Los Angeles at age 76.

Frederick Iranus (1886-1944) was called “Ray.”  He was a carpenter.  He married twice—first to Esther Dahlberg, with whom he had four children, and then to Dorothy Farnum Kaiser, a widow who was his housekeeper after his first wife died.  Dorothy lived only four more years, leaving Ray a widower for the second time at age 54.  He died four years later.

Ithel Georgianna (1888-1944) was married to Ellis Passmore when she was 20 and he was 33, and they had three children.  Ellis was a civil engineer for the Burlington Railroad and later the CB&Q.  After Ithel (pronounced “ee-thel”) died at age 56, Ellis moved to California.

Aurora Linnea (1890-1976) was a schoolteacher, both before her marriage (in Nebraska) and afterwards (in California).  She and her husband Elmer Levene had no children, but Aurora’s mother Christina lived with them after her father Frederick died.

Sture Nels (1892-1979) was the only one to move east—to Illinois—which he did after the Great Depression and the droughts of the 1930s took their toll on the Great Plains farmers.  Sture was in a near-fatal car accident in Iowa in September 1940, while making final arrangements for the move.  Sture and his wife Sara had five children, four of whom lived to adulthood.

Leonard Carl (1898-1977) and his brother Sture both served in World War I.  Leonard and wife Helen Carmichael had two children.  Leonard ran a general store in the hotel that his father built around 1920.  Later he later moved to California to take a job with Boeing Aircraft, where he died at age 78.

So the first generation to come were Nebraska farmers; and the second generation moved beyond the Nebraska prairie to other places and things; and the third generation went to college, if they were willing to work hard; and my generation grew up believing that we could achieve anything we wanted—in no small part, I now know, because of the path blazed by those who came before.

Getting in Touch With My Inner Swede

Recently I wrote about “lutefisk,” and that got me thinking about my Swedish roots. 

Last year I had my DNA tested and it came out 53% Scandinavian.  But growing up a Wallin in the Midwest, it felt like much more.  Looking at my hair, my friends agree; while they are going gray in their middle age, I faded to platinum blonde.  My family tree shows more like 62.5% Swede—five great-grandparents out of eight emigrated from Sweden.  My four grandparents’ surnames are Wallin, Peterson, Anderson, and Erickson.  (The Erickson branch was from northern Germany.)  You’ll find no offensive “-sen” endings on these last names—that would mean Norwegian, and Grandma Wallin had no use for Norwegians. 

I’ve inherited a few things from The Old Country, but not many.  My great-grandparents all came as young adults, with very little but the clothes on their backs.  Only one of the five Swedes who came, my great-grandmother Emelia Fryksdal Peterson, ever saw the old country again, when she went back to Sweden with two of her daughters in 1920, shortly after Great Grandpa died.  A postcard survives from that trip, showing the town where they stayed (Sandviken):

 My Grandma Sara Peterson Wallin said in the 1940 census record that her mother tongue was Swedish, and I believe it.  She had quite a few Swedish books in her possession, and even in her old age, she could open one and read out of it without much effort.  My father remembers as a very young child that the rule was this:  If his grandparents spoke to him in Swedish, he was to answer in Swedish, and if they spoke to him in English, he should answer in English.

My Grandpa Sture Wallin was next-to-youngest of seven Wallin children, the others (in order of age) being Isador, Inez, Iranus, Ithel, Aurora, and Leonard.  My father said that my great-grandpa Frederick Wallin was a bit of a Swedish history buff, which accounts for his children’s names.  Sten Sture, for instance, was a Swedish statesman who “beat up on the Danes,” which would have put him in high favor with Great Grandpa.   

In my childhood and youth, the Wallins gathered at Grandma Sara and Grandpa Sture’s house on Christmas Eve.  Besides the traditional Christmas lutefisk and the delicious butter cookies which we called “Swedish Spritz,” there were Swedish meatballs and rice pudding with a raisin in it.  It was said that whoever ended up with the raisin would have good luck in the coming year. 

Things were a little less Swedish the rest of the year—but compared to my middle-class Midwestern friends, this was still far more ethnicity than most of them were exposed to! 

In my younger days, I colored my hair brown.  But as I have gotten older and given up that expensive and high-maintenance habit, I have gotten in touch again with my Inner Swede.  I think my father and grandparents would be pleased about that...  As Grandpa Wallin said to my brother one time many years ago, “Remember, Bruce, you are a Swede.  And nobody can outthink a Swede, nobody can outwork a Swede, and nobody can outfight a Swede.”


Postscript: Recent ancestry DNA "ethnicity estimate updates" now have me as 84% Scandinavian. I'm not surprised!

Sture Wallin, Soldier and Baseball Player

My grandfather, Sture Nels Wallin (1892-1979) was a Nebraska farm boy, son of Swedish immigrants.  But somewhere along the line he developed a love—and a talent—for baseball.  He was a left-handed pitcher and third baseman who played baseball while in the U.S. Army in Europe at the end of WWI—I wish I could find out more about that team!—and later, after he returned home, in the county leagues of rural Nebraska. 

This photo shows Grandpa and his firstborn son (my father) around 1925.  My father, Robert Milo Wallin, wrote out some memories of Sture and his baseball career:

“Dad always played baseball, usually third base, and always he would hit cleanup (fourth).  There were county leagues in those days, and games were every Sunday afternoon...  He had played in the army as well, having been chosen to one of two teams out of the whole American army in France to travel to Italy and other countries for exhibition games after the war was over (1918-1919).  He was in fast company there, and I can remember him mentioning friends who were then in the Major Leagues in the 1920s.  He played baseball and fast pitch softball until 1936 that I can remember, which would have made him 44 years old.”

I can recall Dad saying that after Grandpa Sture came home from the war, he had the opportunity to try out for two professional baseball teams—one of them the St. Louis Cardinals, and I don’t remember the other one.  But by then Grandpa had been courting Grandma for seven years, and it was time for him to choose between her and baseball—and so he married his sweetheart and settled down on a Nebraska farm. 

But he never gave up baseball...  My Aunt Janet, the only one of his children still living, told me recently that she remembers going to her father’s baseball games as a small child in the 1930s, at the baseball field in Chapman, Nebraska, which was their home field.  She said she paid little attention to the games, though, preferring to wander around the stands and allow the spectators to make a fuss over her and buy her treats.

One of Grandpa’s uniforms survived all these years, and today it is a treasured possession of one of his grandsons, my cousin Brian.