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Note: [Johan August Sjoberg.FTW]
Johan/John settled in Commonwealth, WI in 1893. By 1897 he was living in Iron River, MI. He purchased 40 acres form John M. K& Mary B. Longyear et al on the Old Beechwood Rd. in 1920: T.43N - R.36W, Section 13. (from property abstract: K. & B. Gibbins)
The following excerted from "Frames for the Future - Iron River Area, Michigan", edited by Marcia Bernhardt (1980):
John August Olson was born on November 16, 1876 in Froan[Fröån], Ore[Åre], Jamtland, Sweden, to Olaf[Olof] Bengts[s]on Sjo[ö]berg (born 1832) and Ingeborge Jonsdotter (born 1838). He was the fourth child in the family, the others being Bengt, Annagreta, Ole, Nels, and Ida. John came to the United States on June 15, 1893 and went to Commonwealth, Wisconsin, where his sister Annagreta, and her husband [Anton Berg] were living. He worked in an iron ore mine there for two years. He was injured in an accident when he fell about 90 feet and broke his knee and sustained head injuries. As a result of the accident, he was laid up for eighteen months. When he recovered, he returned to Sweden but came back to the United Stes and to the Iron River area, in 1897. John worked for the railroad and in the mines. On October 3, 1898 he became a citizen. He took a second trip back to Sweden and when he returned to Iron River in June, 1902, he brought his parents and his sister, Ida, and her husband, Andrew Greenlund, with him.
John Olson married Mathilde (Anderson) Martinson on March 16, 1908. She was born in Arne, Bergen, Norway, on August 31, 1887. Tilde came to the United States, to Stambaugh where her aunt, Mrs. Martha Peterson, lived, in 1906 when she was eighteen years old. She was the oldest of seven children of Anders Mjelde and Brita Mickelson. These children were: Mathilde, Boletta, Elert, Andrew, Martin, Bernard, and Axel. Andrew, Martin, and Bernard (Martinson) also emigrated to the Iron River area. Tilde worked at the boarding house in Spring Valley as a maid until she married.
John and Mathilde live in the city of Iron River where their three daughters, Ingaborg Mathilda, Bertha Olive, and Ann Margaret, were born. In 1921 John bought a forty acre farm in Beechwood for $600 and built a four room house. The family moved there in October and Mathilde and the girls had to live there alone during the bad winter months when John could not travel back and forth to his work at the mine. Tilde had been raised in the city (Bergen was known for its weaving mills) and did not enjoy life on the farm. Her greatest consolation was picking berries - especially raspberries. John worked two more years in the mine as pumpman and quit mining for health reasons to become a full-time farmer in 1923. He was a member of the Scandinavian and Vasa Lodges and an active supporter of the "Townsend Plan".
John died in May, 1944 and Tilde in June, 1962. They are buried in the Iron River city cemetery.
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