The story my father told me so long ago about his grandparents Andrew and Brita Dalin left me with two mysteries – well, at least two. The first is the mystery of Brita’s maiden name. I remember my father saying, “Well, it was something like Anderson or Johnson – I think.” In all my years of research, I’ve managed to narrow it down (if you can call it that) to either:
Johnson – based on Brita’s oldest daughter’s marriage license
-or-
Carlson – based on her other daughter’s marriage license
-or-
Anderson – based on her oldest son’s marriage license
Wow.
And now on to mystery number two, which revolves around Brita’s first child who was born – and died – in Sweden (all her other children were born in Montana).
According to notes I took after talking to my father many years ago, that child was a son, born to the couple shortly after Andrew immigrated alone to the United States. Recently while looking at those notes again after a very long time, I noticed that the son’s name was John.1
Armed with this “new” bit of information, I immediately went into Ancestry and added the name “John” to the previously named “Unknown Dalin” in the family tree – and VOILA – this incredible hint popped up!2
I took a deep breath – and a closer look.
- Given Name: Johan Lars Anders (The English variant of “Johan” is “John”. Check!)
- Birth Date: 27 Dec 1887 (Andrew immigrated to the U.S. in 1889 so a birth date of 1887 is entirely possible, in spite of the fact that my father said John was born after Andrew left for the U.S. Check!)
- Birth Place: Hudiksvall, Gavleborg (Based on Andrew’s Declaration of Intention, both Andrew and Brita were born in Hudiksvall. Check!)3
- Father: Anders Dahlin (The English variant of “Anders” is “Andrew”; and “Dahlin” is an alternate spelling of “Dalin”). Check!4
- Mother: Brita Johansdotter5 (The English translation of “Johansdotter” is “Johnsdaughter” – or “Johnsson” had she been a male child rather than female. Doublecheck!6
- Mother Birth Date: abt 1864 (According to my records, Brita was born in about 1863. Check!)
All excitement aside, and as much as I would love to say that the search for a birth record for little Johan is over, I probably have some more work to do. But on the whole, I’m feeling very good about this find!
ASIDES – AND ONE NOTE
- And just how in the world, I asked myself, had I missed that little detail?? ↩
- Keep Calm and Analyze On. ↩
- Getting a little excited . . . ↩
- Even more excited . . . ↩
- The Swedish naming practice known as the “patronymic naming system” means that the father’s first name was used as a part of his children’s surname. In other words, David’s son Karl would be known as “Karl Davidsson” while his daughter Brita would be known as “Brita Davidsdotter”. This practice began dying out in the 1860s when it became more common to adopt a family surname, which is consistent with another story my father told me – which is that “Dalin” was the surname “adopted” at the time Brita and Andrew were married. And that, of course, is yet another research assignment for another day! ↩
- And this is the point where I leapt out of my chair and ran screaming out to the shed where my husband was calmly working on one of his many home-improvement projects. He thinks I’m crazy. ↩
