Last week my Sepia Saturday contribution was a Sunday school group photo from my grandfather's photo album. On the next page in that album, there is this photo from "around 1922". My grandfather (Gustaf) is the one on the left. (Easier to identify in this photo than in that other one!) Born in 1904; so in 1922, he was 18. The guy in the middle is his brother-in-law-to-be (although they would not have known that yet!): my grandmother's brother Nils, born in 1902. The third young man is unknown to me, but according to the note in the album, his name was Gustaf too.
My grandmother Sally was four years older than my grandfather. They grew up in the same village, but when exactly it was that romance started to grow between them, I don't know. They did not get engaged until September 1929 - when she was 29 and he 25. And they got married a year later, in 1930.
As the three young men here are all dressed up, it may have been a special occasion. On the other hand, perhaps just an ordinary Sunday, and they were dressed for church...
But if it was a "special occasion"... like a birthday...
My grandfather's birthday was June 23, which back in those days was always Midsummer Eve. That changed in 1953, so all my own life (I was born in 1955), Midsummer Eve has always been a Friday. But back in my dad's childhood, his father's birthday was always on Midsummer Eve; and used to include big family gatherings to celebrate.
I'm not sure how big a deal it was back in 1922 to turn 18. Nowadays that is the age of majority here - as in a lot of other countries - so quite a major occasion. But back then, that was not until you turned 21...
On the other hand, it's Nils who is in the centre here, and not my grandfather. So perhaps it is his birthday - which was August 17. Checking the calendar (oh how easy these days to do that online!), I see that in 1922 that was an ordinary Thursday. In 1923, though, it was a Friday - and would have been Nils' 21st...
Ah well. Whatever the occasion for the photo: Tomorrow is June 23, and the 115th anniversary of the birth of my grandfather. (Sadly he died rather "young", at 64.) (I'm calling that "young" now because 64 is what I'll be myself in a couple of months!!) (Gasp!!!)
So besides the "threesome" theme, that's another reason for me to choose this photo for...
Sepia Saturday 475
12 comments:
They look too proper to be smoking like the middle fellow was in the inspiration photo. Nice looking young me.
Now I am wondering why they changed Midsummer Eve, isn't that dictated by the calendar? Yes, I do wonder what the occasion was. There are no clues in the background either.
They look very posh and well dressed.
A nice match for the theme. Do you still celebrate "name days" in Sweden? I only recently came across this tradition and did not know that in some countries it is/was popular as a person's actual birthday.
Virginia, I'm not sure about 1922, but my grandfather smoked a pipe sometimes. There are photos of him with a pipe in his mouth. In my own memories (50s-60s) I don't associate their house with the smell of smoke, though. Maybe he quit, or maybe he only smoked outdoors. My great-uncle Nils (in the middle) did smoke cigarettes in my childhood, though. From visits to their house, I remember a wooden cigarette box with a contraption in the shape of a bird to pick up the cigarettes.
Yes it's dictated by the calendar. Which means that if you want to change when to celebrate - you change the calendar... ;) The reason would have been to have Midsummer always fall on a weekend. Back in 1953, I imagine most people had no objection to that (?) as Saturdays were still normally workdays. So moving Midsummer Day to Saturday meant getting a long weekend. Nowadays, Midsummer Eve (Friday) is also often a free day for many, with some shops closed and others closing early.
Digression: In my early school years in the 1960s, we still went to school half day on an ordinary Saturday. Dad worked half day at the office, too. So the "weekend" did not start until Saturday afternoon. Some time later in the 60s Saturdays became work-free for most people. Nowadays it's not all that simple, of course... as a lot of people have to work all weekend to make sure the rest of us have something to do on our free time :)
They do indeed :)
Thanks Mike. Yes, we still celebrate name days in Sweden. I would say less so now than in the past, but the tradition probably varies from family to family. I suspect it may be abandoned eventually, as with increased immigration there are so many 'new' names now that are not included. In my family we never made a big fuss of the name days, we tried to remember them but no 'big' celebrations.
My dad was a little younger than your grandfather, he was born in 1913, but his sister was in 1905. perfect for sepia sunday… as I looked at the photo I thought how the suits for men are almost exactly the same now as then.. in USA 21 is the age of majority.
I thought it was 18 in most US states?
I feel the same about men's suits - at least it's certainly not easy to guess the year of old photos based just on those! :)
I love to see pictures of my grandparents and great grandparents, etc. when they were young as you get a whole new perspective on 'who' they were. Or if you're lucky enough, as I am, to have a journal kept by a great grandparent, you learn a lot about them from their writing - such as how witty or observant they were about things and such. It's one of the reasons I have saved every letter written by my husband to me when we were 'courting' as it were (it was a long-distance relationship for a while - begun as a summer romance at a lake). My mother also kept every letter I wrote to her when my children were young and after those children were grown, she gave them back to me. What a treasure! In the normal course of raising my kiddos, I'd forgotten some of the more mundane but funny things that happened along the way and laughed all over again. Of course there were the normal trials and tribulations recorded as well and I had to shake my head and smile over those as well. Now-a-days, folks email or text each other which is too bad as I don't suppose anyone thinks to save many or any of those correspondences.
LaN, there were tons of papers, letters, notebooks and photos etc when we emptied the house after my parents (and grandparents before them). Living in a small flat myself, I had to make some more or less random choices what to keep! But yes I do have some old letters and journals and such as well (even if I've also let go of some). On my other blog (Greetings from the past, link in my sidebar) I'm exploring old postcards to/from my grandmother's half-siblings from 1901 onward. That has also given me clues to some undated and unnamed photos.
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