Introduction

Subject: Eva Hansen

Interviewer: Ella Hopfner
Date: December 8, 2019
Time: 7:30 PM
Location: Eva Hansen’s House

Sections of Interview
0:19-2:04 Family Life and War
4:33-5:37 Father in the War
10:16-13:15 Experiences in War and Immigrants and refugees

Transcript
0:04-0:15
Ella: So when are where were you born?
Eva: I was born in Sweden April 6, 1939, in a farm in Småland the southern part of Sweden

0:19-2:04
Eva: And I had one brother and two sisters, and we lived on a farm and 19… a few years after I was
born... Should I continue with the farm? My dad was… what do you call it? Into the war…
Tina: Drafted?
Eva: Drafted. He was drafted into the war and we had a big farm with ten or fifteen cows and my mother
had my older sister that was born... two years a year and a half before me and then my brother and then
she had a brother that was born in January the year of ‘41 and the government took my dad away from the
farm and my mother had to take care of my three babies really and a farm with say ten-fifteen cows pigs
chickens and the winters in Sweden at this time where much much much cooler than it has been lately. So
everything froze and I don’t know how my mother could go and milk the cows and all the animals and
have three underage kids in the house.

2:12-2:30
Tina: Why… She didn’t have any help?
Eva: She had no help, the government gave no help and I don’t know the… the pipe was frozen. And I
don’t know how she did it. And she never complained. That she never did.
And it was quite different… do you remember Tina from the house to the farm? It’s quite a difference and
to have to walk there and how she feeds us and feed all those animals I don’t know. And I don’t know, he
was there for almost a year oh maybe not six months I can’t remember. I don’t.

2:52-3:08
Tina: But Sweden was a neutral country how come they drafted?
Eva: To protect Sweden. They took all that was available to...to put down to the border of Denmark to
protect Sweden. In case they invaded us.
3:09-4:28
Tina: Even though they were neutral.
Ella: Wait was this Germany they were worried about?
Eva: No. But they went they went through Sweden to go to Norway. Which was … they shouldn’t be able
to do that.
Tina: Right.
Eva: They had a Swedish… Norway… no… the king of… Now I have lost my thoughts... They were not
allowed to do it but they did. And I remember sitting on my sofa seeing later on when they all those
German troops went through Europe to go to Norway.
Tina: They went through Sweden to go to Norway?
Eva: They went through Sweden. Right, where we lived. And that had to do with something… the prince
says of Sweden was German so they did allow them to go which was an uneditable. But they did it. And I
remember… we were so young we didn’t know what was happening and emm.

4:33-5:37
Tina: Did your father have to fight at all?
Eva: He never had to fight he just had to lay there and… I think with guns in the middle of the winter.
You know how terrible it was and I think I don’t know if they took all the young Swedes but I still to this
day but you know my parents they were farmers, out in the country, they didn’t fight it if they had been
more sophisticated and lived in em they could have fought the government but you know they took what
you have to go and
Tina: So once the germans went through peacefully then he could go home?
Eva: No. No, it was a little after that the Germans came through
Tina: Oh I see
Eva: Because they em, they probably had a peace agreement and when he came home I was so young I
don’t know. He came home

5:38-7:15
Ella: Wait did your parents, where your parents both farmers? Did they grow up where they raised you?
Or did they move?
Eva: My mother was the only child and she grew up on that farm. And my dad hated farming, he came to
America and stayed here for…. Fourteen years, leaving my mother home, they weren’t married…
Tina: Were they engaged?
Eva: No. No engage wasn’t common at that time. They wrote letters all the time. And he saved up money
to own a... Grocery store and finally thirty years forty years later I found out that he’s tradition from… my
dad’s tradition… what do you call it when they?... emm dealing in em trading in Europe. So he was
brought up in he had it in his blood. He wanted to be a owner store. So he saved up for twelve fourteen
years to own a grocery store. And em a year before we were gonna leave the bank collapsed. And he
didn’t have a penny left. So he stayed another year. Sad story I know.
Adam: The great depression occurred
Eva: Ya in 1929

7:20-7:46
Tina: And where was he?
Eva: In Chicago
Tina: In Chicago. What was he doing in Chicago?
Eva: He’s older brother had a building company. I think he worked part-time and I think he worked at the
hospital part-time sometimes I think he did almost a little anything to make a little extra money. Because
my dad always said I don’t want to be in a hospital, he always said that. It’s not very Swedish but he said
that.

7:54-9:04
Ella: Describe your village and homelife
Eva: You know I was very lucky my mother was an only child and she had... You’ve seen the farm… it’s
a beautiful beautiful farm and my and a beautiful, my dad-
Tina: didn’t they build it?
Ella: What happened to the farm?
Eva my dad when he came over and married my mother he was American, typical like he built a new
house, beautiful new house and he built a beautiful barn and he had a toilet, nobody had a toilet. And he
had all the ahh all the tractors
Ella: Modern
Eva: Modern everything was modern and the house you’ve seen the house the house was beautiful the
house was beautiful and he didn’t like farming but he loved ahh my mother was the boss.

10:16-13:15
Tina: Didnt you have to close the shades?
Eva: Ya but that was during the war
Ella: Ya
Eva: Ya during the war we were scared, we were scared for Russia, as long as I can remember we were
scared of Russia. And at night we closed the shades so Russia wouldn’t see that we were living there. And
until I was pretty old that I had that fear. Because the parents and the neighbors put that fear into us
because Russia was terrible at that time, still is
Ella: Why where you afraid of the Russian?
Eva: Because they invaded during the war they invaded they were fighting Germany and allover
Tina: Finland
Eva: Ya Finland was worse
Ella: What happened?
Eva: No they did take over, I don’t know id they took over but they sort of did, but then they, then he had
a lot of Finland kids coming to Sweden as summer kids as ahh maybe for a year or sometimes because
Russia was so bad. But then Russia gave Finland back. So it wasn’t too long there if I remember right.
Tina: Where there any other refugees you remember?
Eva: Later on we have Hungarians and emm but this is much later on
Ella: But how did that impact your village? Did yall care?
Eva: Emm at that time we didn’t care we… Sweden...when I grew up it was only Swedes, there was only
blonde-haired blue-eyed kids and then when you come back a little later on its ehh I was fifteen years
before I saw a back person. I said I thought it was somebody out of space. And they came, they were
playing in theater in em the biggest hotel where I lived. And that was so… can you see that? You never
seen a black person before, it’s unbelievable really.
Tina: But you guys excepted…
Eva: We expected

13:20-13:50
Tina: People living in the city would come out into the countryside to live during the war.
Eva: Ya they had summer houses they come out they even Germany and Denmark came and stayed in
Sweden during the summer because I think it was cheaper and it was safer and they had summerhouse,
around where I lived.