The Stasi (Secret Police) Museum in East Berlin

This was the brutal secret police who spied on everyone and created a climate of fear in Communist East Germany.  The museum is in their old HQ building and one of their political prisons was nearby.  Neighbors were recruited to spy on neighbors and people didn't dare to talk to very many other people, including us when we were there as visitors to the east.

 The political prison of the Stasi in East Berlin.

 

Meeting room for the top Stasi.

Hard to believe we can go there now, where so many awful plans were laid!

 Some of the plans for the new and improved Berlin Wall.

 

 Glorifying, through cross-stich, spying on neighbors (propaganda).

 

 Just one of the many Communist propaganda posters at the museum.

 

 Propaganda glorifying East German and Soviet leaders.

 

 Yet more Communist--anti-capitalist propaganda.

 

East German Army.

Baltic Sea Ferry from Gedser, Denmark to Rostock, Germany

Stockholm

Many of our ancestors are from around this area.  The little towns don't much exist anymore as the city has grown to nearly a million residents nowadays.

But it is s beautiful, clean city.  At 60 degrees north, the sun went down at night (in midsummer), but it never got dark during the night!

Knivsta, Sweden

This little ancestral town doesn't exist anymore.  It has been built over in high-density apartments and shopping centers as a suburban area of Uppsala.

 

 

So here is a pic of some good Swedish kuchen!

Krusenberg Estate, Sweden

This is the estate where my 2nd great grandfather Anders Mattson (Anderson) (Ruby and Faye's great grandfather) worked as a boot-maker to the Baron Carl Emmanuel Cedarstrom.  He was banned from the estate when he and his wife joined the church and they moved to Uppsala.  It is located on the shores of the same large lake as the Alsike Church.  A beautiful location!

 They are working on remodeling it.  It is as high class hotel and conference center now.

Alsike and Alsike Church, Sweden

Alsike, Sweden is the home of my great-great grandparents on my mother's side.  (Ruby and Faye's great grandparents, and Grandma (Violet) Nielsen's grandparents).

 

There is not much left of the old town of Alsike, since it has become more of a suburban arrea of nearby Uppsala, a larger city.

 

But we found the Alsike Church, a beautiful medival church built in the 1300s where my 2nd-grat grandparents were married!!!  This is Anders Mattson (Anderson) and Johanna Margarita Eriksson (or Errson) (Pehrson).  How do we know?  Aunt Mabel Anderson of Manti (she is really Grandma Nielsen's cousin) visited Sweden in the 1960s, meeting some distant relatives and doing some genealogy.  She wrote of this church and took some pictures.  We were able to find it and it is an amazing place.  It is even more amazing to be there and know that this is where they were married.

 

And even more amazing to think of the sacrifice they made to join the church way back then, only to emigrate to the United States and leave their families behind for the Church!