Rosalie Olivecrona

1823–1898.

Author, figure in the women's rights movement

Rosalie Olivecrona was one of the pioneers of the Swedish women's movement. As a debater and women's rights fighter, she made considerable efforts.

In 1857 Olivecrona published a number of articles in Aftonbladet under the title "a crying voice in the desert". The articles defended Fredrika Bremer's novel Hertha, which was a post in the debate about the unmarried woman's authority.

Together with Sophie Adlersparre she started the Magazine for the home in 1859 where she published a variety of texts. Internationally, she had several assignments in the growing female public.

Olivecrona had the main responsibility for the exhibition on Women's crafts at the World Exhibition in Vienna in 1873 and had similar assignments in Philadelphia, Paris and Chicago.

Rosalie Olivecronas literary writing began in the 1840s with poems and short stories in the "Gothenburg trade and shipping magazine" under the pseudonym La Straniera. The poetry collection Forest Flowers was published in 1855 and late in the life study Mary Carpenter and her activities (1887) and Scattered sheets (1889).

 

Burial site: 0104-0255

Image description: Rosalie Olivercrona, 1874. Photo: Bertha Valerius / Västergötlands Museum. [The image is cropped]
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Axel W Persson

1888–1951.

Archaeologist.

Axel W. Persson was born in Kvidinge and was early interested in archaeology.

Persson's studies and interest in the Greek language led to his becoming an associate professor in Greek language and literature 1915, in Classical Antiquity and ancient history 1921. In Uppsala Persson became professor of Classical antiquities and ancient history in 1924.

Persson was the leader of successful excavations in Greece (Asine 1922–1930, Change and Midea 1926–1927, 1937 and 1939 and in Berbati 1936–1937) and Turkey (Milas 1938 and Labraynda 1948–1950).

Special attention was the unplundered dome tomb in Dendra With treasures from Mycensk time that was excavated 1926. The discovery was designated as the largest archaeological find after the tomb of Tutankhamun in Egypt. In the grave rested a king, a queen and a princess. In addition, precious grave gifts were found such as gold swords and bowls of precious metals. The findings from the dome tomb ended up at the National Museum of Athens. Persson's results were published in scientific monographs such as the Royal tombs at Dendra Near Midea (1931). That work is considered a classic.

Together with his wife, during World War II he made an important humanitarian effort for Greece in the service of the Red Cross.

After the end of World War II, Persson made new excavations. In Labraynda, the goal was to find the origins of the Minoan culture. However, a temple site was found for classical and Roman times. Shortly afterwards, Persson died of a stroke.

From 1924 to 1951 Axel W. Persson was professor of classical archaeology and made his findings, his writing and his lectures the classical archaeology known and appreciated in Sweden. Persson was awarded the Övralidpriset.

Persson was regarded at his death as one of the world's leading archaeologists. He is also the father of Viktor Persson, better known as the book-Viktor.

 

Burial site: 0310-0273

Image description: Axel W. Persson, probably 1924. Photo: Museum Gustavianum. [The image is cropped]
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Jane Miller Thengberg

1822–1902.

Seminary teacher.

Jane Miller Thengberg was born in Greenock, Scotland, and after her father's death, her mother with her two children moved back to Sweden.

Miller Thengberg conducted pedagogical studies in Sweden and abroad and taught as a governess in Stockholm 1845-1852. A short time she was also governess in Scotland.

In 1853 she moved to Uppsala where she soon met her future husband, the librarian and teacher at the Cathedral school Pehr Adrian Thengberg.

Miller Thengberg was strongly committed to the issue of girls education. With the support of her husband Adrian Thengberg, P. D. Atterbom, Malla Silfverstolpe and Gunnar Wennerberg, she founded a girls school in 1855 with the name Klosterskolan.

The teaching was conducted in the building on present-day Klostergatan. The school quickly gained a reputation as the best girls' school in the country. The house has its roots in the medieval settlement and is located in the block north of the old monastery area.

When Miller Thengberg was recruited eight years later as director of the Higher educator seminar, with a training school in Stockholm, 130 girls had had time to get schooling in the house.

She was also one of the initiators of the School of Home Economics in Uppsala.

Jane Miller Thengberg is buried at Västgöta nations burial site, which was created by a donation of the spouses Adrian Thengberg (d. 1859) and Jane Miller Thengberg. She paid both the long iron fence and the casting of the sculpted lion performed by the sculptor W. Hoffman.

 

Burial site: 0119-1013

Image description: Jane Miller Thengberg, Stockholm 1870. Photo: W. A. Eurenius & P. L. Quist / UUB. [The image is cropped]
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Eva Andén

1886–1970.

Lawyer.

After her graduation, Eva Andén began studying law at Uppsala University and graduated in 1912.

After a law degree she travelled around the country and lectured on the marriage, child care and poor care laws. Andén also led courses in team knowledge for rural women, organized by country Association for Women's Political suffrage (LKPR).

In 1915 Andén took over a law firm for female clients, the women's law firm, and three years later she became a first woman member of the Swedish Bar Association.

Andén's Specialty was family law and assisted mainly clients in connection with divorces, inheritance, maintenance, custody issues and division of shares in divorces. As a client, Andén had Selma Lagerlöf and Astrid Lindgren.

Eva Andén was also part of a committee that was allowed to constitute the solicitor's referral body concerning family law legislation and, at times, came to have great influence.

During the years 1950-1962 she was also chairman of the Fellowship of the Nine. Andén conducted her lawyer's activities until her death in 1970.

 

Burial site: 0106-0343

Image description: Eva Andén, unknown year. Photo: Atelier Hedström, Uppsala / KvinnSam, Gothenburg University Library. [The image is cropped]
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Alfred Dahlgren

1861–1908.

Photographer.

Alfred Dahlgren learned photography in Germany and with photographer Dahllöf in Stockholm. In 1890 he established his own studio at Dragarbrunnsgatan 48 in Uppsala where he worked as a portrait photographer.

Uppsala City Council decided in 1901 that the city should be photodocumented and Dahlgren was commissioned to take the 350 pictures that would be delivered in two hardcover albums.

On weekdays he worked in the studio and early Sunday mornings, when the city was empty, he went out to take his pictures. After a year, the photographs were handed over to the city council.

The bridge in Uppsala, adorned in connection with the Linnaeus Jubilee 1907. Photo: Alfred Dahlgren / Uppsala University Library.

Sledding through King Jan's Gate at the castle in Uppsala, around 1890. Photo: Alfred Dahlgren / Uppsala University Library.

In 1908, he was instructed to complete the documentation with pictures of the city's outskirts and yards from Old Town yards. The same year, however, Alfred Dahlgren died and his last pictures came to be handed over by his widow.

A total of 540 glass negatives can be found in Upplandsmuseet's (Uppsala county museum) possession and the two albums of the photographs can be found at Uppsala City Library. The photographs are a remarkable treasure, both culturally and historically.

 

Burial site: 0125-1150B

Image description: Alfred Dahlgren ca 1900. Photo: UUB. [The image is cropped]
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Emma Schenson

1827–1913.

Photographer, watercolour painter.

Emma Schenson was probably the first female photographer in Uppsala and one of the first women in Sweden to photograph professionally.

She was first trained as a watercolour painter, but worked from the 1860s in parallel with both painting and photography. During the childhood of photography it was unusual for women to photograph professionally, but after the regulation for freedom to pursue a trade from 1864, it became possible for women to establish themselves as entrepreneurs and photographers.

Schenson was active in Uppsala from 1860 onwards and had a permanent studio on Östra Ågatan 25. In the Photographic Association, which organized photographers, there were in 1888, three female members of a total of 65. These women were Anna Hwass, Wilhelmina Skogh and Emma Schenson.

During Schenson's productive years, the business card photograph as well as the larger cabinet photograph (format approx. 12 × 16.5 cm) became very popular in all social classes. There are very likely pictures in older Uppsala families performed by her.

The Block Domen, Fyristorg and Uppsala Cathedral, Fjärdingen, Uppsala before 1885. Photographer: Probably Emma Schensson, Uppsala / Upplandsmuseet.

"The Geezers of the Svartbäcken creek" in Kvarnfallet at Akademikvarnen, the quarter Holmen, Uppsala 1880–1890s. Photographer: Emma Schenson / Upplandsmuseet.

During the years 1885-1893, Emma Schenson documented the great restoration of Uppsala Cathedral. Through her images we can follow the restoration from start to finish.

There are currently no negatives preserved from Schenson's photographs, but some photos have been preserved and are available today in the map and picture collections at Uppsala University Library.

There is also an album that shows the cathedral's transformation during the time of the great restoration. Early on, the value of this photographic documentation was realized, which can be seen in an inscription in the Schensons album, which ends "alone in its kind and important for the future". The photographs that are preserved, are a remarkable cultural and historical treasure.

 

Burial site: 0101-0031

Image description: Emma Schenson, ca 1865-ca 1875. Photo: UUB. [The image is cropped]
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Sven Lilja

1887–1951.

Music teacher, conductor, sing-along leader.

Through Hugo Alfvén's agency, Sven Lilja was granted a spot at the Stockholm Conservatory of Music and studied there from 1912–1917.

After a few years as an actor he worked as a singing and music teacher in Sundsvall, music teacher at the Stockholm Folk high schools, cantor in Sofia Parish and conductor for Stockholms Arbetarsångförening and the Stockholm Song Association. Sven Lilja introduced the modern sing-along and made it a popular movement.

He led a sing-along movement in the countryside and on radio but above all at Skansen where he for the first time led the movement 1935. In the following year, the sing-evenings at Skansen became a standing institution.

Sven Lilja also plays himself in the film "Love and Sing" from 1944.

 

Burial site: 0132-1384

Image description: Sven Lilja dressed in the classic sing along suit, unknown year. Photo: From private collection. [The image is cropped]
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Sven Anders Hägg

1817–1904.

Shoemaker, politician, author.

Sven Anders Hägg began when he was 10 years old as shoemaker apprentice and received the apprentice letter in 1840. From 1845 to 1848, Hägg was in Stockholm, St. Petersburg and in Paris, where he witnessed the revolution.

Hägg came to Uppsala in 1848 and became foreman of Shoemaker Lindgren's widow at Östra Ågatan 45. Hägg took over the workshop in 1852 and got the right work in Uppsala. The same year he formed General sickness and funeral assistance in connection with the Craft Association and was a member of the city council from 1862 to 1866.

Hägg was a devoutnon-drinker but was happy to go to the theatre, which was said to be "his only pleasure". As a writer, he published the History of the footwear, The urban market and Description of the Old cemetery in Uppsala.

On his 67th birthday, Hägg recieved the King's Medal in gold of the 5th size for civic merit. It was handed over by County Governor Adolf Hamilton.

Hägg had his house at Gräsgränden, next to the entrance to the current Bangårdsgatan at the Fyris creek. In the book about the Old Cemetery he writes about his children: "Two children, a boy close to two years and a girl at the age of four, are buried here".

 

Burial site: 0156-0253

Image description: Sven Anders Hägg, Uppsala ca 1850. Photo: Karl Ågren / UUB. [The image is cropped]
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Henrik Gahn

1820–1874.

Chemist, industrialist, inventor.

Henrik Gahn underwent the Falun Mountain School in 1841–1842 and was a pupil at the Jernkontoret 1842–1848. He later became director of a lead and silver work in Boda (Rättvik) and devoted himself to forest shops, agriculture and chemical experiments.

In 1867 Gahn started a chemical-technical plant at the main square in Uppsala with ink, shiny black and the by Gahn invented disinfectant Aseptin as products. Gahn inventions had a large part in the company's success.

The company had many other chemical-technical products and was known for its soap assortment. The factory was from 1899 in the Gudrun Quarter, at Kålsängsgränd 4 in Uppsala.

The company survived after Gahn's death under the name Henrik Gahn AB in other premises and in 1964, the company was bought up by the Barnängen company which closed down the factory in 1968.

Packaging of soaps in the factory, Uppsala 1917. Photo: Uppsala University Library.

Factory staff, Uppsala 1917. Photo: Uppsala University Library.

Burial site: 0140-1608

Image description: Henrik Gahn, 1870's. Photo: Heinrich Osti / UUB. [The image is cropped]
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Sixtus Janson

1883–1957.

Manufacturer, sports leader.

Sixtus Janson participated in the formation of the Sports Association Thor and several other local associations in Uppsala, for example Uppsala Canoe Company and Upsala Sailing fellowship. Janson also participated in the formation of the Uppland Sports Federation in 1912 and was its chairman for five years.

Together with Albin Lindqvist and J. E. Friberg, he took over the Upsala office book factory at Drottninggatan 6 in 1906.In 1917, the business was moved to Svintorget, today's Kungsängstorg, where Janson lived with his family.

At national level he was elected to the boards of several federation in The Swedish Sports Confederation, such as the Bicycle Association, the Athletic Association, Ice sailing federation and the Swedish skiing federation where he was Chairman 1922–1948. Sixtus Janson was also a member of the Sweden's Olympic Committee and leader of the Swedish ski squad for five Olympic Winter Games, from Chamonix in 1924 to St. Moritz in 1948.

Sixtus Janson lived an active life in addition to work on the factory and sport. His passion was sailing and he was also a prolific photographer.

If Thors athletes in 1906 in their sports area south of Uppsala Castle. Sixtus Janson third from the left. Photo: Popular Movement archive for Uppsala County.

Upsala Office Book Factory probably 1950-Tal, kungsängstorg in Uppsala. The Janson family had an apartment at the top of the factory. The building was demolished about 1970. Photo: Popular Movement archive for Uppsala County.

Burial site: 0108-0417

Image description: Sixtus Janson in the Royal Swedish Sail Society Hat 1907. Photo: Östling, Uppsala / Popular Movement archive for Uppsala län. [The image is cropped]
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