It was a very quiet week at the museum so I thought it would be a good opportunity to give a tour of our gallery as I promised on my last post. Our gallery includes a wide variety of photos, posters, costumes, instruments and many other things that depicts the life of a Swedish immigrant in America.

Allow me to introduce you to the Karl Karlson family. They are arriving to New York for the first time in 1894. The first thing they will see from their long voyage is the Statue of Liberty. They will be processed in the new federal immigration facility, Ellis Island which is only two years old. New York is not their last stop. In a few days they will arrive by train to Chicago!

Allow my to introduce you to Charles R Walgreen, the founder of Walgreen’s drugstore. Walgreen was the son of a Swedish immigrant, Charles R Walgreen Sr. Shown below Mr Walgreen is a picture of the first Walgreen’s at 4134 Cottage Grove Avenue in Chicago. By 1913, there were four stores on the South side of Chicago. Today, Walgreen’s is a billion-dollar company.

Here is a map of the immigration patterns of Chicago in 1950. The multiple colors and patterns represent different countries. The yellow represents the German community, the pink represents the Norwegians, and the teal represents the Swedish population. There were many other countries mentioned such as Mexico, Japan, China,Russia and Greece.

I bet you also didn’t know that there is a children’s immigration museum upstairs…

In this part of the museum the kids can pretend that they live in agricultural 1870s Sweden. They can pretend to milk the cow or hang clothes on the line.

Another fun part of the kid’s museum ( and my personal favorite) is that the kids can look at books translated into Swedish. There are English translations  also provided.

Now that I have been working for the museum for three weeks I think I am much more at home and comfortable. I have my own desk that I work at everyday which makes me feel very official and important.  In my last post I gave a sample of some of the questions I hope to ask immigrants. For this post, I want to give a sample of some of the questions I will be asking non-immigrants or residents of Andersonville. For these people I have decided to separate the questions into two categories: Andersonville and Swedish heritage.

Andersonville

1. Compared to other neighborhoods of Chicago, what was it like growing up in Andersonville?

2. Did you feel a connection to your Swedish heritage growing up in/visiting/working in Andersonville?

3. What sites or stores do you think should be preserved for future generations?

4 Have you or your family always worked in Andersonville?

Heritage

1. What was the cause of you ancestors’ immigration?

2. What year did they immigrate?

3. Did your parents or grandparents tell stories of Sweden when growing up?

4. Are you a member or volunteer of any Swedish groups/clubs/orginizations? If so, what does this group do and what is your role?

5. Do you continue any Swedish traditions within your family or home? If so, what are they?

6. Do you speak Swedish or do you speak/ teach Swedish to your children?

7. Have you taken any trips or visits to Sweden? If so, where and when did you go?

8. What part of your Swedish heritage are you most proud of?

9. Do you have any meaningful objects or photos that you would like to share? (I will ask both immigrants and non-immigrants this question.)

Of course these will not be the only questions that I will ask them. I also plan on asking  specific questions relating to their line of work and how it could be related to their heritage or Andersonville. For example, I hope to interview Scott Martin in the next few weeks. He is the owner of the local Swedish tavern that is across the street from the museum.

For my next post I hope to give a small tour of the museum since I have not done that yet. I think this will be a very cool since it will have lots of photos of our gallery.

So far in my second week at the museum I am beginning to learn my surroundings and understand what I will be doing for the rest of the semester. I think my favorite part about the museum is that it used to be a hardware store. In one of the offices there is the original vault for money that is now used for office supplies.

OK, so now it’s time to discuss what I’ll be doing for the rest of the semester. As I said in my last post I will be working on oral history, which means I will be conducting interviews and later transcribing them. This week, my work has consisted of reviewing the work of previous interns who have done the same thing. My job this week was to notice if there are any patterns with the people we are interviewing. For example, I have noticed that the museum has interviewed quite a lot of second generation females. We want to have as much diversity as possible in our interviews, so interviewing a first generation male would certainly be  a new perspective. I am especially looking forward to interviewing people who have immigrated from Sweden recently or in years past. Below is a sample of some of the questions I hope to ask:

1. How old were you when you immigrated?

2. Were you alone or with family/friends when immigrating?

3. what was the cause of the immigration?

4. What part of Sweden are you from?/Does this part of Sweden have traditions or characteristics that are unique to the country?

5. Have you visited Andersonville?/ How long have you lived in Andersonville?

6. In your opinion, do you think Andersonville captures the essence of Sweden or Swedish culture?/ Do parts of this neighborhood remind you of Sweden?

7.How do/did you find a balance between your old Swedish culture and new American lifestyle?

8. What did you do for a living in Sweden?

9. Why did you choose to come to America over other countries?

10. What does it mean to you to be a Swedish American? What would you like to tell the young of today or future generations?

Of course I will also come up with a set of questions for those who are non-immigrants which I will probably blog for my next post.

Hello! My name is Andrea Marshall and I am a junior studying history at Loyola University of Chicago. During the 2013 Fall semester I will be working at the Swedish American Museum in Andersonville. I hope to be working on oral history, which means I will be conducting interviews with people then transcribing them. I think the museum wants me to this so they can have a bigger picture of what the Swedish American experience is like. Hopefully, by the end of this semester I will have learned what it is like to work in a small cultural museum.

My first day on the job was very exciting because my supervisor, Karin Abercrombie, took me and several Swedish tourists on a walking tour of Andersonville. I’m pretty sure this tour was useful as it will provide context for my research in the future. Below are some of the sites we saw while on the tour.

The first thing we saw on the tour was the Ebenezer Lutheran Church. This church was important to Swedish culture because many Swedish immigrants in the 50s and 60s would gather here to speak their native language. Today, it is still relevant to Andersonville by hosting the ceremony of Saint Lucia every Christmas. It was also very interesting to learn that Ebenezer Lutheran had recently celebrated its 120th anniversary.

The second site we saw was the Swedish Bakery. Karin explained that there used to be five or six Swedish bakeries on Clarke street at one time. Today, you can find a wide variety if baked goods in this store such as cakes and cookies. However, ifcustomers are felling adventurous they can also try a Swedish cannoli.

Our last stop on the tour was Erickson’s delicatessen which sells a wide variety of imported Scandinavian foods.

Overall, I enjoyed my first day at the museum and am looking forward to what I will learn on my second which will start this Tuesday.