This photo has always seemed sad to me, but I recently found out more about it and it made it even more sad.

It was taken in Denmark less than a year before they emigrated to the United States. In the back my great Grandfather Kristian is holding Elna. She was very sick and died shortly after this photo was taken. A cousin on Facebook thinks it was from leukemia, but I seem to remember my grandmother telling me her sister died of diabetes.

On the right, my great Grandmother Ane Marie is holding a baby that, apparently, at the time of the photo was not yet named. After the original Elna died, they named the baby Elna. (Also according to the cousin on Facebook). In the front, on the left, is Antonie (Toni), then Harry, then my Grandma, Emily, on the right.

No one in this photo looks happy and now I know why. I only wish I knew more.

I wish I knew more about their reasons to move to the United States. I think a brother may have been here, but I might be mixing that up with another branch of my family tree.

As I mused in the post about the circus folk who owned the inn my great grandparents ran: Were they out of a job and needed to move somewhere more promising or did they decide they needed to move somewhere more promising which caused the circus and inn owner to quit the circus and run the inn?

Note that the spelling of Nielsen is different depending on what family tree you look at and what census record you view. I am pretty sure Nielsen is correct based on my grandma’s record of baptism.