Today’s Sepia Saturday photo prompt (at end of post) shows a library full of studious young men reading books. The photo I am sharing today doesn’t show a group of young men in a library. Instead it is a photo of an older gentleman, casually dressed, sitting outside. It is a photo of my paternal Great-Grandfather, Carl Albert Gillberg. Why this photo was taken and who took it, I can’t say. What I can say is that I’m glad the photo was taken. I found this special photo in one of my Grandmother Ingrid’s Books of Remembrance.
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| Carl Albert Gillberg in Salt Lake City, Utah |
Carl looks like he’s reading a newspaper. Wouldn’t it be fun to know what he was reading about? Unfortunately, there is no date for this photo. But there is a handwritten note underneath it, written by my Grandmother Ingrid Gillberg (Carl’s daughter). She wrote, “My Dad, sitting on the steps of our home on Grand Ave in Salt Lake City, Utah.”
I’m wondering if my Grandma was mistaken about this home being on Grand Avenue, because when I looked for Grand Avenue on Googlemaps, the only Grand Avenue in Salt Lake City is inside a cemetery.
(Since writing this post, Wendy Mathias of Jollett etc., informed me that there is a Grand Street in Salt Lake City. After checking this out on Googlemaps, this looks to be the likely candidate for where this photo was taken. Thanks Wendy!)
This photo must have been taken sometime between 1909 and 1930. I surmise this because Carl immigrated to the United States from Sweden in 1909 and by the 1930 census he and his family were living in Los Angeles, California. Both the 1910 census and the 1920 census show Carl and his family living in Salt Lake City, Utah. So, sometime between 1920 and 1930, Carl and his family moved to California.
Carl was born in Stockholm, Sweden on January 8, 1882. He passed away in West Covina, California on May 3, 1963 at 81 years of age. He was a hard-working family man, and did his best to provide for his family. As part of my research, I compiled a list showing Carl’s known occupations.
Occupations for Carl Albert Gillberg:
Before 1909 - According to Canadian Passenger List - Tinsmith in Sweden
1910 Census - Laborer - Tending Mason
1920 Census - Baker at Bakery Company
1930 Census - Baker at Bakery
1940 Census - Vegetable Peddler - Private Truck
That last occupation in 1940 somehow makes me sad for Carl. But, this was during "The Great Depression" so times were hard for most everyone. According to the 1940 Census, Carl was engaged in Public Emergency Work, and was seeking employment. I wrote a previous post about finding Carl and his family in the 1940 census.
While Carl worked as a baker in Utah, he was able to bring home flour sacks which his wife, Hilda, used to make clothing for their children and quilts for the family. I wrote a previous post about this. If you’d like, you can read it HERE. These were humble immigrants who did the best they could to provide for their family.
This is a photo of Carl Albert Gillberg taken in La Puente, California in 1962, the year before Carl passed away.
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| Carl Albert Gillberg 1962 |
If you’d like to see “what’s in the news” with other Sepia Saturday participants, just click HERE.
Thanks for reading!
Jana
Copyright © Jana Last 2012
Jana, Look at Grand STREET in Salt Lake City. There are houses with steep yards just like this one. I love the picture and that yard - must have been an adventure to cut the grass. I'm going to go read the linked posts now. They don't sound familiar, so you might have written them before I found you.
ReplyDeleteHi Wendy,
DeleteWow! Thanks for your detective work! Now why didn't I think of that possibility? You're awesome!
Thanks so much for reading and for your very helpful comments!
It turns out I had read those posts already. As soon as I saw the woman with the sausage curls I remembered. It was fun looking back at that post.
DeleteYa, I saw that you had commented on that earlier post. Thanks for that! And thanks again for your awesome detective work. I've given you credit for finding the correct street within my post. :)
DeleteIsn't it great to have these helpful genealogy friends? I went back and read the linked posts too and I had missed the one with the curls - so glad I did. These are great pictures. The first is so natural and the 2nd, although a bit posed for taking a picture, still has a natural feel to it.
ReplyDeleteHi Kathy,
DeleteYep, genealogy friends are so awesome! Thanks for reading the post with my grandma and her curls!
And I do love these photos of my great-grandpa Carl. Especially since I never met him, or at least I don't remember doing so since he passed away when I was a toddler.
Thanks so much for stopping by!
Aren't those casual, no-reason, daily life photos fun to look at now? We need to remember to add those kinds of photos to our photo albums for our families to enjoy in the future! A fun post, Jana.
ReplyDeleteHi Celia,
DeleteI so agree with you! Those casual photos are so fun. And we do need to have those candid photos for our descendants to enjoy.
Thanks for stopping by!
I like this informal picture, reading the paper, enjoying perhaps a free day or after work. People then were so self sufficient. Imagine wearing dresses made from flour sacks. I could imagine that the mother would do her best to make them attractive, perhaps with ribbons etc. Now I go back in your history to look at HERE.
ReplyDeleteHi Titania,
DeleteI like this informal photo too. It's so nice to see our ancestors in casual, everyday settings.
And people then did seem so self-sufficient. I suppose it was a matter of survival, really.
Thanks so much for stopping by!
I'm so glad you gave us the link to the flour sack dresses or I would be wondering how they used them. Times must have been hard.
ReplyDeleteHi Bob,
DeleteI'm glad you enjoyed the linke to my flour sack dresses post. Yes, it does look like times were quite difficult for my great-grandparents, as well as for all those living through the Great Depression.
Thanks so much for stopping by!
When many people here emigrated, the States were known as "the land of unlimited possibilities". That may be so but for some life was tough and not so easy... Anyway, in 1962 Carl looked content and that's good.
ReplyDeleteHi Peter,
DeleteYes, Carl did look quite content in the photo from 1962. I'm so glad to have these precious photos.
Thanks so much for stopping by!
It sounds like the flour sacks from the bakery did not have printed designs if she was dyeing them. There was a time when flour sacks did come with printed designs that were as nice as fabric that could be bought by the yard.
ReplyDeleteHi Postcardy,
DeleteI think you must be right about the flour sacks from the bakery not being printed. In doing a little research about flour sack dresses, I saw images of those dresses made from print flour sacks. Quite interesting! Oh, how I wish my grandmother had saved some of her flour sack dresses made by her mom.
Thanks so much for stopping by!
A moving story of finding this photo, and of a man and his family surviving the Great Depression. I feel as if I'm meeting another branch of the family here, added to your other posts. How much of your ancestry is Swedish? My husband has about half Swedish ancestry, but I have not worked on his tree yet.
ReplyDeleteHi Mariann,
DeleteI'm actually 1/4 Swedish and 1/4 Norwegian, as my father was 1/2 Swedish and 1/2 Norwegian. Those Scandinavian lines can be quite interesting to work on with the last names changing with every generation. My Grandma Ingrid hired a professional genealogist a very long time ago to work on those lines. I'm so thankful she did! But, it's not complete. (Is it ever really done? No.) So, I have more work to do.
Thanks so much for stopping by!
Ah! The occupational thread appears in your post this week too! I just love seeing all the interesting things folks did for a living - whether humble or grand, they give us an insight into life in another time. The slice-of-life photo is perfect!
ReplyDeleteHi Liz,
DeleteI agree with you that discovering the occupations of our ancestors helps us see what life was like in days gone by.
Thanks so much for stopping by!
Snapshots like this one, do have a special place in family albums because they often record the personal details we remember better than the formal studio portraits.
ReplyDeleteHi Mike,
DeleteI agree with you. Candid photos can often help to capture the personality of our ancestors in a way formal studio portraits can't.
Thanks so much for stopping by!
I love how you have woven these family photos with historical facts to tell us some of Carl's story. Enjoyed the post.
ReplyDeleteHii ljhlaura,
DeleteYou are so sweet! Thank you for your kind comments. I'm very glad you enjoyed reading this post about my Great-Grandpa Carl.
Thanks so much for stopping by!
It is almost a perfect Sepia Saturday post and I can't think of a better way of illustrating what Sepia Saturday is all about than by pointing to posts such as this. Great photographs, a slice of history and a lovely example of collaborative Sepia Saturday research. As I say, perfect.
ReplyDeleteHi Alan,
DeleteWow! Thank you so much for your kind comments! High praise indeed. I very much appreciate you stopping by and reading my blog. Thanks again!
How old is the cemetery? Could it have come after the photo? (Probably not, but perhaps the streets were divided up differently after the date of the picture - Grand Ave and Grand Street).
ReplyDeleteThey are both great photos and you are so lucky to have them. It would have been neat if he was reading a newspaper in that last one.
Hi Kat,
DeleteYou raise a good question about the age of the cemetery. Unfortunately, I don't know the answer. And yes, I'm so glad to have these photos. They are truly family history treasures.
Thanks so much for stopping by!
After reading this post and all the comments I have to say this is what I love about this medium - it is so interactive and you get so much help and insight from all your "cyberbuds".
ReplyDeleteHi Teresa,
DeleteYou are so right! The genealogy community is so very helpful.
I appreciate your comments very much! Thanks for stopping by!
For an humble immigrant, he seems to have done right if his descendants are now thriving. He set a good example to abide by.
ReplyDelete:)~
HUGZ
Hi Ticklebear,
DeleteYes, I agree with you. He did set a good example for his descendants for sure.
Thank you so much for reading and commenting. I really appreciate it!
No prob!!
DeleteIf I had boasted on Facebook that I had been sleeping more lately, seems I spoke too soon as insomnia has struck tonight... That'll teach me!!! Gives me time to do my round though.
Good night!!
:)~
HUGZ
Uh Oh! Insomnia doesn't sound fun. Hope you are able to get to sleep soon. Good night to you too. :)
Delete