Essay on Swedish American Contributions to Chicago

Never before have I seen a museum as grand as the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York. From its architecture to its massive art collection, The Met has a little bit of everything and one is sure to find something that captures his or her interest. Considering that The Met is the United States' largest art museum, it is easy to get lost within its many corridors and wings. My visit to The Met took place during the last week of July. Despite the almost unbearable heat and humidity that hung in the air, visiting museums under these climate conditions is a welcome respite from a suffocating, yet bright summer afternoon.

New York City, one of the greatest cities of the world, is remarkable because of its history, culture, and diversity. It is world renowned for its skyscrapers, Statue of Liberty, Empire State Building, Madison Square Garden, Broadway entertainment, Radio City Music Hall, Central Park, and even restaurants specializing in ethnic foods. However, the thing that most intrigues and excites me about New York City is the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

Immigration and Migration have greatly impacted Minnesota history from the state’s beginning to the present. The impact of migration from the end of the 1800s to the Vietnam War to today has brought social, cultural, and political changes that have shaped the state. Within each time period, different ethnic groups migrated to Minnesota, including: Europeans, Africans, and Asians. People of different backgrounds moved to the same location, bringing their culture, views and beliefs with them. The migration periods: the iron range from the end of the 1800s to 1920, after the end of the Vietnam War, and today contain similarities and differences. There’s no doubt that the migration of people has greatly influenced the present, as will the migration of people today influence the future.

Want to see an ever-expanding city of art, culture, and academics? Walk through streets upon streets of local art? Explore cultural, historical, and art museums?

In the late Nineteenth and early Twentieth Century, America was dominated by change. Expansion, urbanization, immigration, and capitalism swept the nation from coast to coast affecting every class, race and religion. The United States economy changed dramatically, as the country transformed from a rural agricultural nation to an urban industrial giant, the leading manufacturing country in the world. As this economic growth proliferated, Chicago was the epicenter in America. Travelers from Europe flocked to Chicago in search of opportunity. Meatpacking and steel were especially attractive for unskilled laborers from Europe.

Emigration documents dated September 20, 1871 indicate that Nels and Anna left Sweden destined for “Amerika” with their four youngest children.26 Although a mere fifteen years of age, Charles Oscar, who went by the name of Charley throughout his life, didn’t emigrate with his parents.27 Furthermore, Jack’s status, approximately thirteen at the time and conspicuously absent from the list of children traveling with Nels and Anna, remains unexplained. Nevertheless, for the family members that did emigrate, their surname changed from Svenssen to the anglicized version, Swenson, which undoubtedly occurred when they entered the United States.28 From the Eastern Seaboard the Swenson family presumably traveled by rail to Rush City, Minnesota

On January 13, 1903, the first Korean Immigrants set foot in Hawaii. There were eighty six people on that first voyage, and since then there have been over 550,000 Koreans who have made the journey to the United States over the past 100 years. The original immigrants and their descendants now total over 1.6 million. Korean Americans make up one of the most prominent Asian communities in the United States. Many elements of Korean Culture, ranging from Kim Chee to Tae Kwon Do, have made their way into the American Lifestyle. There have been many events that have shaped the Korean American community and there are many current issues that affect Korean Americans.

Before I went to the museum, my prospective about a museum was poor expectations. What can a museum will offer? , this was one of the questions that I always had in mind. For these reasons, I never thought that I could enjoy a museum tour. However, everything change after visited the Phoenix Art Museum. I went to the trip with poor expectations, but since I arrived in the lobby with all of my classmates and the professor. I started feel that this trip will be sash an educational experience.

This is another example of historical costuming; however this one is more specifically Norse. It shows the decorative closure at the front, along with the high neckline and longer silhouette as the previous.

     Carl Sandburg may be one of our most influential poets in American history, he knew the American working man and his necessities. Sandburg used his poetry to explicate to the economy how life is, can, and could be. Carl Sandburg was born in Galesburg, Illinois January 6, 1878 to Swedish immigrant parents with the names of August and Clara Johnson. His family was extremely poor. Carl left school at the age of thirteen to work odd jobs from bricklaying to dish washing to earn money to support the family. At seventeen, he left home to travel to Kansas as a hobo, there he turned to the army for help. He served eight months in Puerto Rico during the Spanish-American war.

Positioned alongside Central Park within the heart of New York City, The Metropolitan Museum of Art is one of the largest and most influential art museums in the world. The Met houses an extensive collection of curated works that spans throughout various time periods and different cultures. The context of museums, especially one as influential as the Met, inherently predisposes its visitors to a set of understandings that subtly influence how they interpret and ultimately construct meanings about each individual object within a museum. By analyzing two separate works on exhibit at the Met, I will pose the argument that museums offer a unique expression of a world view that is dictated through every element of its construction.

The family traveled together, leaving Sweden from the country’s southern port of Malmö on June 30, 1881 destined for Glasgow, Scotland or Larne, Ireland. From one of these British Isle ports, the Engströms embarked on their trans-Atlantic crossing on board the ship, State of Florida, destined for New York City. Following their arrival in New York they undertook their inland journey, probably by rail, to North Branch, Minnesota.38 Subsequent to and undoubtedly a consequence of the immigration, the surname Engström became the anglicized version Engstrom.39 Their apparent mid- to late-summer arrival in North Branch necessitated a year long period without the full benefits of the sustenance gained from the husbandry of their own land. Consequently, they possibly survived by working for previous settlers. In addition to Olof and Anna, the three children, roughly twenty-one, eighteen, and sixteen years of age, perhaps sought employment. Whether immediately following their arrival or at a later date the family settled on a farm less than a mile east of Harris, Chisago County, Minnesota, a community with rail service five miles north of North Branch.40 Furthermore, a distance by pioneer roads of approximately ten miles separated the Swenson farm, to the northwest, from the Engstrom

To put things in retrospect, Walley begins her ethnography with the story of her great-grandparents’ generation immigrating to the United States during the post-World War II era—America’s pinnacle for middle-class growth—to start a new life in Southeast Chicago. Walley illustrates the struggles of her Swedish family by introducing her immigrant great-grandfather’s memoir, Big Grandpa, an immigrant from Sweden. To exemplify his progress and hindrances, Walley incorporates anecdotes about childhood, pictures of her family, and conversations with her family. Although Walley’s family grappled with despair

According to the American Alliance of Museums, community engagement in museums includes the use of this facility as “a center where people gather to meet and converse and an active, visible player in civic life, a safe haven, and a trusted incubator of change” (Long 141). Different museums

IKEA established itself as the largest furniture retailer in Sweden by the early 1970s by reinventing the wheel of furniture manufacturing at that time. Majority of furniture manufacturers in Sweden produced expensive products with designs that were basic or passed down generation to generation, additionally other manufacturers stores where located in downtown congested areas. IKEA’s strategies which consisted of low cost low priced furniture, brave intricate designs, self-assembly,