Once upon a time in Norway, lived a sailor named Peder who married a schoolteacher named Susanna, who he called Susie. They married and had a little girl named Anny.
One day, Peder, took his wife and baby girl aboard a ship and sailed across the Atlantic Ocean to Trenton, New Jersey. Not long after, they moved to Philadelphia and had more children. The first one born in the United States was Alvilda.
Meanwhile in Washington, D.C., a boy named Tom was growing up. When he was old enough, he joined the Merchant Marines to sail the oceans seeking adventure. One adventure was a shipwreck. The survivors held on to the ships floating debris. Tom saved an older sailor named Peter from drowning and they became friends.
Peter brought Tom to Philadelphia to meet his family and that is when Tom met the girl he wanted to marry, Alvilda, who he always called Al. Alvida said she was too young and had too much to do before getting stuck in a marriage. It was the beginning of the roaring 20s for heaven’s sake!
Not long after that, Tom found himself chosen to be best man at Alvilda’s upcoming wedding to his friend. But when Alvilda discovered her fiance was a “drunkard,” she dumped him. Tom wasted no time getting her to marry him instead. They married in 1922. Later, she joked, “Why marry the groom when you could have the best man?”
Once he married Alvilda, Tom decided it was time to settle down and took a job with the railroad. He enjoyed that job because he loved the trains! He worked on the railroad until they made him retire.
Although Alvilda wanted a large family, they only had two children. Her third pregnancy ended in a miscarriage when she was riding a train home with her little girl, Clara, after visiting her father who was shipping out again. After that, she was unable to have any more children. But they loved the ones they had with all their hearts!
Tom and Alvilda were married for over fifty years. Tom died one day before his seventy-fifth birthday. Alvilda stayed active and spent all of her free time with her kids and grandkids and great-grandkids until she died eleven days after her ninetieth birthday.
If Peder didn’t drag his young family across the Atlantic Ocean or if Tom didn’t seek adventure on the high seas, I wouldn’t be here right now.
But they did. And I for one, am grateful!
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Fran Beally's Blog 