What we know
1845 - 1906
Farmer’s wife from Sweden. Her husband, Sven, had the only successful farm in the Valley. When Sven died in 1901, Ingrid sold the mansion he had built her to Michael Nolan and his new wife Mariam. Moved into Victoria Green’s boarding house. Five children.
Sven’s Wife
Sven liked his coffee1
boiled just so—
with a spoonful of molasses.
Or chicory smoked into honey
when she couldn’t get his coffee.
He would stand quietly
over the breakfast table,
crumbs of cornbread licking his
mottled gold whiskers.
He’d take a tin cup up past the barns—
for coffee and memory, he’d say,
and his eyes would smile.
When his clothes piled up
by the scrub-board on washing day2,
she would stand for a moment,
drinking his scent.
Connections

Portal
Sources
Carlson, Carl Adolph.Northmen Who Went West. Greeley, Colorado: The McVey Printery, 1935. Available at the Western History Department, Denver Public Library.
Portal caption and links
A drawing of a washtub
Charity Paine
Lillian Cooper