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North and South
Stories and Genealogy of Theodore Charles Anderson and Sara Carlene Shuttleworth
The Sawmill
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The Dear River Sawmill where Ted's father lived in the 1910's
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This page has been visited 502 times
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Risør
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Ted’s Grandfather, Andrew Eng Anderson, was born in Southern Norway on Jan 16, 1869. His father's name was Anders Olson. He had 2 brothers, Haval and Henrik, and 3 sisters, Helge, Olina and Andera. Their birth dates and order are not known. Andrew became a carpenter and cabinetmaker. We don't know what became of the others.
Grandpa married Theoline Marie Tonneson on Nov 9, 1896 when he was 27. Theoline was actually born in the United States, in Greensboro, NC on Sept 30, 1877. As many Scandinavians did at the time, her father, Ole Tonneson, had come to the United States after the Civil War hoping to benefit from the Reconstruction. However, he soon became disappointed and returned to Norway. The exact date of his return is not known. He and his family are not listed in the US 1880 census, so he was gone by then. We do know that Theoline went to school and grew up in Risør.
She had a brother, Jenns, and a sister, Emma (who later became the Mayor of Risør - for about 40 years). Their exact birth dates are not known, we just know they were born after 1874. It's possible that one or both of them came to the US too, but it's not likely. More probably, they were both born in Norway after Ole returned.
Grandpa and Grandma had a son, Oscar Thoralf, I, in 1898 and a daughter, Margit, in 1900. Unfortunately, Oscar Thoralf I died in Norway at the age of 4 in 1902.
In 1904, Grandfather Andrew was working as the ship's carpenter on a Norwegian freighter, which also carried passengers to the United States. Ted's Grandmother Theoline worked on the same ship as a Steward. As it turned out, Ted’s father, Oscar Thoralf, II, was born in the United States on May 30, 1904 when the ship was in New York City. (He was actually born across the river in New Jersey.) Thus, both Ted’s father and Grandmother were born in the USA, but both grew up in Norway.
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Margit and Oscar Thoralf (II) in Risør Norway
(Circa 1906)
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As soon as they were able, they all returned to Risør, where Dad went to school and grew up. A second daughter, Judit Constance, was born in Risor on Aug 17, 1906.
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Immigration
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Ted’s Grandfather longed to return to the United States, but Grandmother didn't want to have anything to do with it. So, after a while, they decided to split up. Grandpa returned to the US in 1911 with the three children while Grandma Theolina stayed on in Risør. As far as we know, they never divorced, but she did take on her father's name, Olsen.
Grandpa moved to Lake Mills, Iowa located in the Northeastern corner of the State. He built a house there but wanted land, which was unavailable to him in Norway or in Iowa. In an effort to obtain that land, he homesteaded in Moose Jaw, Saskatchewan, Canada.
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In the early 1900's, the Canadian West remained largely under-populated, so the government began an intensive settlement program offering cheap land and social and religious freedom.
A homestead in Canada at that time cost $10 for a 160-acre piece of land. Title to the property could be obtained after three years - provided that the settler lived on the land at least six months out of each of the first three years in Canada,
that he cultivated at least 40 acres of land on the homestead, and built a house on the property. Grandpa did all this but found he wasn't much of a farmer and that the winters there were much too harsh for him. After a while, he gave up on the idea and went back to Lake Mills for good. (Dad said Grandpa almost froze to death in Moose Jaw.)
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The Sawmill
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While Grandpa was homesteading in Moose Jaw for 6 months out of the year, a family friend, Mrs. Kettleson, took care of the girls in Lake Mills, but Ted’s Dad was stashed (his description, not mine) at a sawmill in Deer River, Northern Minnesota.
He hated it and, on the day of his 18th birthday, joined the US Navy, leaving Deer River forever, never to return.
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Andrew Eng Anderson died in Lake Mills in 1945 at the age of 76.
Theoline Marie Tonneson died in Risør in 1970 at the age of 93
Aunt Margit stayed in Lake Mills, lived in the house that Grandpa built and never married. She died in Lake Mills in 1993 at the age of 92.
Aunt Judith married a Swede, also named Anderson, and moved to Mason City, IA where she died in 1987. She was 81. She had 2 children, Patricia and Donald, both of whom still live in Iowa.
While stationed in Washington DC, serving as a radioman on the Presidential Yacht the USS Sequoia, Ted’s Dad met Ted’s Mother, Susan Ida Black. They were married in December 1933. Ted came along a year later.
In 1937, Dad was transferred to NAS North Island, San Diego. Mother, Ted’s sister Peggy (Margaret Louise Langley from Mom's first marriage) and Ted came across the country by train. Peggy says that Ted walked across the country, running from car to car, up and down the train. Ted was about 3 at the time, she was 14.
The fanily settled in La Jolla, CA, which was not too far from the naval base (Dad didn't want his family to live in Government housing). Ted’s brother Mike (John Michael) was born in La Jolla on Oct 26, 1937.
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Tune "Peer Gynt's Homecoming"
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The introductory tune used on this page is "Peer Gynt's Homecoming" from the Peer Gunt Suite composed by the famed Norwegian composer Edvard Grieg (1843-1907) in the year 1876.
Eight songs make up the suite. All are intended to put a musical interpretation to Henrik Ibsen's play by the same name, which was written about a decade earlier in 1867. The play is approximately 5 Acts (dependent on which version you follow) and spans from Norway to Morocco to Egypt before returning home. The play has surprisingly few principal characters, but of course all action follows the tragic (and possibly delusional) Peer Gynt in his travels and deeds. Supporting roles are filled by his mother Aase, a plain girl Solveig who is his faithful love, a young bride Ingrid, The Troll King, and finally the play's "judge" of humanity, the Button Molder.
In Peer Gynt's Homecoming, musical anger from the Gods rains forth. It contains the song of the thunderclap, the song of the coming winds and rain from atop a hill looking over a quiet village, boarded up against the changing weather. Alltogether, Peer Gynt's Homecoming music is intended to represent the ominous electricity in the air with lightning heating the horizon.
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This page and all genealogical data contained on it are Copyrighted © 2007/2008
by Theodore C. Anderson
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