Above, you can see Arvid Andersson when he was 59 years old in 1943. Arvid was born in 1884. He was my grandfather. His daughter Greta was my mother. Arvid's pose in the photo was one so typical of him and it brings up lots of feelings from my childhood. Arvid was an honest and heart-warming man.
In the background, there is a small house. That house was Arvid's carpenter workshop. It was painted with the traditional Swedish red color. This house can also be seen in the “wheelbarrow” photo below. The house still is there, but it is now rebuilt to a yellow villa.
When the first three photos on this web page were taken by my father, the Second World War was going on just outside the borders of Sweden.
This photo shows my mother Greta Andersson and Margit. With Greta to the left and Margit to the right. In 1942 Greta was 32 and Margit 24 years old. Margit's lastname was Andersson before she married Nils Pettersson.
This photo shows Greta driving Margit around on a home-made wooden wheelbarrow at Arvid's small farm. Margit was the daughter of Augusta, who was Arvid's sister.
Augusta, Margit and Greta were living and working in Lidköping at that time. Greta and Margit were like sisters all their lives.
For many years Greta worked as a maid in Lidköping, doing hard work that ruined her body. When Greta was 60 years old she was tormented with pain from all of her joints. Greta herself blamed the bad conditions she was working under in one of the families that she served in Lidköping. Greta moved back to Långö in 1944, when she married Hugo.
The newborn son was already baptized to Conny Andersson, by a priest at the hospital in Falköping. You can see me and my proud mother above.
Greta is happy to be alive and proud to have given birth to me in this photo. Probably, she had recently came home with me from the hospital. Greta had stayed in the hospital for some extra time after my birth, because of her weakness with its roots back in her earlier life. So, Hugo wanted to celebrate the occasion by taking a photo.