A Shining Light Emerges from Tragic Loss
Introducing My Guest Contributor
You’ve met my sister Carol (see my Top 10 Tips article after our recent trip to Pennsylvania) and today you get to meet my older brother Sam.
Sam has been doing the heavy lifting of the genealogy portion of the Larson family research, and is a master at finding, collecting, and organizing the massive amounts of information available on the internet and elsewhere.
Here is a small demonstration of Sam’s ability: When Carol and I were in Pennsylvania there were several times we drove to a town we thought significant in some way. We would text Sam as we approached it, asking, “We think this town is important! Did anything happen here?” He would respond within minutes with a full rundown of who lived, married, died or was born there, often with specific addresses we could go find. Impressive, no?
Sam is also constantly looking for far flung distant relatives around the globe who are connected to the various family trees he has compiled over the years (both sides of our family but also branches of his wife’s family). He loves it (as do I) when someone unexpected finds and contacts him out of the blue with a question like: “I think we may be related, but I don’t know how.” Where there is a connection, he is always able to trace that person back to the common ancestor, and takes the various breadcrumbs he has found scattered around the internet to produce a clear trail, filling important gaps in the web of relationships that crisscross through time. Every family who wants to preserve their history needs a Sam - just sayin’!
In honor of Memorial Day 2023, Sam took some of the recent information he and I have been working on for the Larson narrative I am sharing on this blog, and created a beautiful tribute to one of those distant relatives we never met, but feel a clear connection with. He gave me permission to include his writing here, so I am presenting the rest of Will’s family story mostly through Sam’s voice. Those of you who saw his tribute on FaceBook will recognize the portions included here. I have made only minor edits to his original version, and the sections where I have supplemented his story with additional information and context appear in italics. Enjoy.
Sam Lebold’s 2023 Memorial Day Tribute
This year on Memorial Day, I choose to remember Captain William Frithiof Larson, who was killed in action on August 11, 1944, while leading Operation Percy Red in support of the French resistance during Nazi occupation of France. He was awarded the Bronze Star and Purple Heart.
Captain Larson would have been my second cousin once removed, although I had not heard of him, or his branch of our family, until recently. His family and his story are among those fading into the forgotten mists of time.
My great-grandfather Frank Larson emigrated from Sweden to western Pennsylvania in 1881 at the age of 19, along with his twin brother Will, and their brothers John and Linus (who came over in 1884). Coming from a peasant farming background, the brothers found work, got married, raised families, and settled into their new American life. They were successful and remained a close family, even when they moved to distant places.
When Frank and John moved to Sheffield to work in the big tannery there, Will stayed behind in Costello. We don’t know how long he lived there but eventually he made his way to Port Allegany, where he worked for a number of years. We don’t know exactly what he did but he identified himself as a “farmer” in 1889, and a “lumberman” in 1892. It was in Port Allegany that he met Annie Johnson. Annie arrived in Pennsylvania from Sweden in 1886 when she was just 16 years old. She and her older brother decided to emigrate together after losing both of their parents in Sweden. We don’t know what happened, but it seems the time was right for them to start a new life in the U.S. Annie was working as a housekeeper when she met Will.
At one point the tannery owned 44,000 acres of forest. The photo provides a sense of the massive amounts of bark that were being stripped from the trees to serve the needs of the tanning operation.
Will married Annie Johnson in 1889, and they settled in Wilcox PA where he worked in the logging industry as they began raising their family.
The Wilcox tannery was another of the very large operations in western Pennsylvania described in previous articles. It specialized in making sole leather (used in shoes) and relied heavily on massive quantities of both bark and animal hides to meet its production demands.
Wilcox was a small town of about 1200 people in 1890, located on the Clarion River. As the photo shows, it was a somewhat traditional “company town” in that the Wilcox Tanning Company provided homes complete with toolsheds and outhouses for the workers and their families. The town had both electric and gas power, and boasted its own doctor, not a common occurrence in such a small town. It also had hotels, general stores, churches and other businesses.
It is reported that President Ulysses Grant was an avid fisherman and visited Wilcox twice, leading to the construction of the Grant House hotel in 1882 in his honor, although apparently he never stayed there himself.
Will’s job while living in Wilcox was a “barker.” The load of bark in the photo demonstrates how this strenuous job required him not only to physically strip the bark off the huge hemlock trees in the forest, but also to pile it onto wagons, which were then pulled down the mountain by teams of horses to be loaded onto railroad cars.
Part of Will’s job was also the “bark driver” who managed the horses and the load as they maneuvered their way out of the forest to the railroad cars waiting for them. This work peaked during the winter months, when there was plenty of snow on the ground to aid the horses in moving the heavily-laden sleds down the mountain.
Sadly, in February 1892, at the age of 30, Will was walking alongside his wagon when it slid in the snow. The load of bark came loose and toppled, crushing him to death. Annie was left with their two-year-old child, and another on the way. Annie and Will's brothers buried him in the Wilcox cemetery, where he rests alone.
Annie named her second child William Frank, after the twin brothers. She lost her first child not long after, but she raised William Frank to adulthood. He married Lennea Anderson of Titusville PA; they raised two children and provided Annie a home for her remaining years. William Frank, Lennea, and Annie all rest together in the Riceville cemetery in Crawford County, PA.
Captain William Frithiof Larson
William and Lennea's first child was born in 1917, and they named him William Frithiof. After graduating from high school and working during the depression, in 1940 at age 23 William registered for the draft. He enlisted, and rose to the rank of Captain.
He was leading a highly trained team of 18 soldiers working with the French resistance, when he was shot by Nazi fire. His death was yet another tragedy for Annie and her son William Frank. He now rests in a field in France surrounded by his fallen comrades, at the Epinal American Cemetery and Memorial.
Captain Larson's sister Carolyn was nine years old when he died. She grew up, moved to California, married, raised three children, and died in 2016. I don't know who or where her children are now, but perhaps they too honor their Uncle William on Memorial Day. Perhaps one day I will know.
To my cousin, Captain Larson: your family and your country thanks you for your service, and for your sacrifice. We are privileged and grateful to honor your memory.
Thanks to Sam for bringing such a sensitive and heartfelt closing to the story of Will Larson and his family and for allowing me to share it with you here. My hope is that if any of Carolyn’s descendants ever see this article, they will know that there are others out in the universe who are witness to the remarkable history that we have been able to lift up and embrace with reverence. If you are out there, please let us know!
If you would like to read a more detailed version of the mission that cost Captain Larson his life, you can read about it here.
Next Steps
Next steps? I don’t know what my next steps are, so my next article will be a surprise for all of us! I’ve been buried in history and family and need to get cracking on planning my big 1938 Project road trip in October. I’m also scheduled to be camping in New England for the month of July. I’ll report on my progress here, and try to post some interesting historical tidbits along the way. Please consider subscribing if you want to get a direct notice when the next post comes out. ‘Til next time, be well.
Resources
Information and photos for portions of this article came from the following sources:
McGeehan, Dennis (2007). Images of America: Elk County. Arcadia Publishing.
Special shout-out to Dwight “Andy” Anderson for so thoughtfully preserving the memory of Captain Larson on Findagrave.com. The information found on that site is largely a labor of love by the volunteers who post photos and other information about where long lost (and maybe not so lost) relatives are buried. You can read the profile of Mr. Anderson here.