July 14, 2022 • 47 mins
In 1923, a young Norwegian named Peter Sundness emigrated to the Seattle Area and, after several years, brought his wife and children over too. Pete’s daughter Ruthi Sundness Winter, later born in Seattle, fondly remembers playing Scandinavian music together with her family, a tradition that has continued after marrying Mike Winter, whose own family had a similar tradition.
The result is the present day Winter Band that plays Scandinavian favorites that celebrate both life in America as well as "back home". In this podcast you’ll meet Ruthi, and hear about her discovery of writings and tapes made by her father long ago, detailing his adventures as a fisherman, logger, trapper, and whaler - a life that Ruthi had never known about him.
Join us as we talk about her father’s dangerous occupations as a young immigrant, about growing up Norwegian-American, and about how music and the stories they convey bind a culture -- and all of us -- together.
The band plays Søstrene Fra Flatholmen Fyr, a song about a daring rescue in 1894 of a shipwreck near Flatholmen Lighthouse near Stavangar, Norway. Please see this podcast's episode webpage at nordicontap.com for more information about this song, about the band, and audio clips and videos.
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Episode Transcript
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(00:00):
Naar er det tid for Nordisk paa Trykk!
Welcome to our podcast, featuringinterviews, music, folktales, and lots
(00:24):
of hygge, all with a Nordic flavor.
I'm your host Eric Stavney.
I have found that I've been ableto have some amazing experiences
and do some amazing things that I'dnever be allowed to do unless I had
a job and was being paid for it.
But I have been able to have thoseexperiences by being a volunteer.
(00:46):
One of the pleasures of volunteeringtoe, the concert venues at Seattle's
National Nordic Museum is gettingto meet the musicians, the bands and
groups that play at the museum ormidsummer festivals, Swedish Pancake
Breakfasts or local Scandinaviandance venues are not professional.
(01:08):
They may get some small remunerationto play, but it can't be much.
So I've been trying to get to know folksin Seattle's Nordic community, and I've
found these musicians willing to shareabout themselves just as they share
their love of Nordic music, of playingtogether and being recognized as part
(01:29):
of the Nordic community themselves.
You may have heard some of my otherpodcasts with Alfred Morton Hori,
Ruthie Bernfeld Begi, and Philages Rachel Nevi to name a few.
And in this podcast, I'd like youto meet another band and its main
spokesperson, Ruthie Ness Winter.
(01:49):
This group of five known as the WinterFamily Band plays Nordic favorites,
as well as songs that Ruthie knowswere important to folks in Norway
and America when her family wereimmigrants to the United States.
The band plays these songs and explainswhat they're about in order to celebrate
and share the old songs, of course.
(02:10):
But for Ruthie especially, sheparticularly wants to honor her
parents and her relatives from Norway.
Music obviously is integral to everyculture, just as the cuisine and
the language and the traditions.
All of those things definewhat that culture is.
Songs, of course, are frequently stories.
(02:33):
In the old days, traveling Troubadoursor minstrels of Europe came into
villages and sang about old and newevents, about love and loss, and
about remembering where you came from.
Those groups were often families,just as some bands are today.
And as you'll see, the Winter Family Bandcontinues this tradition of two families,
(02:56):
the Winter and Ness families making musictogether for us to enjoy and learn from.
If you're not an immigrant from anothercountry, and I'm not, it's hard to fathom
the struggle to learn a new language,how to make your way in a new culture.
You don't understand what people aresaying and you're just trying to do what
you can to earn enough money to survive.
(03:19):
Now, this wasn't special to theScandinavian immigrants at the
late 18 hundreds and the early 19hundreds for we know that millions of
immigrants and refugees immigrate tonew countries today across the world.
So what you're about to hearand includes experiences that
are shared among all immigrants.
Ruthie's Father Pete Sunnis isan interesting case because he
(03:44):
documented his experiences, whichRuthie later collected into a book.
And so I'd like you to meet Ruthie fromthe Winter Family Band to learn about
her family's music traditions and learn alittle of the amazing stories her father
wrote about and what it was like to be animmigrant to the United States during the
Great Depression and the Second World War.
(04:07):
As usual, when I interview someone, Iask Ruthie to start at the beginning.
I was born in Seattle, Swedish Hospitalsoon after my parents arrived from Norway.
In 19 40, 19 46, I think they came.
My sister was born and then I wasborn in 48 and my mother was like 37.
(04:32):
She couldn't speak English I wasdefinitely born into an immigrant world.
Like a little Norway becausewe grew up speaking Norwegian.
'cause my mom couldn't speak Englishand she had just had Norwegian friends.
So I have a strong relationshipto Norway, I should say.
I know from what you've said in your bookthat frequently your father wasn't around.
(04:54):
He was off earning money for the family.
Fisherman.
Yeah.
So it's mostly you and yourmom and brothers, sisters, my
brother.
Yep.
Yeah.
Oh, that's great.
So you were born in Seattle though, right?
Yeah.
So you, I have read that what you calledyour band, the Winter Family Band.
And you've said something about there'sbeen music for a long time in the family.
(05:16):
You wanna trace how far back that goes?
Yeah.
My mom is the musical side of the family.
Her father was a fiddler.
And he bought an organ for the girls.
There were five girls in his family andthey all learned how to play the organ.
So when she came to America, we gota piano and she had her guitar, and
(05:37):
then my sister played the cello.
I played the violin.
My brother played the accordion and thesteel guitar, and we always played that
Norwegian music that she knew she taught.
That's the music, especially myolder brother who was born in
Norway as our family brand grew.
He was the one that taught us themusic 'cause he was the one that
remembered it as well as my mom.
(05:59):
And he was the leader of our band, familyband un, until he couldn't anymore.
And so Chris, my cousin Chris, whowas always around, cousin Chris,
ve Houg, he played the accordion.
And so we all played together.
Christmas, Easter family occasions,anybody's birthday, we'd always end up.
(06:20):
Playing our music.
So one time I always had such of myparties, had a whole crowd of people
and someone said, oh, will you play forour Yuli Fest at Daughters of Norway?
And I said, okay, if you thinkwe're good enough, we'll come.
So then that snowballed.
Then somebody says, oh,will you come and play here?
Will you come and play there?
And we always had these familytunes, which we play today.
(06:43):
Okay.
I was gonna ask you about that.
Whether what I associate with NorwegianAmerican favorites are, in fact sounds
like true, nor at least in the old days,
they're Norwegian favoritesthat are true to their hearts.
In fact, when we play, sometimesthe old ladies come up to us and
said, I sang every verse with you.
I knew all those songs, sothe old folks know the songs,
(07:06):
but the younger ones don't.
But we, our mission is topreserve these old tunes and
because they're slipping away.
Like one song we play is in, it's a tango.
Nobody remembers that.
My younger cousins in Norwaydon't even remember that, and
it's nowhere on the internet.
(07:26):
We can't find it.
And so someone at Midsummer, whenwe played last week, asked me about
it where they could get the music.
I said, it's all in my head.
It's learned, it's passeddown through the generations.
Not all of our music, but somesongs are not recorded at all.
I don't know any other bands.
They're dance bands.
They play for the dancers and welike to play for the dancers too.
(07:48):
But basically we play oldcherished Scandinavian,
Norwegian, Scandinavian songs.
So you said you concertized at Daughtersof Norway probably every venue there is.
Right?
Greater Seattle area plus, yeah.
The Swedish
Club.
(Nordic) Heritage Museum.
Yeah.
We played Julefest and any chancewe can get to play at the Nordic
(08:08):
Museum and we played for theNational Convention of the Daughters
of Norway in Bremerton last year.
That was a big honor.
People from all overthe United States and.
Of course Lorianne Reha always makessure that we end up at Bergen's Place
at Syttende Mai and at the Life.
Leif Erikson Sons in Norway,stage at Syttende Mai.
And so it's a real pleasureto share our music.
(08:29):
It's a big joy for us.
You've said that on yourwebsite that in fact.
You have found ways tocontinue, oh my gosh.
Being hurt into the pandemic era.
In the early days, we didn'tknow where the contagion came
from, so we all stayed outside.
We continued practicing and thenwe set up our big garage, which
(08:50):
faces a kind of a major street.
It was open to the public and so we, weset up a stage there and seats and we
would announce it to the neighborhood.
We put signs up and people wouldcome with their masks on standing
six feet apart, just scared.
We were the first live music they'dheard in ages, and so we did that
(09:13):
every couple months and peoplewould, tell other people about it.
Pretty soon we got a pretty good crowd.
They'd be dancing in the street and theywere so thankful to hear some live music.
We all felt safe doing that outside.
And so you weren't forgotten whenthings have started to loosen up.
They thought I, I remember mygood times on that street, and
(09:33):
we're gonna get them booked again.
I hope
that's right.
We're gonna do it again this summer.
The neighbors are calling from our music.
It's fun.
Yeah,
that is fun.
Why don't you tell me a littlebit about your, the book about
your father, how you stumbled uponwritings, tapes, and you mentioned
letters and the evolution of that.
(09:56):
I knew, my dad was always writing wherethe last part of his life when he'd
retired, he's always putting down histhoughts about his life, but we were busy.
With our lives.
And no, we didn't ever talk about it.
And he didn't talk about it, butwe'd see him writing in this book.
And then in his mid seventies,late seventies, he got cancer and
(10:17):
then he started writing in earnest.
And then after a while thatwas too stressful to write,
so he talked into a tape.
So then after he passed away, we justdidn't touch that for 20 some years.
And then I retired and I thought,oh my gosh, I know there's
all this information here.
I need to look at it.
And so with the encouragement ofmy husband, I tried to transcribe
(10:40):
all of his little scribblings.
He didn't ever learn proper grammar.
So some words were half Norwegian,half English, and sometimes the
story would be told multiple times.
So I had to try to figure out atimeline of all of this, piece it
all together, make the grammar.
Work, make the timeline work.
And that's how we came up with the book.
(11:01):
Now it's in his voice.
I started it in the thirdperson and that didn't work.
The first person, hisvoice really made sense.
So I hope his story comes to life.
And my favorite part is theepisodes for close calls.
According to my view, he shouldn'thave lived past the age of 20.
Oh my gosh.
Especially when he wasin that tree in Norway.
(11:24):
He and his friends climbed up in thetree and the guy sawed down the tree.
This was a big tree andhe came crashing down.
Just wanted to see what it waslike, coming down in a crash tree
and then all of his crazy episodes.
He should not have livedpast like 17 actually.
And then his episodes closecalls in Alaska with the bears
and the trappers and storms.
(11:46):
It's amazing that he lived a full life.
Pretty much a full life.
He passed away at 82, so thatwas my favorite part, and I
didn't know any of these stories.
Until 20 years after he passed,he, these Norwegians are very stoic
That comes across.
They don't wanna botheryou with their story.
You're so busy, you'reso busy with your life.
(12:08):
I'm not gonna ask you to sitdown so I can tell you my story.
No.
So I really discovered my dad.
Through this book.
And it was a wonderful thing for me.
'cause I realized he was, he had awhole different life than I thought.
I thought he was this boring fisherman.
And then I learned he'd hadall of these adventures and
it was just marvelous for me.
I think that choice of firstperson is, makes this magic.
(12:32):
It reads as almost as a story.
You say he's a fisherman, but he wasalso a logger and a trapper and a
bait on ships and all kinds of stuff.
Whaler...
and
Forgot about whales.
And the ships he sailed on when he cameover, when he was 17, he'd ship out.
They were sailing ships frigates.
They had all of these full sails andhe was climbing up, unfurling the
(12:54):
sails, and one time the rope broke andhe happened to throw himself across
the yard arm and saved his life.
Yeah.
I mean that right there.
He should have passed away right there.
And I think a lot of youngimmigrant boys did die.
They were expendable.
Those young immigrant boys.
Yeah, that was an interesting.
His life too.
You get that sense of he's charmed,but he does mention a number of his
(13:18):
friends along the way that got killedin a logging accident or Oh, yeah.
Fishing accident.
And so it, it definitely highlightsthat it is dangerous work.
Yeah.
The logging especially.
Yeah.
In his neighbor from Vic, Norwaywas one of those killed, and that
was a terrible thing for him.
His best buddy that he cameover to the states with.
Then years and years later, thatfamily came to visit us here in Seattle
(13:41):
and wanted to go and find his grave.
And of course, logging companiesdidn't even hardly take notice
of those little immigrant boys.
There was no record of his death, butthey're still mourning that poor boy.
So my dad was lucky he survived that.
And I got also that I'll say it'snot true for me today, is guests, the
Norwegian community was fairly closeknit, even across Washington and Alaska.
(14:05):
Like he would go staywith people or Right.
He wouldn't have a house andthey'd just take him in and
feed him and he'd do the same
Hospitality was huge.
Is huge with the Norwegians.
Yeah.
And they had that connection in Alaska.
All those Norwegian fishermenwould take care of themselves.
They were family.
Same on boats and helping each other out.
What?
He bought several boatsand sold several boats.
(14:28):
I went through quite a few boats.
Yep.
I knew how to fix 'em all too.
Those wooden boats.
These been the winter fixingthem so they'd be ready mnet.
So they'd be ready forthe spring fishing season.
Yeah, it was fun.
I feel like I spent my childhood onFisherman's Dock in Salmon Bay, and
those were only fishing boats, salmonboats, and halibut boats way back then.
You would never see ayacht or a pleasure boat.
(14:49):
Never.
They were not allowed.
And now it's sad to see that's allthere is, but I just love to go down on
the docks with my dad 'cause he wouldspread the nets out on the pavement
there to fix them up and to sew them.
And I'd just hang around and my mom.
Having just come from Norway,the little girls in Norway had
a big satin bow in their hair.
If you look in pictures way back then,the girls always had these huge big
(15:13):
white satin bows and she'd always putone in my hair and there I go with a
fisherman and they all knew me down thereuntil I had to start going to school.
That was the end.
And in the proof that all thiswas happening too, is are these
pictures, pictures of you asa baby and a couple years old.
I'm like, that's Ruthie.
(15:34):
But you notice in his memoirs, I thinkI get one sentence, Ruthie was born.
That's it.
Yeah.
Fishing was, the fishing storieswere so much more important.
He was a very smart guy.
He had a great recall, sohe remembered most of that.
However, he had lots of receiptsand bills and phish information,
(15:56):
so he get dates and time.
Yeah.
I don't know if he kept a journal,but there was a lot of information
there that would help him remember.
I enjoy these receipts that youprinted in the back of the book.
I see how much he got a poundfor those sockeye salmon and.
I was at Costco yesterday,$20 a pound, and he got $2, 2
(16:19):
cents I think apparently there.
The fisherman way back when.
Yeah.
And even that price went up and down.
Sometimes he barely evenbroke even or didn't.
Right?
Oh some years.
And there were strikes, fishing strikes.
The cannery strikes and thefishermen couldn't fish and
they had to tough it out.
Yeah.
I don't know how my parents made it
when I go to the Fisherman's Terminaland see the trawlers with the big poles
(16:42):
that go up and meeting here that, yeah.
Several times he either hadto cut his off in order to
survive storm or whatever, but.
He heads in has to gethis owning poles right.
He did.
In the forest.
That's delightful.
In some ways, it's a thrill for youto discover what your dad was like.
(17:04):
In this other realm.
It's probably sad that you werenever able to talk to him about it.
That would've been neat.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Very quiet guy.
You know those old Norwegians?
I know them well.
Stoic is the word.
Stoic.
Stoic.
Never
whining, never complaining.
Just.
Still never self-aggrandizing.
The total opposite.
(17:25):
Yeah.
Never bragging.
There's the one story when he wasout in this horrible storm and a
lot of boats went down and he hadto fight for 48 hours or something.
He didn't get any sleep.
And finally he limps his way into portand someone asked how it was, and he
just said, he hardly said two words.
He didn't tell 'em what a terriblelife-threatening storm he lived through.
(17:47):
Just didn't say much.
Yeah, he wasn't bragging about howhe made it through this awful storm.
My grandfather, I remember I'd gofishing with him river fishing and
something where he a couple timeshooked his thumb or something with a
hook or managed to get that out andhe's bleeding profusely and just.
Turn, wiping it off casuallygo, grandpa, are you okay?
(18:11):
That's gotta hurt like the devil.
And he goes it stings a bit.
And did you read the story about thehalibut hook going into my dad's hand?
Oh yeah.
Oh my gosh.
Yeah.
Yeah.
I can't even imagine that.
Those are big hooks, huge hooks.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Fishing is one of the mostdangerous occupations in the world.
I believe it.
The statistics a while ago weresaying one boat goes down for
(18:33):
every day of the year up in Alaska.
Honest to God.
Wow.
Yeah,
that's what I read while back.
So how did you get to typing it up?
It looks like you self-published.
Yeah.
Yeah.
That's an interesting story.
I have a busy life, so I nevercould sit down and actually type
for hours and hours to come.
So my husband, Mike Winter, is aretired aeronautical engineer and the
(18:56):
equivalent of Boeing in Turkey hiredhim for two weeks to come and help them.
With a plane they were making.
So we went to Anura and I stayedin like a worker man's dormitory.
We had two cots in a little room, andwhile he was gone all day, I brought my
manuscripts with, and I typed and typed.
(19:17):
I had nothing to bother.
So all of those two weeks Ijust typed and typed away.
It was magical.
There were no interruptions at all.
And that's what I got half of it done.
At that time,
is it hand typed or was it type set?
I hand typed it and sent in the documentto the publisher and then they said it.
I decided the font and how everything,the chapters and how it should all go.
(19:39):
And then they said it.
Yeah.
No, I mean it's very professional.
I've seen a lot of hand type books.
This is great.
My first book.
Your first book, and only,
never say never.
You've mentioned that your fatherfinally had got enough money to send.
(20:01):
Family, and yet due to circumstancesthey couldn't get on the boat.
You wanna talk about that?
Yeah.
First of all, my parents got married.
My father came at 17, but then when he,13 years later, his dad was ill in Norway.
So he went back to Nesvik andat that time he met my mom.
Who lived in the neighboring village.
(20:22):
And so they got engaged.
He went back to Alaska for a fishingtrip, came back within nine months
and they got married and then hestayed maybe six months, nine months.
And then he had to go back to Alaskaagain 'cause that was his only income.
So he went back to Alaska and inthe meantime, world War II started.
And it just got worse and worse.
And so he worked with the US Embassyto get her passage and when that came
(20:50):
to her, and Sison, remember they didn'thave internet, they just had telegrams.
Telegram came to this travel agency andSison and he told my mom, come right now.
Come.
You have to leave now.
So she just had 24 hours toget everything together and get
money together and get down to.
Slow to get going.
(21:11):
She had a ticket to Petal Finland tocatch the USS American Legion, and
then that was gonna go to New York.
But once she got mybrother now is one year.
'cause my, when my father left, my momwas pregnant, so he's about a year now
and, and when she got to Oslo, the Germanswere already there and there was chaos,
(21:34):
and she went to the Norwegian council,which was supposed to issue this ticket
that was allowed by the Americans.
And they were in such anuproar that they said no.
It took a while for them to say no.
They said, come back.
Come back.
We need this.
We need that.
We need this hard toget all those documents.
(21:55):
You know when you're in Norway at thetime, but she managed to get everything
they wanted and then they finally said no.
And so she had to go back to her farmland.
That's the boat that took princessMartha and the kids along with
all kinds of other famous people.
So I think in the end they just jammedall the famous people on and denied
(22:16):
the other people were promised passage.
'cause us, US government.
By this time my dad's an Americancitizen and so they were trying
to get all American citizens out.
And my brother was an Americancitizen because my dad was.
And that was the ticket out mybrother, 'cause he was an American
citizen and, but still in all thechaos, they wouldn't let her go.
(22:38):
And then the boat tookoff and so she was stuck.
Then she got this letter fromUS Embassy, welcome to America.
Oh my God, please take the next boat out.
The next boat was seven years later.
So it was a tragedy for them.
But then I think thishappened to a lot of people.
I think that is a
long time to sustain amarriage and a family.
(23:00):
It was.
It was.
And so I have this pile of letterswritten between them, which have
been sitting in there since theywere started in the thirties.
Until my dad came and I've onlyread some of them and I'm only
reading them now 'cause I thoughtthey were so difficult to read.
They were on that onion skin whereyou could see both sides and they're
(23:21):
in Norwegian and this dialect.
And I thought, oh, it'sgonna take me forever.
But once I got the hang of it.
It wasn't that hard to decipher and read.
So just last, not this winter, the lastwinter I started reading those and I got
the full impact of those seven years.
And I haven't gotten throughall the letters yet, but what
I've read is just heartbreaking.
(23:42):
You know how she missed my dad and shetried to describe every little thing
that my brother, who was a baby, so thathe could get bonded with his dad and
and they had no money.
The US governmentwouldn't allow any money.
Into Nazi occupied lands.
So she had zero money andwas dependent on her in-laws.
(24:04):
Yeah.
Yeah, it was a tough time andI always felt like it was just
my mom who suffered like that.
But as I read other books, I realizeda lot of Norwegian fishermen families
were caught in that same situation.
That's amazing.
So you said that your family camefrom the Olsons area, or your father?
(24:24):
Yeah.
Yeah.
In the Fjord lands to give fromOlson to my grandfather's farm.
A bus ferry, and a bus.
There's a lot of fjords and it'snot that far away as the crow
flies, it's probably an hour.
Yeah.
But those little Fjordcommunities are hard to get by.
It's on the ow of Fjord de Fjord.
(24:46):
The closest little town is Ock, whichhas a hospital in, a teaching university.
Cute little town.
What I've noticed that I likeis the ferries and the trains
and the buses are integrated.
So the, sometimes the ferry won'tleave the dock until the bus shows up.
Isn't that amazing?
And gets on.
It's really?
That never happens around here?
(25:08):
It's perfect.
They're perfectly synchronized.
Absolutely amazing.
Great system.
Yeah.
Your Bruno must be from the Olson area.
Oh yeah.
It's a sun bun.
And my aunt did the embroideringon my 40th birthday.
It was a surprise for me.
My husband Mike, and my cousin Kunigot into cahoots with each other and
(25:28):
said, I think Ruthie needs a boo.
So they arranged for my aunt.
I. To do the embroider.
It took her 10 months to do all theembroider and then the shirt also
has all kinds of embroider on it.
And then we went to Norway that summer andthen they surprised me with the boo nod.
It was so wonderful, such, such asurprise, and I was just so thrilled.
(25:50):
And now I get to wear it all the timewhen I play music with the winter band.
It's really effective that you're alsothe spokeswoman for the group too.
It's you are the Norwegian packageright there at the microphone.
You know it's all there.
So you've been back and forth to Norwaymany times as you grew up, including
the University of Oslo summer program.
Yeah.
I was really lucky that the Life EricksonSons of Norway gave me a scholarship.
(26:14):
I was tipped off by my Norwegianinstructor at the UDub and he
said, you ought to do this.
And I did.
And they provided tuitionand travel expenses back and
forth to the United States.
Yeah.
And that was huge.
That was huge.
'cause my parents being fishermen, theycouldn't afford anything like that.
So that was a wonderful experience for me.
(26:36):
And then I had a auntand uncle living in Oslo.
So once the summer school was over.
I enrolled at the University of Osloand stayed with my aunt and uncle.
And then finally I got a place in studentPoso where all the students lived, right?
So I moved in there with all thestudents and oh my, that was one
(26:58):
of the best years of my life.
And then finally when it wasall over, I had to bite the
bullet and come home because theuniversity system was so different.
They don't match.
They I did take classes.
They gave me a few credits.
They don't work on thecredit system, but they.
They did arrange connect withthe University of Washington.
Said, okay, we'll give her so and somany, I got half the credits I should
(27:21):
have had, but I didn't care 'causeit was such a wonderful experience.
Yeah.
I made friends.
In fact, I still connect.
I had a finished roommate fromFinland who's also studying.
I still connect withher and I visited her.
I still connect with a friendthat I met on the, we took
the Oslo Fjord from New York.
(27:41):
To Oslo there were a lot of studentNorwegian students going home on the
boat, and I studied at the University ofOslo with that one guy I met on the boat.
We still send Christmas cards.
So it was just, I made lastingfriendships at that year and a half.
That's amazing.
And you worked Stein and Strøm, huh?
Stein and Strøm.
(28:02):
They gave us a month off forChristmas or something like that.
So I went and applied and Iworked in the toy department
and I was dressed like hunts.
They made it all into Hunts andGretel, and so a journalist from Dog
Blo came and interviewed me one day.
Took a picture of me and I have aarticle in the newspaper picture of
me in my Hans and Gretel outfit andwrote an article about, American
(28:24):
student working at Stein and Strøm.
Yeah.
You were dressed as Hans, not as Gretel.
Nope.
There was another Gretel.
I was Hansel and that's how Ihad to come to work and that
outfit, I had wooden clogs.
They gave it to me and I wore it.
I was just so happy to have thejob and it was, stain and storm.
It was the only department store.
The very best.
(28:45):
Okay, so what's the connection?
And it seems to me that had somethingto do with your dad coming over here.
How, what's the connection with the sho?
Yeah, Oli Sho is my great uncle.
He's my grandmother's brother.
And my mom's uncle and Chris,cousin Chris, who's my accordion
(29:06):
player, is his grandfather.
And Uncle Ole was our contactin Seattle when we got here.
Did he own a boat or was ableto get your dad onto a boat?
He probably made connections for my dad.
Yeah.
Uncle Ole came at a very young age.
Also not speaking English,he has a whole nother story.
(29:28):
He.
Got his master mate in pilot licenseand then became a captain of a ship.
Yep.
And then World War II camealong and he became captain of
a huge ship, huge Navy ship.
Wow.
So he was pretty well-known.
Famous guy here in the Norwegiancircles, captain Oli, they have
(29:49):
you have your other lifeas your day job as well.
You wanna tell me aboutyour teaching career?
Yeah, I got my art education andcertificate as well as degree
as well as a minor in Norwegianlanguage and literature from the uw.
I was just a couple credits shortof a double major and teaching
(30:09):
jobs were hard to come by.
I moved to California and couldn't.
Couldn't get anythingbut a substitute job.
So I thought, okay, while I'm waiting formy teaching job I'll go in the airline.
So I ended up working forthe airlines for 11 years.
And so I had all kinds offlight benefits so I could go
back to Norway, I could travel.
And then when that ended,there were strikes and.
(30:29):
Airlines were purchased by otherairlines, and we were all laid off.
Then I went back into teaching.
When I went back into teaching, Icouldn't get an art job, so I became
a reading specialist and then finallywent back and got my master's in ESL.
Couldn't get an ESL job,but then came the art job.
Then I got the art.
I loved it.
I taught art until I, I retired.
(30:49):
So the ESL wasn't that long.
No I would help the immigrant kids.
At my school and I would talk tothe staff about being an immigrant.
So my mom was I knew the troubles ofan immigrant parents and missing home
and not knowing the language and thenthe kids end up being translators
and they have to run the house.
(31:11):
Yes.
Because the parents don't knowwhat's going on and there are a lot
of responsibilities for these kids.
So I advocated for thosekids at staff meetings and.
Other meetings and then I wouldhave afterschool programs for
them, but my main job was art.
Wow.
Very good.
So it, you've also mentioned that youhelped get your students published with
(31:31):
regards to little things that they'd made
Oh, since I was an art teacher, theylet me handle the publishing department.
The mission of our school was writing,and so they were in this big huge
writing program where every kid hadto write for 45 minutes a day, every
day, five days a week to begin with.
They could write about anything theywanted, they could have any story.
(31:55):
And then I typed it up and I printed itup and published it in a hard bound book.
I learned how to do that, andthere was sewing involved.
There was book binding,there was all kinds of.
Books and we publishedabout a thousand books.
And then every year we had an author Stay.
We brought in a publishedfamous kind of author to speak.
And then we brought parents in,adults in, and the kids could
(32:18):
read their books to the adult.
We celebrated them as authors.
Yes.
And the books had all the things.
A real book had author's page, everything.
It was like a real bookand it was just wonderful.
And these kids reallylearned the craft of writing.
They came out of five years worthof that being really good writers.
So I was proud to be apart of that program.
Hey, who was the person at, theprofessor at the UB that referred you
(32:42):
to Leveson or any of the professors?
Who did you have?
I had Professor Sehmsdorf.
Do you remember him?
Sehmsdorf, Henning.
That department has generated a lotof relationships and connection.
I have a couple of Henning'sbooks actually, 'cause I'm
into folklore and so was he.
So he's written a couple things there.
(33:03):
And
I loved my time with theScandinavian department.
Oh, one thing I didn't mention,I had a Norwegian restaurant
at the time, a spinoff of that.
Yeah.
I don't know if Kathy Hanson.
She's a professor of Scandinavianlanguage and literature.
She worked at PLU for many years.
Okay.
She still does translation work.
And so I had just come back fromthe University of Oslo and we were
(33:24):
roommates and we were making open facesandwiches and we started catering
at around to like different eventsthat were going on and someone says,
oh, you should start a restaurant.
So we did, and it was called roa,and that lasted for us summer.
And then we had to go back to school,but we served lunch and coffee and
dinner and it was served family styleand I think Stor was a part of that.
(33:47):
Stor and Orad, they all came andall the Norwegian students at the
University of Washington, it was.
It was pretty magical.
That was a magical summer.
But of course we didn't makemoney 'cause we serve real butter
and pig heatings to everybody.
And so it, it was not productive moneywise, but it's a treasure of memories.
I'd like to play one of thesongs that's on one of your CDs.
(34:10):
You wanna talk a little bitabout how people can get
ahold of you and your group?
I guess there are CDs available for them.
We have a website.
It's called Winter Band Seattle.
Dot com.
Pretty easy to remember.
Winter Band, Seattle, and there'sa website put on by Band Zule.
They do a pretty good job.
There's some snippets of recordingsof our songs there and lots
(34:32):
of pictures, lots of history.
And last year, Lorianne Reinholdand the Norwegian American.
Wrote an article on us.
So there's a really nice articlethat pretty much gives a history of
who we are, if anybody's wanting toknow what we do, where we've been.
That's a great place.
Yeah.
To find us.
I'll make a link to thatfrom the our episode page.
(34:52):
Are there one or more of yoursongs, ones that I know you're
very careful to give some of thehistory and the story behind it.
You wanna pick one or two andtalk about them and then we'll
play it for the listeners?
Yeah.
I think there's one song that probably.
Not many people know.
The Norwegians do know 'causeit is it is on the internet.
It's called Fra Flatholmen Fyr,Sisters from the Flatholmen Lighthouse.
(35:17):
It's a lighthouse in southernNorway where when it's stormy,
it's super dangerous for all boats.
And back in the day, probably late18 hundreds, there were families that
lived in the lighthouses and there weretwo girls they would row out in their
little skiff out to the shipwreck and.
Rescue these sailors.
And then one time the sailor was sothankful that he wrote a song about the
(35:39):
girls, and this was a song my mom loved.
And there were like 14 verses that toldthe story and she used to sing them.
It was special.
It's special 'cause itwas special to my mom.
(38:02):
So that one has a great story to it.
About these stories, I didn't thinkanybody would be interested in the
stories, but when I first startedplaying in front of audiences,
I, it was just came natural to meas a way of introducing the song,
right?
To say a little bit about 'em.
I found out later they said, oh.
Don't forget to tell the story.
'cause I thought I probablyshouldn't be talking so much.
(38:22):
And I go, oh, you like the stories?
Okay.
Okay.
Then I'll tell the stories.
It was interesting to me that theylike to know what the song was about.
I agree with you.
It makes it just that much richer,especially if it's in Norwegian.
And even if it's in English, youcan't always follow the words.
But people like that.
I think so
it makes the song so much more meaningful.
Don, I know what I wanna add.
(38:43):
So did Mike your husbandplay bass when you met him?
No.
He played the trumpet.
I played the violin.
We were in little local symphonies.
The Boeing Symphony for many years.
Yeah.
So we were symphony peopleand then we went back to
Minnesota, to the winter family.
They were auctioning off all the farmand the contents because all the aunts
and uncles had passed and there wasa big base and there was a fiddle.
(39:07):
And so we got a big van and we piledthe kids in and we went to Minnesota
and we picked up the bass and hisgrandfather's fiddle, which I play today.
So we brought them home and thenMike started playing the bass.
Yeah.
And
he's very talented with that bass.
He doesn't practice a lot like I haveto practice, but he is a natural on
(39:28):
that bass and it has so much history.
'cause there was a winter familyband in Minnesota Uhhuh with all
of his eight, nine aunts and unclesand grandparents and cousins,
maybe there were 12 or 16 of them.
They all had instrumentsand they play at dances.
And this old bass, they'd go fromdance to dance place on a horse
drawn sleigh way back in the day.
(39:49):
And the bass was on the sleigh and.
One time in a snowstorm, they wentacross a fence post that knocked the
base up out, and it broke its neck.
So the neck is bolted on.
You can see the splice, whereit's bolted on and there's, it's
got some tape here and there.
It has a lot of character toit, but it plays just fine.
(40:10):
So we are so happy to rescuedit before they had this auction.
And my violin is a beautiful violin.
It's beautiful sound.
I really like it.
Yeah.
So how'd you end up ropingin Chris and Lyle and Dusty?
Chris has always been apart of our family band.
He's always brings his accordionand he and my brother, they have
dueling accordions and play the music.
So Chris has always known the music.
(40:31):
Now Chris has been in a rock bandsince he is been like, ah, 16 and
whole bunch of rock bands and Lyleand Dusty were in his last band
Got it, until just a few years ago.
He asked if they would like to join us.
And so they did, and they stayed.
They're still in different bands.
They hang in there with us andwe're so happy to have them.
(40:53):
Little mandolin sound is just a greatlittle tinkle, it sounds so great.
He, I know it isn't that great.
He,
yeah.
Yeah.
He always wears some kind of hat.
Yeah.
Because he is full of music,absolutely full of music.
(41:13):
Every little note delights him,and he's so happy when he plays.
He just can't wait toget to music practice.
Can I just say one thing about mygrandfather was a fiddle, hunts.
My mom's dad, Hans Avik was a fiddler,and Mike's grandfather was a fiddler.
I'm using Mike's grandfather's fiddle,but my best ofat hunts, his fiddle doesn't
(41:35):
exist anymore, and this is why in hisyounger days he was the hot fiddler in
the area and he played at all the dances.
My parents come from theBible belt and dancing was.
Only bad things happened at dances.
And so the dances were reallylooked down on by religious people.
And so when my grandfather married mygrandmother, he became very religious.
(41:58):
One day he took that violin.
It's an evil thing.
Now this violin, he took that violin,rode it out into the middle of the fjord.
Threw it overboard.
So that's where that fiddle ended up.
And personally, my cousintold me that story in 2016.
I had never heard of it, but I did readin the Norwegian American a couple years
(42:19):
ago, Lorianne had a story about the evilviolin, and there was a documentary,
but I could never find that documentary.
I wanna know what is it that this.
Violin is so evil.
Was so evil back in the day.
I know Harting failures wereprohibited from being played in
churches till fairly recently.
(42:40):
That's a wonderful story.
Yeah.
Little side story.
Thank you very much, Ruthie.
This is, I really
appreciate it.
Wonderful.
Yeah, I'm very much so
glad you're interestedin my family stories.
I love stories.
Yeah.
So do I.
Okay.
Okay.
Thank you Eric.
Thanks for having me.
Take care.
Bye.
(43:03):
So that's an introduction to RuthieSunne Winter and the Winter Family Bands.
I recommend their websiteto learn more about them.
That's at winter band seattle.com.
There are other winter bandsout there, so you wanna make
sure you get the Seattle one.
I'll put links to their websiteon our Nordic on tap.com website.
(43:25):
Be sure to visit that, read the newspaperarticles that I'll provide links for
and leave a comment, especially ifyou're used to listening to the show
on a podcast service like Podbean orApple Music, that's fine, but we'd love
to get your feedback on our website.
You may have noticed the wonderful newintroductory music written by Morton
(43:46):
Alfred Hori, and played by MortonAlfred and Ruthie Bernfeld Morton.
Alfred, by the way, was my very firstinterview on my very first podcast.
Wonderful guy.
I. I refer you to his website, mortonalfred.com, where you can get a link
to order a book of folk tunes composedby Mr. Hoyer appropriately called
(44:10):
Englis Waltz, 25 Danish Folk Tunes.
Or you can email him directly atMorton Alfred all lowercase@gmail.com.
I just got my copy in the mail fromEurope and I'm having a great time
playing his tunes on the piano.
(44:30):
Our exit music was composed andperformed by my friend Darrell Jackson at
Darrell Jackson Music all one word.com.
On his website, you can click themusic tab and hear the whole song.
It's called Southbound Train to Reason.
I can report that we're working ona new Folktale podcast of Norwegian
(44:53):
folktales in both Norwegian and English.
So you can hear these storiesin the vernacular as they
were originally written.
It should be a fun time.
So that's our show.
Thanks for hanging out with me.
I'm Eric Stane.
We'll see you soon.
Vi sees on Nordic on Tap.
Naar er det tid for Nordisk paa Trykk!
Welcome to our podcast, featuringinterviews, music, folktales, and lots
(00:24):
of hygge, all with a Nordic flavor.
I'm your host Eric Stavney.
I have found that I've been ableto have some amazing experiences
and do some amazing things that I'dnever be allowed to do unless I had
a job and was being paid for it.
But I have been able to have thoseexperiences by being a volunteer.
(00:46):
One of the pleasures of volunteeringtoe, the concert venues at Seattle's
National Nordic Museum is gettingto meet the musicians, the bands and
groups that play at the museum ormidsummer festivals, Swedish Pancake
Breakfasts or local Scandinaviandance venues are not professional.
(01:08):
They may get some small remunerationto play, but it can't be much.
So I've been trying to get to know folksin Seattle's Nordic community, and I've
found these musicians willing to shareabout themselves just as they share
their love of Nordic music, of playingtogether and being recognized as part
(01:29):
of the Nordic community themselves.
You may have heard some of my otherpodcasts with Alfred Morton Hori,
Ruthie Bernfeld Begi, and Philages Rachel Nevi to name a few.
And in this podcast, I'd like youto meet another band and its main
spokesperson, Ruthie Ness Winter.
(01:49):
This group of five known as the WinterFamily Band plays Nordic favorites,
as well as songs that Ruthie knowswere important to folks in Norway
and America when her family wereimmigrants to the United States.
The band plays these songs and explainswhat they're about in order to celebrate
and share the old songs, of course.
(02:10):
But for Ruthie especially, sheparticularly wants to honor her
parents and her relatives from Norway.
Music obviously is integral to everyculture, just as the cuisine and
the language and the traditions.
All of those things definewhat that culture is.
Songs, of course, are frequently stories.
(02:33):
In the old days, traveling Troubadoursor minstrels of Europe came into
villages and sang about old and newevents, about love and loss, and
about remembering where you came from.
Those groups were often families,just as some bands are today.
And as you'll see, the Winter Family Bandcontinues this tradition of two families,
(02:56):
the Winter and Ness families making musictogether for us to enjoy and learn from.
If you're not an immigrant from anothercountry, and I'm not, it's hard to fathom
the struggle to learn a new language,how to make your way in a new culture.
You don't understand what people aresaying and you're just trying to do what
you can to earn enough money to survive.
(03:19):
Now, this wasn't special to theScandinavian immigrants at the
late 18 hundreds and the early 19hundreds for we know that millions of
immigrants and refugees immigrate tonew countries today across the world.
So what you're about to hearand includes experiences that
are shared among all immigrants.
Ruthie's Father Pete Sunnis isan interesting case because he
(03:44):
documented his experiences, whichRuthie later collected into a book.
And so I'd like you to meet Ruthie fromthe Winter Family Band to learn about
her family's music traditions and learn alittle of the amazing stories her father
wrote about and what it was like to be animmigrant to the United States during the
Great Depression and the Second World War.
(04:07):
As usual, when I interview someone, Iask Ruthie to start at the beginning.
I was born in Seattle, Swedish Hospitalsoon after my parents arrived from Norway.
In 19 40, 19 46, I think they came.
My sister was born and then I wasborn in 48 and my mother was like 37.
(04:32):
She couldn't speak English I wasdefinitely born into an immigrant world.
Like a little Norway becausewe grew up speaking Norwegian.
'cause my mom couldn't speak Englishand she had just had Norwegian friends.
So I have a strong relationshipto Norway, I should say.
I know from what you've said in your bookthat frequently your father wasn't around.
(04:54):
He was off earning money for the family.
Fisherman.
Yeah.
So it's mostly you and yourmom and brothers, sisters, my
brother.
Yep.
Yeah.
Oh, that's great.
So you were born in Seattle though, right?
Yeah.
So you, I have read that what you calledyour band, the Winter Family Band.
And you've said something about there'sbeen music for a long time in the family.
(05:16):
You wanna trace how far back that goes?
Yeah.
My mom is the musical side of the family.
Her father was a fiddler.
And he bought an organ for the girls.
There were five girls in his family andthey all learned how to play the organ.
So when she came to America, we gota piano and she had her guitar, and
(05:37):
then my sister played the cello.
I played the violin.
My brother played the accordion and thesteel guitar, and we always played that
Norwegian music that she knew she taught.
That's the music, especially myolder brother who was born in
Norway as our family brand grew.
He was the one that taught us themusic 'cause he was the one that
remembered it as well as my mom.
(05:59):
And he was the leader of our band, familyband un, until he couldn't anymore.
And so Chris, my cousin Chris, whowas always around, cousin Chris,
ve Houg, he played the accordion.
And so we all played together.
Christmas, Easter family occasions,anybody's birthday, we'd always end up.
(06:20):
Playing our music.
So one time I always had such of myparties, had a whole crowd of people
and someone said, oh, will you play forour Yuli Fest at Daughters of Norway?
And I said, okay, if you thinkwe're good enough, we'll come.
So then that snowballed.
Then somebody says, oh,will you come and play here?
Will you come and play there?
And we always had these familytunes, which we play today.
(06:43):
Okay.
I was gonna ask you about that.
Whether what I associate with NorwegianAmerican favorites are, in fact sounds
like true, nor at least in the old days,
they're Norwegian favoritesthat are true to their hearts.
In fact, when we play, sometimesthe old ladies come up to us and
said, I sang every verse with you.
I knew all those songs, sothe old folks know the songs,
(07:06):
but the younger ones don't.
But we, our mission is topreserve these old tunes and
because they're slipping away.
Like one song we play is in, it's a tango.
Nobody remembers that.
My younger cousins in Norwaydon't even remember that, and
it's nowhere on the internet.
(07:26):
We can't find it.
And so someone at Midsummer, whenwe played last week, asked me about
it where they could get the music.
I said, it's all in my head.
It's learned, it's passeddown through the generations.
Not all of our music, but somesongs are not recorded at all.
I don't know any other bands.
They're dance bands.
They play for the dancers and welike to play for the dancers too.
(07:48):
But basically we play oldcherished Scandinavian,
Norwegian, Scandinavian songs.
So you said you concertized at Daughtersof Norway probably every venue there is.
Right?
Greater Seattle area plus, yeah.
The Swedish
Club.
(Nordic) Heritage Museum.
Yeah.
We played Julefest and any chancewe can get to play at the Nordic
(08:08):
Museum and we played for theNational Convention of the Daughters
of Norway in Bremerton last year.
That was a big honor.
People from all overthe United States and.
Of course Lorianne Reha always makessure that we end up at Bergen's Place
at Syttende Mai and at the Life.
Leif Erikson Sons in Norway,stage at Syttende Mai.
And so it's a real pleasureto share our music.
(08:29):
It's a big joy for us.
You've said that on yourwebsite that in fact.
You have found ways tocontinue, oh my gosh.
Being hurt into the pandemic era.
In the early days, we didn'tknow where the contagion came
from, so we all stayed outside.
We continued practicing and thenwe set up our big garage, which
(08:50):
faces a kind of a major street.
It was open to the public and so we, weset up a stage there and seats and we
would announce it to the neighborhood.
We put signs up and people wouldcome with their masks on standing
six feet apart, just scared.
We were the first live music they'dheard in ages, and so we did that
(09:13):
every couple months and peoplewould, tell other people about it.
Pretty soon we got a pretty good crowd.
They'd be dancing in the street and theywere so thankful to hear some live music.
We all felt safe doing that outside.
And so you weren't forgotten whenthings have started to loosen up.
They thought I, I remember mygood times on that street, and
(09:33):
we're gonna get them booked again.
I hope
that's right.
We're gonna do it again this summer.
The neighbors are calling from our music.
It's fun.
Yeah,
that is fun.
Why don't you tell me a littlebit about your, the book about
your father, how you stumbled uponwritings, tapes, and you mentioned
letters and the evolution of that.
(09:56):
I knew, my dad was always writing wherethe last part of his life when he'd
retired, he's always putting down histhoughts about his life, but we were busy.
With our lives.
And no, we didn't ever talk about it.
And he didn't talk about it, butwe'd see him writing in this book.
And then in his mid seventies,late seventies, he got cancer and
(10:17):
then he started writing in earnest.
And then after a while thatwas too stressful to write,
so he talked into a tape.
So then after he passed away, we justdidn't touch that for 20 some years.
And then I retired and I thought,oh my gosh, I know there's
all this information here.
I need to look at it.
And so with the encouragement ofmy husband, I tried to transcribe
(10:40):
all of his little scribblings.
He didn't ever learn proper grammar.
So some words were half Norwegian,half English, and sometimes the
story would be told multiple times.
So I had to try to figure out atimeline of all of this, piece it
all together, make the grammar.
Work, make the timeline work.
And that's how we came up with the book.
(11:01):
Now it's in his voice.
I started it in the thirdperson and that didn't work.
The first person, hisvoice really made sense.
So I hope his story comes to life.
And my favorite part is theepisodes for close calls.
According to my view, he shouldn'thave lived past the age of 20.
Oh my gosh.
Especially when he wasin that tree in Norway.
(11:24):
He and his friends climbed up in thetree and the guy sawed down the tree.
This was a big tree andhe came crashing down.
Just wanted to see what it waslike, coming down in a crash tree
and then all of his crazy episodes.
He should not have livedpast like 17 actually.
And then his episodes closecalls in Alaska with the bears
and the trappers and storms.
(11:46):
It's amazing that he lived a full life.
Pretty much a full life.
He passed away at 82, so thatwas my favorite part, and I
didn't know any of these stories.
Until 20 years after he passed,he, these Norwegians are very stoic
That comes across.
They don't wanna botheryou with their story.
You're so busy, you'reso busy with your life.
(12:08):
I'm not gonna ask you to sitdown so I can tell you my story.
No.
So I really discovered my dad.
Through this book.
And it was a wonderful thing for me.
'cause I realized he was, he had awhole different life than I thought.
I thought he was this boring fisherman.
And then I learned he'd hadall of these adventures and
it was just marvelous for me.
I think that choice of firstperson is, makes this magic.
(12:32):
It reads as almost as a story.
You say he's a fisherman, but he wasalso a logger and a trapper and a
bait on ships and all kinds of stuff.
Whaler...
and
Forgot about whales.
And the ships he sailed on when he cameover, when he was 17, he'd ship out.
They were sailing ships frigates.
They had all of these full sails andhe was climbing up, unfurling the
(12:54):
sails, and one time the rope broke andhe happened to throw himself across
the yard arm and saved his life.
Yeah.
I mean that right there.
He should have passed away right there.
And I think a lot of youngimmigrant boys did die.
They were expendable.
Those young immigrant boys.
Yeah, that was an interesting.
His life too.
You get that sense of he's charmed,but he does mention a number of his
(13:18):
friends along the way that got killedin a logging accident or Oh, yeah.
Fishing accident.
And so it, it definitely highlightsthat it is dangerous work.
Yeah.
The logging especially.
Yeah.
In his neighbor from Vic, Norwaywas one of those killed, and that
was a terrible thing for him.
His best buddy that he cameover to the states with.
Then years and years later, thatfamily came to visit us here in Seattle
(13:41):
and wanted to go and find his grave.
And of course, logging companiesdidn't even hardly take notice
of those little immigrant boys.
There was no record of his death, butthey're still mourning that poor boy.
So my dad was lucky he survived that.
And I got also that I'll say it'snot true for me today, is guests, the
Norwegian community was fairly closeknit, even across Washington and Alaska.
(14:05):
Like he would go staywith people or Right.
He wouldn't have a house andthey'd just take him in and
feed him and he'd do the same
Hospitality was huge.
Is huge with the Norwegians.
Yeah.
And they had that connection in Alaska.
All those Norwegian fishermenwould take care of themselves.
They were family.
Same on boats and helping each other out.
What?
He bought several boatsand sold several boats.
(14:28):
I went through quite a few boats.
Yep.
I knew how to fix 'em all too.
Those wooden boats.
These been the winter fixingthem so they'd be ready mnet.
So they'd be ready forthe spring fishing season.
Yeah, it was fun.
I feel like I spent my childhood onFisherman's Dock in Salmon Bay, and
those were only fishing boats, salmonboats, and halibut boats way back then.
You would never see ayacht or a pleasure boat.
(14:49):
Never.
They were not allowed.
And now it's sad to see that's allthere is, but I just love to go down on
the docks with my dad 'cause he wouldspread the nets out on the pavement
there to fix them up and to sew them.
And I'd just hang around and my mom.
Having just come from Norway,the little girls in Norway had
a big satin bow in their hair.
If you look in pictures way back then,the girls always had these huge big
(15:13):
white satin bows and she'd always putone in my hair and there I go with a
fisherman and they all knew me down thereuntil I had to start going to school.
That was the end.
And in the proof that all thiswas happening too, is are these
pictures, pictures of you asa baby and a couple years old.
I'm like, that's Ruthie.
(15:34):
But you notice in his memoirs, I thinkI get one sentence, Ruthie was born.
That's it.
Yeah.
Fishing was, the fishing storieswere so much more important.
He was a very smart guy.
He had a great recall, sohe remembered most of that.
However, he had lots of receiptsand bills and phish information,
(15:56):
so he get dates and time.
Yeah.
I don't know if he kept a journal,but there was a lot of information
there that would help him remember.
I enjoy these receipts that youprinted in the back of the book.
I see how much he got a poundfor those sockeye salmon and.
I was at Costco yesterday,$20 a pound, and he got $2, 2
(16:19):
cents I think apparently there.
The fisherman way back when.
Yeah.
And even that price went up and down.
Sometimes he barely evenbroke even or didn't.
Right?
Oh some years.
And there were strikes, fishing strikes.
The cannery strikes and thefishermen couldn't fish and
they had to tough it out.
Yeah.
I don't know how my parents made it
when I go to the Fisherman's Terminaland see the trawlers with the big poles
(16:42):
that go up and meeting here that, yeah.
Several times he either hadto cut his off in order to
survive storm or whatever, but.
He heads in has to gethis owning poles right.
He did.
In the forest.
That's delightful.
In some ways, it's a thrill for youto discover what your dad was like.
(17:04):
In this other realm.
It's probably sad that you werenever able to talk to him about it.
That would've been neat.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Very quiet guy.
You know those old Norwegians?
I know them well.
Stoic is the word.
Stoic.
Stoic.
Never
whining, never complaining.
Just.
Still never self-aggrandizing.
The total opposite.
(17:25):
Yeah.
Never bragging.
There's the one story when he wasout in this horrible storm and a
lot of boats went down and he hadto fight for 48 hours or something.
He didn't get any sleep.
And finally he limps his way into portand someone asked how it was, and he
just said, he hardly said two words.
He didn't tell 'em what a terriblelife-threatening storm he lived through.
(17:47):
Just didn't say much.
Yeah, he wasn't bragging about howhe made it through this awful storm.
My grandfather, I remember I'd gofishing with him river fishing and
something where he a couple timeshooked his thumb or something with a
hook or managed to get that out andhe's bleeding profusely and just.
Turn, wiping it off casuallygo, grandpa, are you okay?
(18:11):
That's gotta hurt like the devil.
And he goes it stings a bit.
And did you read the story about thehalibut hook going into my dad's hand?
Oh yeah.
Oh my gosh.
Yeah.
Yeah.
I can't even imagine that.
Those are big hooks, huge hooks.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Fishing is one of the mostdangerous occupations in the world.
I believe it.
The statistics a while ago weresaying one boat goes down for
(18:33):
every day of the year up in Alaska.
Honest to God.
Wow.
Yeah,
that's what I read while back.
So how did you get to typing it up?
It looks like you self-published.
Yeah.
Yeah.
That's an interesting story.
I have a busy life, so I nevercould sit down and actually type
for hours and hours to come.
So my husband, Mike Winter, is aretired aeronautical engineer and the
(18:56):
equivalent of Boeing in Turkey hiredhim for two weeks to come and help them.
With a plane they were making.
So we went to Anura and I stayedin like a worker man's dormitory.
We had two cots in a little room, andwhile he was gone all day, I brought my
manuscripts with, and I typed and typed.
(19:17):
I had nothing to bother.
So all of those two weeks Ijust typed and typed away.
It was magical.
There were no interruptions at all.
And that's what I got half of it done.
At that time,
is it hand typed or was it type set?
I hand typed it and sent in the documentto the publisher and then they said it.
I decided the font and how everything,the chapters and how it should all go.
(19:39):
And then they said it.
Yeah.
No, I mean it's very professional.
I've seen a lot of hand type books.
This is great.
My first book.
Your first book, and only,
never say never.
You've mentioned that your fatherfinally had got enough money to send.
(20:01):
Family, and yet due to circumstancesthey couldn't get on the boat.
You wanna talk about that?
Yeah.
First of all, my parents got married.
My father came at 17, but then when he,13 years later, his dad was ill in Norway.
So he went back to Nesvik andat that time he met my mom.
Who lived in the neighboring village.
(20:22):
And so they got engaged.
He went back to Alaska for a fishingtrip, came back within nine months
and they got married and then hestayed maybe six months, nine months.
And then he had to go back to Alaskaagain 'cause that was his only income.
So he went back to Alaska and inthe meantime, world War II started.
And it just got worse and worse.
And so he worked with the US Embassyto get her passage and when that came
(20:50):
to her, and Sison, remember they didn'thave internet, they just had telegrams.
Telegram came to this travel agency andSison and he told my mom, come right now.
Come.
You have to leave now.
So she just had 24 hours toget everything together and get
money together and get down to.
Slow to get going.
(21:11):
She had a ticket to Petal Finland tocatch the USS American Legion, and
then that was gonna go to New York.
But once she got mybrother now is one year.
'cause my, when my father left, my momwas pregnant, so he's about a year now
and, and when she got to Oslo, the Germanswere already there and there was chaos,
(21:34):
and she went to the Norwegian council,which was supposed to issue this ticket
that was allowed by the Americans.
And they were in such anuproar that they said no.
It took a while for them to say no.
They said, come back.
Come back.
We need this.
We need that.
We need this hard toget all those documents.
(21:55):
You know when you're in Norway at thetime, but she managed to get everything
they wanted and then they finally said no.
And so she had to go back to her farmland.
That's the boat that took princessMartha and the kids along with
all kinds of other famous people.
So I think in the end they just jammedall the famous people on and denied
(22:16):
the other people were promised passage.
'cause us, US government.
By this time my dad's an Americancitizen and so they were trying
to get all American citizens out.
And my brother was an Americancitizen because my dad was.
And that was the ticket out mybrother, 'cause he was an American
citizen and, but still in all thechaos, they wouldn't let her go.
(22:38):
And then the boat tookoff and so she was stuck.
Then she got this letter fromUS Embassy, welcome to America.
Oh my God, please take the next boat out.
The next boat was seven years later.
So it was a tragedy for them.
But then I think thishappened to a lot of people.
I think that is a
long time to sustain amarriage and a family.
(23:00):
It was.
It was.
And so I have this pile of letterswritten between them, which have
been sitting in there since theywere started in the thirties.
Until my dad came and I've onlyread some of them and I'm only
reading them now 'cause I thoughtthey were so difficult to read.
They were on that onion skin whereyou could see both sides and they're
(23:21):
in Norwegian and this dialect.
And I thought, oh, it'sgonna take me forever.
But once I got the hang of it.
It wasn't that hard to decipher and read.
So just last, not this winter, the lastwinter I started reading those and I got
the full impact of those seven years.
And I haven't gotten throughall the letters yet, but what
I've read is just heartbreaking.
(23:42):
You know how she missed my dad and shetried to describe every little thing
that my brother, who was a baby, so thathe could get bonded with his dad and
and they had no money.
The US governmentwouldn't allow any money.
Into Nazi occupied lands.
So she had zero money andwas dependent on her in-laws.
(24:04):
Yeah.
Yeah, it was a tough time andI always felt like it was just
my mom who suffered like that.
But as I read other books, I realizeda lot of Norwegian fishermen families
were caught in that same situation.
That's amazing.
So you said that your family camefrom the Olsons area, or your father?
(24:24):
Yeah.
Yeah.
In the Fjord lands to give fromOlson to my grandfather's farm.
A bus ferry, and a bus.
There's a lot of fjords and it'snot that far away as the crow
flies, it's probably an hour.
Yeah.
But those little Fjordcommunities are hard to get by.
It's on the ow of Fjord de Fjord.
(24:46):
The closest little town is Ock, whichhas a hospital in, a teaching university.
Cute little town.
What I've noticed that I likeis the ferries and the trains
and the buses are integrated.
So the, sometimes the ferry won'tleave the dock until the bus shows up.
Isn't that amazing?
And gets on.
It's really?
That never happens around here?
(25:08):
It's perfect.
They're perfectly synchronized.
Absolutely amazing.
Great system.
Yeah.
Your Bruno must be from the Olson area.
Oh yeah.
It's a sun bun.
And my aunt did the embroideringon my 40th birthday.
It was a surprise for me.
My husband Mike, and my cousin Kunigot into cahoots with each other and
(25:28):
said, I think Ruthie needs a boo.
So they arranged for my aunt.
I. To do the embroider.
It took her 10 months to do all theembroider and then the shirt also
has all kinds of embroider on it.
And then we went to Norway that summer andthen they surprised me with the boo nod.
It was so wonderful, such, such asurprise, and I was just so thrilled.
(25:50):
And now I get to wear it all the timewhen I play music with the winter band.
It's really effective that you're alsothe spokeswoman for the group too.
It's you are the Norwegian packageright there at the microphone.
You know it's all there.
So you've been back and forth to Norwaymany times as you grew up, including
the University of Oslo summer program.
Yeah.
I was really lucky that the Life EricksonSons of Norway gave me a scholarship.
(26:14):
I was tipped off by my Norwegianinstructor at the UDub and he
said, you ought to do this.
And I did.
And they provided tuitionand travel expenses back and
forth to the United States.
Yeah.
And that was huge.
That was huge.
'cause my parents being fishermen, theycouldn't afford anything like that.
So that was a wonderful experience for me.
(26:36):
And then I had a auntand uncle living in Oslo.
So once the summer school was over.
I enrolled at the University of Osloand stayed with my aunt and uncle.
And then finally I got a place in studentPoso where all the students lived, right?
So I moved in there with all thestudents and oh my, that was one
(26:58):
of the best years of my life.
And then finally when it wasall over, I had to bite the
bullet and come home because theuniversity system was so different.
They don't match.
They I did take classes.
They gave me a few credits.
They don't work on thecredit system, but they.
They did arrange connect withthe University of Washington.
Said, okay, we'll give her so and somany, I got half the credits I should
(27:21):
have had, but I didn't care 'causeit was such a wonderful experience.
Yeah.
I made friends.
In fact, I still connect.
I had a finished roommate fromFinland who's also studying.
I still connect withher and I visited her.
I still connect with a friendthat I met on the, we took
the Oslo Fjord from New York.
(27:41):
To Oslo there were a lot of studentNorwegian students going home on the
boat, and I studied at the University ofOslo with that one guy I met on the boat.
We still send Christmas cards.
So it was just, I made lastingfriendships at that year and a half.
That's amazing.
And you worked Stein and Strøm, huh?
Stein and Strøm.
(28:02):
They gave us a month off forChristmas or something like that.
So I went and applied and Iworked in the toy department
and I was dressed like hunts.
They made it all into Hunts andGretel, and so a journalist from Dog
Blo came and interviewed me one day.
Took a picture of me and I have aarticle in the newspaper picture of
me in my Hans and Gretel outfit andwrote an article about, American
(28:24):
student working at Stein and Strøm.
Yeah.
You were dressed as Hans, not as Gretel.
Nope.
There was another Gretel.
I was Hansel and that's how Ihad to come to work and that
outfit, I had wooden clogs.
They gave it to me and I wore it.
I was just so happy to have thejob and it was, stain and storm.
It was the only department store.
The very best.
(28:45):
Okay, so what's the connection?
And it seems to me that had somethingto do with your dad coming over here.
How, what's the connection with the sho?
Yeah, Oli Sho is my great uncle.
He's my grandmother's brother.
And my mom's uncle and Chris,cousin Chris, who's my accordion
(29:06):
player, is his grandfather.
And Uncle Ole was our contactin Seattle when we got here.
Did he own a boat or was ableto get your dad onto a boat?
He probably made connections for my dad.
Yeah.
Uncle Ole came at a very young age.
Also not speaking English,he has a whole nother story.
(29:28):
He.
Got his master mate in pilot licenseand then became a captain of a ship.
Yep.
And then World War II camealong and he became captain of
a huge ship, huge Navy ship.
Wow.
So he was pretty well-known.
Famous guy here in the Norwegiancircles, captain Oli, they have
(29:49):
you have your other lifeas your day job as well.
You wanna tell me aboutyour teaching career?
Yeah, I got my art education andcertificate as well as degree
as well as a minor in Norwegianlanguage and literature from the uw.
I was just a couple credits shortof a double major and teaching
(30:09):
jobs were hard to come by.
I moved to California and couldn't.
Couldn't get anythingbut a substitute job.
So I thought, okay, while I'm waiting formy teaching job I'll go in the airline.
So I ended up working forthe airlines for 11 years.
And so I had all kinds offlight benefits so I could go
back to Norway, I could travel.
And then when that ended,there were strikes and.
(30:29):
Airlines were purchased by otherairlines, and we were all laid off.
Then I went back into teaching.
When I went back into teaching, Icouldn't get an art job, so I became
a reading specialist and then finallywent back and got my master's in ESL.
Couldn't get an ESL job,but then came the art job.
Then I got the art.
I loved it.
I taught art until I, I retired.
(30:49):
So the ESL wasn't that long.
No I would help the immigrant kids.
At my school and I would talk tothe staff about being an immigrant.
So my mom was I knew the troubles ofan immigrant parents and missing home
and not knowing the language and thenthe kids end up being translators
and they have to run the house.
(31:11):
Yes.
Because the parents don't knowwhat's going on and there are a lot
of responsibilities for these kids.
So I advocated for thosekids at staff meetings and.
Other meetings and then I wouldhave afterschool programs for
them, but my main job was art.
Wow.
Very good.
So it, you've also mentioned that youhelped get your students published with
(31:31):
regards to little things that they'd made
Oh, since I was an art teacher, theylet me handle the publishing department.
The mission of our school was writing,and so they were in this big huge
writing program where every kid hadto write for 45 minutes a day, every
day, five days a week to begin with.
They could write about anything theywanted, they could have any story.
(31:55):
And then I typed it up and I printed itup and published it in a hard bound book.
I learned how to do that, andthere was sewing involved.
There was book binding,there was all kinds of.
Books and we publishedabout a thousand books.
And then every year we had an author Stay.
We brought in a publishedfamous kind of author to speak.
And then we brought parents in,adults in, and the kids could
(32:18):
read their books to the adult.
We celebrated them as authors.
Yes.
And the books had all the things.
A real book had author's page, everything.
It was like a real bookand it was just wonderful.
And these kids reallylearned the craft of writing.
They came out of five years worthof that being really good writers.
So I was proud to be apart of that program.
Hey, who was the person at, theprofessor at the UB that referred you
(32:42):
to Leveson or any of the professors?
Who did you have?
I had Professor Sehmsdorf.
Do you remember him?
Sehmsdorf, Henning.
That department has generated a lotof relationships and connection.
I have a couple of Henning'sbooks actually, 'cause I'm
into folklore and so was he.
So he's written a couple things there.
(33:03):
And
I loved my time with theScandinavian department.
Oh, one thing I didn't mention,I had a Norwegian restaurant
at the time, a spinoff of that.
Yeah.
I don't know if Kathy Hanson.
She's a professor of Scandinavianlanguage and literature.
She worked at PLU for many years.
Okay.
She still does translation work.
And so I had just come back fromthe University of Oslo and we were
(33:24):
roommates and we were making open facesandwiches and we started catering
at around to like different eventsthat were going on and someone says,
oh, you should start a restaurant.
So we did, and it was called roa,and that lasted for us summer.
And then we had to go back to school,but we served lunch and coffee and
dinner and it was served family styleand I think Stor was a part of that.
(33:47):
Stor and Orad, they all came andall the Norwegian students at the
University of Washington, it was.
It was pretty magical.
That was a magical summer.
But of course we didn't makemoney 'cause we serve real butter
and pig heatings to everybody.
And so it, it was not productive moneywise, but it's a treasure of memories.
I'd like to play one of thesongs that's on one of your CDs.
(34:10):
You wanna talk a little bitabout how people can get
ahold of you and your group?
I guess there are CDs available for them.
We have a website.
It's called Winter Band Seattle.
Dot com.
Pretty easy to remember.
Winter Band, Seattle, and there'sa website put on by Band Zule.
They do a pretty good job.
There's some snippets of recordingsof our songs there and lots
(34:32):
of pictures, lots of history.
And last year, Lorianne Reinholdand the Norwegian American.
Wrote an article on us.
So there's a really nice articlethat pretty much gives a history of
who we are, if anybody's wanting toknow what we do, where we've been.
That's a great place.
Yeah.
To find us.
I'll make a link to thatfrom the our episode page.
(34:52):
Are there one or more of yoursongs, ones that I know you're
very careful to give some of thehistory and the story behind it.
You wanna pick one or two andtalk about them and then we'll
play it for the listeners?
Yeah.
I think there's one song that probably.
Not many people know.
The Norwegians do know 'causeit is it is on the internet.
It's called Fra Flatholmen Fyr,Sisters from the Flatholmen Lighthouse.
(35:17):
It's a lighthouse in southernNorway where when it's stormy,
it's super dangerous for all boats.
And back in the day, probably late18 hundreds, there were families that
lived in the lighthouses and there weretwo girls they would row out in their
little skiff out to the shipwreck and.
Rescue these sailors.
And then one time the sailor was sothankful that he wrote a song about the
(35:39):
girls, and this was a song my mom loved.
And there were like 14 verses that toldthe story and she used to sing them.
It was special.
It's special 'cause itwas special to my mom.
(38:02):
So that one has a great story to it.
About these stories, I didn't thinkanybody would be interested in the
stories, but when I first startedplaying in front of audiences,
I, it was just came natural to meas a way of introducing the song,
right?
To say a little bit about 'em.
I found out later they said, oh.
Don't forget to tell the story.
'cause I thought I probablyshouldn't be talking so much.
(38:22):
And I go, oh, you like the stories?
Okay.
Okay.
Then I'll tell the stories.
It was interesting to me that theylike to know what the song was about.
I agree with you.
It makes it just that much richer,especially if it's in Norwegian.
And even if it's in English, youcan't always follow the words.
But people like that.
I think so
it makes the song so much more meaningful.
Don, I know what I wanna add.
(38:43):
So did Mike your husbandplay bass when you met him?
No.
He played the trumpet.
I played the violin.
We were in little local symphonies.
The Boeing Symphony for many years.
Yeah.
So we were symphony peopleand then we went back to
Minnesota, to the winter family.
They were auctioning off all the farmand the contents because all the aunts
and uncles had passed and there wasa big base and there was a fiddle.
(39:07):
And so we got a big van and we piledthe kids in and we went to Minnesota
and we picked up the bass and hisgrandfather's fiddle, which I play today.
So we brought them home and thenMike started playing the bass.
Yeah.
And
he's very talented with that bass.
He doesn't practice a lot like I haveto practice, but he is a natural on
(39:28):
that bass and it has so much history.
'cause there was a winter familyband in Minnesota Uhhuh with all
of his eight, nine aunts and unclesand grandparents and cousins,
maybe there were 12 or 16 of them.
They all had instrumentsand they play at dances.
And this old bass, they'd go fromdance to dance place on a horse
drawn sleigh way back in the day.
(39:49):
And the bass was on the sleigh and.
One time in a snowstorm, they wentacross a fence post that knocked the
base up out, and it broke its neck.
So the neck is bolted on.
You can see the splice, whereit's bolted on and there's, it's
got some tape here and there.
It has a lot of character toit, but it plays just fine.
(40:10):
So we are so happy to rescuedit before they had this auction.
And my violin is a beautiful violin.
It's beautiful sound.
I really like it.
Yeah.
So how'd you end up ropingin Chris and Lyle and Dusty?
Chris has always been apart of our family band.
He's always brings his accordionand he and my brother, they have
dueling accordions and play the music.
So Chris has always known the music.
(40:31):
Now Chris has been in a rock bandsince he is been like, ah, 16 and
whole bunch of rock bands and Lyleand Dusty were in his last band
Got it, until just a few years ago.
He asked if they would like to join us.
And so they did, and they stayed.
They're still in different bands.
They hang in there with us andwe're so happy to have them.
(40:53):
Little mandolin sound is just a greatlittle tinkle, it sounds so great.
He, I know it isn't that great.
He,
yeah.
Yeah.
He always wears some kind of hat.
Yeah.
Because he is full of music,absolutely full of music.
(41:13):
Every little note delights him,and he's so happy when he plays.
He just can't wait toget to music practice.
Can I just say one thing about mygrandfather was a fiddle, hunts.
My mom's dad, Hans Avik was a fiddler,and Mike's grandfather was a fiddler.
I'm using Mike's grandfather's fiddle,but my best ofat hunts, his fiddle doesn't
(41:35):
exist anymore, and this is why in hisyounger days he was the hot fiddler in
the area and he played at all the dances.
My parents come from theBible belt and dancing was.
Only bad things happened at dances.
And so the dances were reallylooked down on by religious people.
And so when my grandfather married mygrandmother, he became very religious.
(41:58):
One day he took that violin.
It's an evil thing.
Now this violin, he took that violin,rode it out into the middle of the fjord.
Threw it overboard.
So that's where that fiddle ended up.
And personally, my cousintold me that story in 2016.
I had never heard of it, but I did readin the Norwegian American a couple years
(42:19):
ago, Lorianne had a story about the evilviolin, and there was a documentary,
but I could never find that documentary.
I wanna know what is it that this.
Violin is so evil.
Was so evil back in the day.
I know Harting failures wereprohibited from being played in
churches till fairly recently.
(42:40):
That's a wonderful story.
Yeah.
Little side story.
Thank you very much, Ruthie.
This is, I really
appreciate it.
Wonderful.
Yeah, I'm very much so
glad you're interestedin my family stories.
I love stories.
Yeah.
So do I.
Okay.
Okay.
Thank you Eric.
Thanks for having me.
Take care.
Bye.
(43:03):
So that's an introduction to RuthieSunne Winter and the Winter Family Bands.
I recommend their websiteto learn more about them.
That's at winter band seattle.com.
There are other winter bandsout there, so you wanna make
sure you get the Seattle one.
I'll put links to their websiteon our Nordic on tap.com website.
(43:25):
Be sure to visit that, read the newspaperarticles that I'll provide links for
and leave a comment, especially ifyou're used to listening to the show
on a podcast service like Podbean orApple Music, that's fine, but we'd love
to get your feedback on our website.
You may have noticed the wonderful newintroductory music written by Morton
(43:46):
Alfred Hori, and played by MortonAlfred and Ruthie Bernfeld Morton.
Alfred, by the way, was my very firstinterview on my very first podcast.
Wonderful guy.
I. I refer you to his website, mortonalfred.com, where you can get a link
to order a book of folk tunes composedby Mr. Hoyer appropriately called
(44:10):
Englis Waltz, 25 Danish Folk Tunes.
Or you can email him directly atMorton Alfred all lowercase@gmail.com.
I just got my copy in the mail fromEurope and I'm having a great time
playing his tunes on the piano.
(44:30):
Our exit music was composed andperformed by my friend Darrell Jackson at
Darrell Jackson Music all one word.com.
On his website, you can click themusic tab and hear the whole song.
It's called Southbound Train to Reason.
I can report that we're working ona new Folktale podcast of Norwegian
(44:53):
folktales in both Norwegian and English.
So you can hear these storiesin the vernacular as they
were originally written.
It should be a fun time.
So that's our show.
Thanks for hanging out with me.
I'm Eric Stane.
We'll see you soon.
Vi sees on Nordic on Tap.
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