Andreas Severin Harjo

A childhood between Vadsø and Tana

Andreas Severin Harjo was born in Vadsø on November 6, 1895, to Johan Ludvig Harjo and Anna Kathrine Børresen. He was baptized at home six days later, and the baptism was confirmed in church on Christmas Eve. By 1900, the family was living at Larsnes in Tana, where his father worked as a merchant. His grandfather Johan was part of the household too.

Read Ludvig’s story · Read Anna’s story

Andreas lost his father in 1908, when he was twelve. Two years later, the census found him doing farm work at Masjoknes, in the household of Johan Salomonsen and Mathilde Danielsen. Their daughter Sofie was there as well. The records do not tell us when Andreas and Sofie became close, but they place them in the same household before their marriage.

A New Year’s wedding, and a home at Solheim

On New Year’s Day 1915, Andreas married Sofie Magdalene Salomonsen in Sør-Varanger. He was nineteen and living in Kirkenes, where he worked as a shop assistant. Both were marrying for the first time.

By December 1920, they had made their home at Solheim in Tana. Andreas earned his living from fishing and also worked his own smallholding. With them lived seven-year-old Randi Augusta Myreng, born on September 25, 1913. The census calls her their foster daughter. It is a glimpse of the family they were caring for together, although we do not yet know when Randi came to live with them.

Ester, and her mother Elen Anna

On March 16, 1922, Ester Kristine was born in Tana. Her birth return names Andreas Harjo as her father and Elen Anna Bavda as her mother. Andreas was still married to Sofie; Elen was unmarried. The record gives us Ester’s parentage, but the circumstances of Andreas and Elen’s relationship—and who cared for Ester in her earliest years—are not yet known.

Elen Anna had been born on June 29, 1887, to Ole Johnsen Bavda and Kirsten Mikkelsdatter at Sommernæs in Tana. Her parents had married on the last day of 1876. Their marriage record connects Ole with Polmak and Kirsten with Karasjok.

Before Ester, Elen had a daughter, Margit Adrianne, born on November 25, 1913. Margit’s father was Andreas Haugenes, a different man from Andreas Harjo. The best-matching household in the 1920 census places Elen with her father and Margit at Fiskenæs in Smalfjord-Vestertana, earning her living as a seamstress. Margit was Ester’s older maternal half-sister.

A short life, and the family who lived on

Andreas died on April 22, 1925, aged twenty-nine. The death return records tuberculosis and describes him as a married farmer and seaman. Ester had just turned three. Sofie was left a widow, but we have not yet found the settlement of Andreas’s estate or a list of his heirs.

Ester lived into her nineties. Her family’s death notice names her as Ester Kristine Rasmussen, born Harjo, and records her death at Tana health centre on May 15, 2014. It remembers her as a mother, grandmother, great-grandmother and aunt, and names her children Ruth and Liv. The photographs below let us meet her many years after the childhood that the old records describe.

The family farm in 1955

Ester in family photographs

The documents behind the story

English reading of Ester’s notice: Our dear mother, mother-in-law, grandmother, great-grandmother and aunt, Ester Kristine Rasmussen, née Harjo, born March 16, 1922, died May 15, 2014 at Tana health centre. Children: Ruth and Liv. Son-in-law: Jan. Grandchildren: Lone, Hans-Ivar, Petter and Karina. Great-grandchildren: Ivan and Alisa. Other family. Funeral from Tana Church, Wednesday May 28 at 11 a.m.

In the Newspapers

Family moments, remembered lives and news from the places they called home. Open a clipping to read more. Explore the whole family’s newspaper collection.

Finnmarken · April 28, 2011 · p. 23Anne-Lise shares a photograph and memories of her father’s family

English summary

Anne-Lise Harjo shares a family photograph she dates to 1904–05, probably taken in Vadsø before the move to Masjok. It shows her grandparents Ludvig and Anna with some of their children; her father Fredrik had not yet been born. She recalls the family’s losses to tuberculosis, Ludvig’s death in 1908, and Anna’s later marriage to Petter Barski of Østre Seida, with whom she had a daughter. Signe and Kristian were the longest-lived of the children pictured. Anna is remembered for her kindness and warmth.

English translation

Photo memory

Do you have an interesting photograph from our recent or distant history that you would like to share with Finnmarken’s readers? Send it to Finnmarken, P.O. Box 616, 9811 Vadsø. Write down everything you know about where and when the picture was taken and who is in it. Remember to include a return address.

A family sorely tried

This photograph is actually more than a hundred years old. Its contributor, Anne-Lise Harjo, who now lives in Vadsø, tells us that it was taken as early as 1904–05.

She also tells us that it shows members of her own father’s family. Her father, Fredrik, who lived in Masjok, had not been born when the photograph was taken. Among those pictured is his brother Kristian, seated at the front. On the left sits her grandfather Ludvig Harjo, with her grandmother Anna Katrine. At the back, on the left, we see Isak Harjo and Andreas Harjo, while the girl on the right is Signe Margrethe Harjo. She married a man from Salangen in Troms and eventually had four children.

But life was not as easy for the others. Andreas and Isak both died of tuberculosis. They were only twenty-seven and twenty-eight years old.

The eldest brother, Bernhardt, who is not in the photograph, also died young, at only twenty-one, of the same disease. Andreas was married and left a wife and a daughter. Bernhardt and Isak were unmarried and died without children.

Anne-Lise Harjo believes the photograph must have been taken in Vadsø. She bases this on the fact that the family lived in Vadsø before moving to Masjok in Tana.

We have mentioned that many of the children in the family died very young. So did their father Ludvik, who died as early as 1908. At that time, the youngest son was only two years old. His wife eventually remarried, to Petter Barski from Østre Seida. They had a daughter together.

Of the people in the photograph, Signe and Kristian lived the longest. Anne-Lise’s father also died young, at only forty-seven, while his wife Anna was sixty-two when she died. She is remembered as an incredibly kind, warm and good woman.

Translation note: The newspaper’s photograph identifications and ages are retained as printed. Its final paragraph mixes generations: Anna Katrine was Ludvig’s wife; Fredrik’s wife was Gunvor. The family’s updated identifications remain in the biographies.

Original newspaper page · In the newspaper collection

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