Ove Syverson Family: 52 Ancestors Prompt "At the Cemetery"

Ove Syverson/Severson/Siverson Family and Linden Lutheran Church Cemetery 

52 Weeks/52 Ancestors Prompt: At the Cemetery

            My great-grandparents, Ragnhild and Ove Syverson, (my paternal grandmother’s parents) worshipped at a small church near their Linden Township farm in rural Minnesota. The church, like the township, was named for a nearby lake, Linden Lake. The cemetery surrounding Linden Lutheran Church holds the graves of many of the Severson family members, and has been a great help in my genealogical research. 

            Linden Church is located amid fields or corn and soybeans in Brown County, Minnesota. It is accessible only by creeping along bumpy gravel roads that wind around the sharp corners demarcating the property lines of old homesteads. The church is a pretty little white building with a square, squat steeple topped with a six-sided bell tower and black-shingled roof. 

There are four arched and not very colorful windows on each side of the sanctuary, and a low, single-story church hall built on the back, looking like a tiny 1950s ranch house grafted onto the much older church.

Unfortunately, few people come to Linden Church anymore. The countryside around Linden emptied out during the last couple decades as small family farms were sold to large farm corporations and jobs disappeared from the surrounding small communities. Young people moved away, and the older people who remained are now dying off.  The church congregation withered away until a few years ago, the church was forced to close its doors when there were no longer sufficient funds coming in to heat the building. The remaining parishioners were forced to worship at the Lutheran parish in the nearby town of Hanska or to find another church even further away. 

            Despite the closure, people still care about the property. The cemetery that wraps around three sides of the church is still neatly mowed and tended, and the church is available for special events such as the occasional wedding or funeral. A farm family lives across the road from the property, keeping watch and protecting Linden from vandals. 

The cemetery board has done a wonderful job. The cemetery records have been digitized and are on Findagrave and are accessible on Ancestry. The cemetery also features a kiosk with a record book listing the surnames of the people buried there, and a map showing where the plots are located. I was able to find several ancestors’ graves due to the efforts and diligence of these volunteers. 

Cemetery records helped to clear up confusion about the number of children the Syversons had, and when they died. The couple had a young son named Syver, born in Wisconsin in October 1869. This child disappeared from census records, and a second Syver was born in 1882. While no stone survives at the cemetery, the records indicate the first Syver—called Syver Overson in the cemetery records (Ove’s son, a surname conforming to Norwegian surname patterns)—died in 1876 and was buried in the family plot. Another son, Ole, was born in 1872 and died the next year. I only know of his existence due to the cemetery records listing him as Ole Overson and showing his parents’ names. When another son was born in late 1873, he was named Ole in honor of his dead baby brother. Without the cemetery records, the duplicate birth and death dates for the Oles and Syvers would have led to great confusion. 

Ove Syverson

Ove and Ragnhild also had a daughter, Anne Sirine or Syrina, born in 1877 who died in 1896, shortly before her twentieth birthday. Like her little brothers, she has no surviving headstone. 

Ragnhild Syverson

Ove and Ragnhild’s headstones are in the cemetery. I noted that there is vacant space around their graves; I hypothesize that space is the likely location of the three children’s missing graves. 

Jorgine Syverson

The cemetery also contains the graves of two of the Syverson children who reached adulthood, Jorgine Syverson Ahlness, 1879-1908, and Ole Syverson, 1873-1933. Along with Ole’s grave are those of his wife Inger Syvine Broste, 1876-1905, and their little son Oscar, 1900-1904, who died just a month after his fourth birthday. Without the headstone for Oscar, I would have had a hard time confirming his was Ole’s son—Ole’s obituary failed to even mention him. 

 

Oscar Syverson

Ole Syverson

I love to visit Linden Lutheran Church Cemetery. Its peaceful, remote location evokes the past. I feel closer to my ancestors buried there, and I am grateful for the work of the volunteers that contributed to my records of the Syverson family.