March 19.....HOLD THE PRESSES!!!!

March 19 - Have you discovered a surprising fact about one of your female ancestors? What was it and how did you learn it? How did you feel when you found out?

 

Gust and Johanna Brogreen were married on Dec. 5, 1891 in Rock Springs WY. We have th document to corroborate this fact. So imagine my surprise, when I'm skipping through the pages of the Rock Springs Miner for 19892 at  The WY Newspaper Project and I come across this little tidbit.

Title: Rock Springs Miner. no. 26. June 29, 1892, page 4

"Gus Borgreen is the father of a fine boy. Dr. Murray, the attending physician informs us that the mother and child are doing nicely."

It would appear that Gt. Grandma was already expecting at the time of the wedding. This did surprise me until I buckled down to do some Swedish research and found it was perfectly acceptable and quite common for young people to co-habitate before the marriage, as long as they had made their intention to marry public. Its not uncommon to find the births of children entered in the church register before the actual marriage date of the parents. It would seem that Gust and Johanna simply brought this tradition to the states with them.

I do have to make one correction to the newspaper bit, though. The oldest child of Gust and Johanna, who was actually born in June of 1892, was their daughter, Esther.