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Erie Jensen
Paper 3
STATE MASSACHUSETTS
NkME OF WORKER MRS. EMILY B. MOORE
ADDRESS 84 ELM STREET, WORCEbTsa,
MASSACHUSETTS
DATE OF INTERVIEW JUNE 18, 1939
SUBJECT LIVING LORE
NAME OF INFORMANT ERIC JENSEN
ADDRESS WORCESTER, MASSACHUSETTS
Names Emily B. Moore
Title: Living Lore
Assignment: Erik Christian Jensen
Topic: Danish Steel Worker
Paper 3
It was raining torrents but I had told Mr. Jensen I would be
around for a visit, so at precisely 3 o'clock, I opened the door of
the bicycle shop and said' hello
Old Erik was very much troubled for fear I had wcatched cold".
With my rubbers and umbrella safely stowed away I sat down on the little
stool and we began our chat.
"Bad day you should come, but I like to see you Jain! Last time
I tell you when you come again I take you upstairs to see my missus,
but she say her talk not so good, and I better tell you. Much she re-
members 'bout her days in Denmark and mine, too, and lots of things is
done different here. IN both laugh when we talk about the funerals in
this country. You bury your dead too quick. One day they die and next
day they get buried. In Denmark a funeral lasts sometimes a week, and rich
people have them longer. Everybody comes and they eat. No, just eat
and talk, and in the evening we had church music and prayers. On name
days and christenings we have plenty to eat and drink and music to dance.
We have everything out of the house, but in the bedrooms,- then we dance
or play cards or sing. The young people usually dance, maybe four or
eight couples, but sometime in the evening, everybody dances.
"Like I tell you, in Denmark the houses are all on one floor, a
big atting room, and a dining room and kitchen, and bed rooms to the size
of the families. If lots of children, there is one room for them, and
lost of places the beds is made right in the wall, like you say -'bunks'
and all around the room is 'bunks'. For the father and mother, they
Names Emily B. Moore
Titles Living Lore
Assignment: Erick Jensen
Topics Danish Steel Worker
Paper 3
have beds, but they make them out of wood and the springs is made of
rope, but the 'ticks' is made of feathers, you cover up with feather
'ticks', only not so thick, like you sleep on. If you have hired girl,
you make for her, room back of kitchen. My miscue says what she don't
like when she first comes here is the stoves. In Denmark the stoves
is in the corner and they are high and every room has his own stove.
Sometimes they is high as the ceiling, and that is sometimes 10 or 12
feet. Sometimes theys about 3 feet high. When she comes to Worcester,
they is little round stoves and in the middle of the room, or they is
little holes in the wall and all open and they blaze up, and sometimes
they is big fireplace and big logs is burned. It takes my miscue long
time to like American stoves. Now, by golly, she has electric stove
and she likes.
"You know, in Denmark, when you go in somebody's house, right in
the middle of floor is a table, and on top is a big Bible, and in it
is all the names and ages of everybody in your family. Here, you never
no more see a Bible on the table.
nJahl Denmark is nice, but I like better here. You go into a
house in Denmark of a evening, you see the children all sittinl rovnd
the table, studying their school books, and the miscue, she sits by and
does needlework, and the Pappa he sets by the stove and smokes and reads,
too. No, never do you smoke cigars in your house the men smoke big
pipes, so uig you can put a big handful tobacco in them, and they last
all night.
Name: Emily B. Moore
Title: Living Lore
Assignments Erick Jensen
Topic: Danish Steel Worker
Paper 3
*Danish families are good families and the children alwa.ys obey
the father and mother, and never fights. Always on the name days (birthday)
they give presents, even if it's wild flowers, but never forgets the
name days of the family. WIristmas time in Denmark is good, too. A big
tree is put up in the Dig hall and everyoody comes and dances and sings
and gives presents. The rich and the poor people mix up that one time in the
year. Weeks and mebbe months the wimmint make thea'asbleskiver' and they
give it to everyoody that cumes. Oh, that's make of apples, and sugar
and flour, and like candy and cake, and its hard and you can keep it
long time. There's always a big feast, like your banquets, and every-
body eats gruel, made out of milk, and they roast duck, stuffed with
prunes or chestnuts, and give you that with 'beer sauce'. Oh, Jahl dot
iss gootl The beer sauce gives it taste very good. Why, in Deni,ark,
they use beer like in America they use water. The wimmin make soup out
of beer and float slices of rye bread on top. Jahl that is goot, too.
We use lots of soup in Denmark, and on Saturdays we have ,Baenkavallingt,
that's is made out of soup that's left over every day$ and they call it
soup made in a bench well just like you say 'leavings' after each day.
Oh, we have lots of different soup, and the favorite soup of the Danes
is 'Prune Soup'. My missus makes it from prunes, milk, eggs rice and
vegetables. Jah, that's the best soup.
oNever do I eat oreakfast in a lunch cart or outside mine house.
First when I come here I must eat out, and they laugh at me, but now I
Name: Emily B. Moore
Title: Living Lore
Assignment: Erick Jensen
Topic: Danish Steel Worker
Paper 3
have my house and my missus gives me kind of breakfast Danish people
eat. Well, here you eat bacon or ham with eggs and fried potatoes.
My miszus makes me my ismorrebrod, why, that is a slice of rye bread,
with putter and a slice of meat or fish, with beer or tea. That is a
national dish of a Danish man. They laugh if you eat that in the out-
side here. My girls they don't eat that, but my missus and me do. When
you come to Danish home for a meal you get some soup, then hot meat with
horseradish, then some cake or sweet, and then you have cheese and bread.
Yu must know how to slice the cheese thin, or you're not good cook.
"When you get up from Danish table you say 'Thanks for meal'.
You see, lots of things different here. You say 'excuse, please' and
if you say excuse in Denmark, that means you're sorry., so you see
how it does? Danish people are good, quiet people, always very slow
moving, and when you move slow, you think slow, and when you think slow,
you never in trouble get. Why, it is true, in Denmark they have the
clocks at the railroad station five minutes fast, so the people don't
miss their train. The only thing that moves fast is the dQ01, and they
have lots of racing clogs, and that is funny, now, don't it? Never do you
see a Dane walking fast.
"This will be nice time of year in Denmark, for they get ready
for Easter; they start with Holy Thursday and everything is shut tight
till Monday after Easter. Even the shops and business is closed up, and
people are sad, out happy too. They go to church everyday, and then
they walk all around the town. In Denmark the churches are on a hill