European Languages and Societies Commons^™

A Danish Lad In America, Fred Delcomyn

The Bridge

“The past is a foreign country: they do things differently there.” So said L.P. Hartley in The Go-Between (1953). Looking back on myself as a young immigrant child in Detroit at mid-century, the phrase seems especially apt. In my past I was quite literally in a foreign country.

Heinrich Handschin: Childhood Places

Swiss American Historical Society Review

Heinrich Handschin was born on February 1, 1830, in Rickenbach in the Canton of Basel-Landschaft as the son of Anna Maria Obrist and Johannes Handschin. He was the youngest of four children and grew up in the 'Butcher House' named for the butcher line of the Handschin family from Rickenbach which has many wide-spread branches. Yet for a long time there had been no more butchers in the family, instead there were lacemakers, weavers of silk ribbons, small farmers, day-laborers and farmhands. In the 19th century other family members undertook the difficult journey to America in the hope to find …

The International Life Of A Swiss Hotelkeeper, Marianne Burkhard

Swiss American Historical Society Review

Among the papers of Ferdinand Sperl there is a

small black book in which he chronicled the stages of

his life from his childhood to the 1960s. This

chronicle is very interesting as it shows first, how the

son of a hotelier was thoroughly prepared for

following in his family's footsteps as a fourth

generation hotelier, and second, how his arrival in the

United States in 1939 and the Second World War led

him to an unexpected career in military intelligence

after which he returned to his career as hotelier.

Then And Now, Gustav T. Durrer

Swiss American Historical Society Review

The first big event of my life was on the 26th of September 1911, at two

in the afternoon, when I first saw the light of the world. I was entered in the

civil register of the city of Luzern as Gustav Theophil Durrer, Luzern, son of

Dr. Gustav Durrer, senior; citizen of Dallenwil (Nidwalden) and Luzern. My

parents and sisters (aged 2 and 4) lived in the Lowen-Platz in Luzern.

From Here To There: Memoirs Of A Swiss Childhood, Ellen Carney

Swiss American Historical Society Review

Flags are the hallmark of August ist, a day steeped in tradition and legend. Flags are flown all year round, but they serve mainly decorative purposes on mountain tops, steam boats and on occasion, a church tower. The bright red square with the white cross livens up the green (or white) countryside, gray city streets and certainly looks photogenic against the blue sky of calendar pages. Swiss love their flag but don't pledge allegiance to it, not even on this day when it assumes a patriotic dimension and is flown everywhere, from ordinary buildings, across narrow streets in the old …

Review Essay, Stefan Maechler, John E. Woods

Swiss American Historical Society Review

Stefan Maechler, The Wilkomirski Affair: A Study in Biographical Truth.

Translated by John E. Woods. New York: Random House , 2001.

vii, 496 pp. Paperback, $16.95.In

A Family Sketchbook, Eva M. Johnson

The Bridge

Father, Otto Christensen, was born in 1875 on a farm

that lay on the edge of the North Sea in Jutland, Denmark.

When he was four his mother died and his father remarried.

He spent his childhood tending sheep and cattle and playing

in the sand dunes and heather along the sea. He must have

spent much time dreaming his dreams.

Sentenced To Be Hanged: The Tragic Story Of A Danish Immigrant, Peter D. Thomsen

The Bridge

Several years ago, Thorvald Hansen who was then in

charge of the Danish Immigrant Archives at Grand View

College, Des Moines, Iowa, asked if I would be interested in

writing the Peter Mathiasen story. I had previously told him

that in my childhood home I had heard bits and pieces of this

tale and that what I remembered most was how intensely it

was discussed by some of the immigrant people with whom

my parents associated. Little did I realize they were talking

about something that happened fifteen years before my

birth.

Memories From Childhood And Early Youth, Andrea Blichfeldt Smith, Alma K. Stark, Translator, Peter D. Thomsen

The Bridge

The story which follows was translated from the Danish language shortly after it was written around 1937. The original manuscript, written in longhand on scraps of brown-bag paper, no longer exists. On the typewritten copy of my cousin's translation, however, she writes: "Mother wrote this at my request." Today, at age 95, Alma Stark lives at 14801 Sherman Way, Van Nuys, California. She corresponds regularly with me and has been very helpful in my quest for genealogical information.

Reminiscences From A Long Life, Ane Helena Paulsen

The Bridge

My maiden name was Ane Helene Nielsen and I was born in Yestergaard, Lendum Sogn close to Frederickshavn on January 22, 1866. My father's name was Ole Christian Nielsen, Kirkerod, Skaerum Sogn. He died early of tuberculosis. I can scarcely remember him. My mother's name was Mariane Jensen. She was the daughter of Jens Nielsen, Sondergaard, Lendum Sogn, and his wife Johanne Marie Larsdatter of Vang, S4,ndergaard, Tirslev Sogn.

Book Review, Egon Bodtker

The Bridge

This short book tells the reader what life was like for one young man in a small village in Denmark in the first two decades of this century. As the author writes in the Foreword: " it is a collection of reminiscences, a mosaic of people and places seen from a long distance, both geographically and chronologically." This sensitive sketch of a childhood and adolescence in the first two decades of the twentieth century will make all readers aware of the monumental changes in the world from then until now. While many of the individual behaviors can be related to …