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Emma
Raalien
Birth: 30 May 1885 Kerkhoven, Minnesota, USA 1 Death: 5 Oct 1976 Quesnel, British Columbia 1 Father: Ole Olson RAALIEN (1844-1935) Mother: Rangdi JOHANNSON (aka Randi JOHANNESDATTER) (1849-1925)
Spouse: Draper William IRWIN Birth: 7 Oct 1873 Timulkenny Farm, Drumcree, County Armagh, Ireland Death: 25 Jul 1950 Quesnel, British Columbia 2 Father: William IRWIN (~1840-) Mother: Sarah CHAMBERLAIN (~1840-). Born in England.
Marriage: 27 Feb 1900 Brainerd, Minnesota
Children: William [Bill] John (11 Apr 1901- 27 Sept 1971) Hackensack, Minn. Married Exilda [Toots] Crotteau 29 Jun 1925 Prince George, BC Mabel Doris (22 Oct 1903 -3 Sept 1986) Hackensack Minn. Married William Henry [Harry] Nichols 22 Nov 1922 Quesnel, BC Verona Irene Winifred (1917-1998) |
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The following three photographs of Emma were taken in 1910. (The first two are at Lake Minnetonka, Minn.) | |||
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NOTES FOR EMMA ...
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WHAT'S IN A NAME?
For years there has been confusion over the spelling of Emma's maiden
name. In Dragon Lake Memories
written by her daughter, Verona, it is spelt Rolein. Genealogy research
has shown that it was spelled numerous ways throughout the years
(Rolein, Rolien, Raalien, etc.).
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When Norwegians immigrated to North America they
began using the
same last name for the
entire family.
However, as is evident within
Emma’s family, the spelling or length of that last name might be fluid.
Norway, in 1923, ordered (by law) that each family should have a single, hereditary last name. Surnames derived from place names commonly originated as farm names. Most families adopted a farm name. RAALIEN is a farm name in Vinger, Norway; the area from which her parents emigrated. As we can see from US Federal and Minnesota State Census the spelling of the family’s surname varied from Raalien to Rolie to Rolein to Rolien. |
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Emma with great-grandchildren Terry and Karen Nichols. (Terry & Karen are cousins) | Emma with grandchildren Sandra & Terry | Emma with daughter Verona and grandchildren Sandra, Terry and Wendy |
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Remembering Grannie Irwin (Emma Raalien Irwin 1885-1976)
By her granddaughter, Wendy
Fraser The scent of talcum powder. A boisterous World War 1 song about “K-k-k-Katie” with lyrics promising, “When the moon comes over the c-c-c-cowshed, I’ll be waiting for you at the k-k-k-kitchen door.” A home movie from the 1970s showing our grandmother Emma Irwin tottering along the front porch of my brother Terry’s home in Langley, taking dad’s arm and walking to the car where she pauses, smiles and waves a gentle goodbye.
My memories of Grannie are still vivid, almost 40 years after her death.
She was a childhood source of comfort, impish humour, songs, hot milk
and cinnamon toast. Her own memories of her I once read that every writer has a storyteller somewhere in his or her childhood who provided nurture and inspiration. When I read that statement, I understood instantly that Grannie was my storyteller. She told me two of her brothers worked as loggers in the Great North Woods right alongside Paul Bunyan and his Blue Ox Babe. I promptly went to school and regaled my classmates with those stories. They believed me and even the teacher did not try to dissuade me, instead writing in my report card that “Wendy’s stories and accounts of her travels are fascinating.” |
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Today, I know that Bunyan and Babe the Blue Ox did not single-handedly
dig the
There were stories, too, of frightening Indians coming to the door of
the farmhouse and asking my great-grandmother Rangdi Johannson Raalien
for food. It may sound far-fetched that Grannie and her siblings were
afraid of those aboriginal Americans, until one considers that the last
Indian battle in the Grannie received a rudimentary education. When she was a little girl, she suffered a very serious dog bite to her leg that kept her away from school for months as her mother nursed her back to health. By the time she was well enough to return to school, she was far behind her classmates. She could read, write and count, but her hand-writing was always plain and straightforward, without the flourishes common to her time. Her stories of growing up with all her sisters and brothers are what I remember best. One of my favourites was The Preacher and The Pumpkin. There was a young bachelor preacher (Lutheran, I’m assuming) who visited the farms in his charge on a regular basis to meet with parishioners. He traveled on horseback. On one memorable occasion, he arrived at the Raalien home and my great-grandmother invited him in for a chat over fresh-baked gingerbread. As great-grandmother and the preacher visited, Grannie and her sisters and brothers were busy outside, boiling big vats of pumpkin over an open fire to preserve the pumpkin for the coming winter. One of her brothers had a bright idea. What, he wondered, would happen to the preacher’s chaps (conveniently left just outside the door) if they filled them with the hot pumpkin? The children began to pour pots of pumpkin into the leather chaps, which began to creak and crack and expand. By the time the preacher finished his visit, his chaps were ruined and the children were anticipating the punishment they were convinced was coming. Great-grandmother was embarrassed and mortified, but the preacher thought the prank was hilarious and pleaded on the children’s behalf. They weren’t punished. And there were the nights Grannie went night fishing on the lake with her father Ole Olsen Raalien. They would hang lanterns from the boat – not exactly sporting for the fish involved - but Ole had 11 children to feed. There were also the many times, day or night, when her mother would be summoned to act as midwife and bring new life into the world. Great-Grannie would grab her black medical bag and head off in a buggy or buckboard to a farm or cabin where a mother-to--be awaited her arrival. The family did not have it easy. As mom (Verona Irwin Thorne Fraser) remembered the story, great-grandfather Raalien co-signed a loan for a friend. The friend couldn’t make the payments and skipped town. Then the bank and the authorities turned their focus to great-grandfather, who couldn’t make the payments, either. The family was forced to make hurried arrangements to abandon their homestead and move on to a fresh start somewhere else. Grannie never forgot the experience of leading the family cow down the back roads and trails, under cover of darkness, after they packed up all they could carry in their wagon and left their home for the final time. |
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Mom was always under the impression that this was when the family name
changed from Raalien to Olsen. The surname Olsen was as common in
Grannie’s time with her parents and siblings was short-lived. She went
to work at a young age – 11? 12? 13? – as a house maid for Dr. John G.
Cross and his family. Dr. Cross eventually became a professor of
medicine at the Grannie was given her own bedroom, with a fine bed, complete with a pillow and pillow case, sheets, blankets and a bed spread. The bed was beautifully made. She knew she could never sleep in it and then re-make it the next morning to its beautiful state, so she slept instead on a rug on the floor. This went on for several nights, perhaps a couple of weeks, until Mrs. Cross discovered her sleeping on the floor. Why, she asked, aren’t you sleeping in your bed? Grannie confessed that she didn’t know how to make the bed. Mrs. Cross gently showed her how the various bed linens fit together and Grannie slept in her bed from then on. When she went to work for the Crosses, her English was still somewhat poor. The Raaliens/Olsens spoke Norwegian at home. Grannie always remembered the time she was sent on an errand and a well-dressed woman, of obvious good breeding, accidentally stepped backwards onto the foot of young, red-headed Emma. The woman exclaimed, “Oh, excuse me!” and Grannie, trying to be polite, summoned her best English and replied, “No excuse!” She enjoyed telling that story. |
The
Cross family was very kind to Grannie. Our family has photos of her
visiting them at their home on the shores of Grannie loved to sing and had a fine voice. In addition to “K-k-k-Katie,” the other song she taught me was “Red Wing” with its lyrics: “Oh the moon shines tonight on pretty Red Wing/ The breeze is sighing/The night birds crying…” I was a sentimental little kid and the tragic fate of Red Wing and her lover (“her brave lies sleeping, while Red Wing’s weeping/her heart away”) sometimes left me in tears, especially when I figured out that “sleeping” actually meant Dead. All in all, “K-k-k-Katie” was much less traumatic. I remember with a smile her strength, her common sense, her love, her laughter, and her strongly held-opinions on anything and everything. As her hearing became worse as she became elderly, she used to drive me nuts with her own versions of the plot of the TV shows we were watching. Eventually, I gave up trying to explain the real plots to her. In retrospect, her versions were probably as good as the typical medical show dramas or mystery crime fare of the late 1960s/early 1970s. In addition to being our grandmother, I believe the argument can be made that Grannie was the grandmother of today’s conspiracy theorists. When Neil Armstrong took his “one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind” in the summer of 1969, we all gathered around the TV and watched the blurry black and white images beamed back from the moon.
Grannie was having none of it. It was a fake, she declared. It was all
being filmed in
What a long and extraordinary life she had, spanning the time from
Buffalo Bill to Neil Armstrong. How extraordinarily fortunate we were to
know and love her.
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