09 July 2019

Scandinavian Folk Festival Jamestown

Jamestown's Scandinavian Folk Festival will be at the JCC campus on Friday thru Sunday, July 19th - 21st.  Information about the festival can be found at scandinavianjamestown.org or at their Facebook page.

THANKS TO ALL THOSE WHO CAME OUT TO ENJOY THE FESTIVAL AND STOPPED BY!


One of the features of the festival has been its genealogy table.  I'll be setting up alongside this year looking for families that have Swedish ancestors who arrived in Chautauqua or Warren counties before 1865.  I am hoping to find Swedish immigrants who aren't in my database, but more importantly, I an hoping to learn new stories of these early settlers. In appreciation, I will be giving out buttons for those who qualify.  So if you have family stories, books brought by your ancestor from Sweden, letters in Swedish received or sent before the Civil War, early Swedish Methodist church records, photographs or any similar document please stop by.

Second Wave button. Design © John Everett Jones 2019


Most of us are descendants of Swedes who arrived in the tsunami of emigration that started after the close of the American Civil War.  In several years, more emigrants left from Sweden than the total of all those who had emigrated before 1865 (during the First and Second Wave).

My great grandfather was one of those, he arrived as a toddler in 1866.  So I am part of what historians have labelled the "third wave" of Swedish emigration.  If you contribute to our local cultural institutions, I would be happy to give you a button like the one that I'll be wearing.

Third Wave button. Design © John Everett Jones 2019



Talks at the Festival


I'll be talking at 4pm on Saturday (JCC Carnahan Building room 168) about my current research:

RELIGION AND THE EARLY SWEDES (1844-1865) 
A description of the religious motivations of the Swedes who established the Scandinavian community in the Jamestown area. Details about the formation of congregations and conflicts that divided the Swedish community. And biographies of the first Swedish ministers who served our area.



I'm also going to be speaking at 3pm on Sunday   (JCC Carnahan Building room 168)



                            SLIDES FROM THIS LECTURE


THE EARLY DANISH COMMUNITY IN CHAUTAUQUA AND WARREN COUNTIES
Danes arrived in Jamestown in the mid 1850s.  The beginnings of the community here is traced back to C.C. Beck who arrived as a ships carpenter in Buffalo in 1848.  Beck was born in Sweden of Danish parents and grew up in Bornholm, the island that was origin to almost all of the Danes in our area. The early Danish settlers were young men whose apprenticeships were put to advantage in Jamestown.  This group hosted Jacob Riis when he lived in our area in 1870-1871.








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