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| Jennie Christine Johnson milking a cow with her little sister, Ellen Eveline Johnson, circa 1908. |
"This photo is of my great aunts Jennie Christine Johnson (milking cow) and Ellen Eveline Johnson. It is taken on their parent's farm - Charles (Carl) Otto Johnson (Born in Borgvik, Varmland) and Wilhelmina Frederika Johansdotter Elmstedt (Born in Almeboda, Kronoberg). Our family still owns the farm. We have this photo as well as that of their homestead (paulson064) - both were made into post cards to send to relatives. This one in particular had writing on the front "Jennie and Ellen". Jennie was born in 1890 and Ellen in 1906 so I estimate this photo would have been taken in 1908."I was especially excited to get this comment as I had found the history of Miss Jennie Johnson but had no identified pictures of her and so her story had gone untold.
Jennie Christine Johnson (1890-1913) was the oldest daughter of Charles and Minnie Johnson. Swedish immigrants, Charles and Minnie met in Wisconsin after each had immigrated. Charles had been in America for some years, while Minnie was a relatively recent immigrant. Jennie was born in Drummond (Bayfield) Wisconsin. The family moved on to the Olivia area when she was quite small about 1892/1893. (Post: From Foreclosure to Prosperity.) Like other young women of the area - Jennie moved to Austin for a while and worked as a domestic for the Rector Thomson (a real estate agent) family. Her name appears in the city directory as a servant in the household only for the single year of 1910. C. Johnson noted:
The last record I can find for her is in the 1910 census of Austin, she is 19, working as a house maid for the family of Rector M Thomson along with another Swedish American working as a cook - Christine J Wilson aged 21.It is likely that the "Christine J. Wilson" working in the same home was Jennie Christine Wilson - from Olivia the daughter of Edward and Bina Wilson - another early Olivia area. Jennie Johnson soon returned to Olivia and married a local boy, Hjalmar Larson October 23, 1912. The Larsons owned farm land close to the Johnsons, but the Larson sons were sailors. Hjalmar, Jennie's new husband, was a captian in the Coast Guard.
Trajedy struck a short nine months after their marriage. Jenny's death certificate, dated 16 June 1913, notes that she died of Landry's disease/ acute ascending paralysis after a duration of 2 days, 6 hours. Today we call this disease "Guillian Barre Syndrome." Starting with a tingling sensation in the feet and hands, paralysis ascends up the body. Often it simply reverses itself, but in some acute cases - death results from paralysis of the diaphragm or heart. There is something strange and terrible about the thought of lying there feeling death creeping closer, 2 days, 6 hours.
After Jenny's death, Hjalmar Larson left Olivia and sailed away to Galveston, Texas. There he married the young Daisy Perkins on November 3, 1917. They raised a large family.
As for Jenny's little sister, Ellen Eveline Johnson (born February 7, 1906, died 1947) she took nursing training, and went to live in Houston Texas. The 1930 census finds her living with her sister, Marie Hardy's family and working in a physicians office. Also living in the household is J. E. Dawdy, Jr., a bookkeeper working at State National Bank in Houston. Ellen and J.E. Dawdy, Jr. married in May 1930, shortly after the census was taken in. He continued to work at the bank while Ellen opened her own Swedish Massage business, Elite Massage. Located in one of Houston's early "skyscrapers" the Kress Building, Elite Massage shared space with dentists, physicians and dressmakers. "Mrs. Ellen Dawdy" appears to have been successful in her occupation as she remained in business until her death in 1947. Unfortunately her marriage was not so successful and she and her husband divorced sometime during the mid 1940s. She died at the age of 41 in 1947 having lived a full, if not entirely happy, life.
Identifiers:
Negative: Paulson357 (Originally scanned at 1200 bpi tiff, downsized to 400 bpi jpeg for this post)
Related Posts:
Charles and Minnie Johnson
From Foreclosure to Prosperity.
Jennie also is present in a number of the other photographs in this blog. You can find these by searching on her name (Jennie Christine Johnson)
People:
Jennie Christine Johnson (Larson): Born 29 May 1890 in Drummond (Bayfield) Wisconsin. Married 23 Oct 1912 to Hjalmar Emanual Larson. Died 16 Jun 1913. Olivia (Calhoun) Texas. (Buried in the Olivia Cemetery)
Hjalmar Emanual Larson (born 21 Feb 1886. Married Jennie Johnson 1912. Married Daisy Perkins 1917. Died 22 Aug 1975. Houston
Ellen Eveline Johnson (Dawdy) Born 7 Feb 1906. Married 1930 to J. E. Dawdy, Jr. Divorced mid 1940s. Died 18 Sept 1947.)
J E Dawdy, Jr. (Ellen's husband). Probably this is the John Edward Dawdry, Jr. who was born 27 Oct 1905 (Palacios, Texas), died in Aug. 8, 1981, Bay City Texas. He enlisted in the army 7 Nov 1942. Ellen and JE would have been married sometime after the 1930 census when she is living with her sister in Houston, and JE Dawdy is listed as a boarder and the publication of the 1930 Houston city directory when she is listed as Mrs. Ellen Dawdy, masseur. Their address continues to be the same up through 1942 and it is only in the 1948 directory listing that her name has returned to "Johnson"
Place: Olivia area (Calhoun County) Texas
Date: Circa 1908/1909
Sources include:
Eden Lutheran Church Record, Olivia, Texas.
Death Certificates (Ellen Eveline Johnson, "Jinnie Larson", Hjalmar Larson, J.E. Dawdy, Jr.)
Marriage Certificates/Records (accessed through Ancestry.com and Family Search.com)
Census Records
Johnson, C. Personal communication.
City Directories from Houston and Austin
Ancestry.com family trees were used to find "leads" and then all information was verified through other records.
A couple final notes:
Marriage and the children of immigrants:
I am interested in the number of these young women and men of the area who married Swedes or the children of other Swedish immigrants. Jenny's marriage into another Swedish immigrant family is very common in this second generation of Swedes. Less common is the fact that none of her brothers and sisters married spouses of Swedish descent. As I look at family records throughout the Swedish American communities (in Texas, Iowa, and Minnesota) in which the Paulsons lived - it appears that the majority of children of Swedish immigrants married spouses of Swedish descent. In each following generation, a larger and larger percentage married outside this group.
Help with identification and comments are welcome!
Since I am "abandoning" the earlier copy of this post - I am including the full comment from C. Johnson here. As mentioned - there is definitely some updating to do on some other posts as Jenny is recognizable in a number of them!
"I can not thank you enough for posting this blog and these images, they are such lovely momentos of our ancestors. This photo is of my great aunts Jennie Christine Johnson (milking cow) and Ellen Eveline Johnson. It is taken on their parent's farm - Charles (Carl) Otto Johnson (Born in Borgvik, Varmland) and Wilhelmina Frederika Johansdotter Elmstedt (Born in Almeboda, Kronoberg). Our family still owns the farm. We have this photo as well as that of their homestead (paulson064) - both were made into post cards to send to relatives. This one in particular had writing on the front "Jennie and Ellen". Jennie was born in 1890 and Ellen in 1906 so I estimate this photo would have been taken in 1908. Because the Swedes in Texas book published in 1918 (family #1152) states that Wilhelmina had 5 living children at the time, I believe Jennie died between 1910 and 1918, I truly wish we could learn what happened to her. I was hoping Christine Wilson may have been from Olivia, she was born in Iowa and I understand the Edward Wilson family of Olivia also had spent time there, unfortunately there are no children listed by the name of Christine in the Swedes of Texas nor on any census where I can find the Wilson family. If you have any information from the Eden church logs you have reviewed or anything else you can share that might shed light on what happened to Jennie I would be so grateful. Other photos you have posted on this blog in which I recognize our family and/or the farm are Paulson213 "They want to stay here" , Paulson062, in "Women and Girls, Olivia, Texas, circa 1910", Paulson246 and Paulson195. I will try to annotate the photos with identifications. I have more photos from this timeframe and later that contain images of the Swedish families there and would like to share them with you, unfortunately they are not well annotated and may just say "The Larsons" but that is so much better than a photo without annotation which unfortunately is most often the case. Thank you once again, I am so grateful for the work you have put into this, the images bring them all back to us." -
Comment from C. Johnson (January 31, 2016)
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