Category: Roots & Shoots

Fostering Family Connections	
Friday, 10 March 2023
	
Greetings

Language is a necessary but troubling challenge to exchange ideas. I have found the use of “liberal” to be confusing and often mistaken for both political and economic discourse or conversation. Last Wednesday evening I found and related a quote from Francis Fukuyama, professor emeritus at Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies. Here is what he said in a Harper's interview.

    I would start by saying what I don’t mean by liberalism. If you call someone liberal in the United States, you mean that person is left of center, prioritizes equality, and wants government to do more to promote it. If you call someone liberal in Europe, you mean that person is right of center, prioritizes liberty, wants free markets and less government intervention. I don’t think these economic definitions are the essence of the thing. To me, liberalism revolves around a presumption of basic equality of dignity that applies to all of us as members of our species, and the idea that this dignity is ultimately based on our moral autonomy, our ability to make moral choices. You institutionalize liberalism through a rule of law that puts constraints on the use of political power such that the government does not interfere with this basic autonomy.

Since its beginnings in the seventeenth century, liberalism has also been closely associated with a certain cognitive mode—that of modern natural science, with its belief that there is an objective reality beyond our subjective consciousnesses, a reality that we can come to know through the scientific method. We can then use the resulting knowledge to manipulate that reality, moving from science to technology, and finally to the engineering of economic and social life.

If you use the term this way, Sweden, Denmark, and other big social democratic states qualify as liberal, but so do the United States, Japan, and other countries that have smaller welfare states. Liberalism has much more to do with this fundamental recognition of individual rights.

The highlights coincide with mental models I have held since my undergraduate days.
	
	
JOTTINGS:

    AFIB or Atrial Fibrillation was discussed last Wednesday and Dick Lindgren used an illustration of an EKG to explain how diagnosis of AFIB may be made and how it can be fraught. He had found the $100 portable devices attached to an iPhone to be of questionable value. Drugs to treat AFIB can be expensive, so Dick has some recommendations on reducing costs.
    Dave Lindgren was finally able to tell us about his findings regarding Swedish Coffee. He presented a nice slide show to explain how he used the recipe. I'll be editing the video and posting it on the website along with Aunt Hazel;s recipe for Apple Cake.
    Snow (and weather) is always close to mind on our Zoom calls and this week the Minnesota Mafia was ranting about the record setting snowfalls (approaching the tenth highest historically) in Minnesota.
    Jon and Elaine Lindgren are planning a drive to New York City to see granddaughter Lily perform for her ballet studies at Fordham University.
    My daughter, Erika Rivers, is anticipating a trip to Hawaii and the Volcano National Park on Maui. She will be leading a group sponsored by Wilderness Inquiry.
    Because of feedback I received by eMail and a question about how to contact the entire distribution list, I will post Roots & Shoots on the LONet website each week. This will provide readers with a way to comment. If you have anything by way of rebuttal or additional information, please post your comments there.
    Steve Lindgren has been monitoring the proposed merger of our Minnesota-based Fairview Health System with the Sanford Health operating out of Sioux Falls, South Dakota. Because University of Minnesota physicians associate with the UMN Medical School are opposed t the merger, it has attracted a great deal of attention in the TC area.

ZOOMING

Our NEW SCHEDULE for Zooming begins nest Tuesday, March 14th at 7:30PM. We're not abandoning Wednesday evening but want to try out other days and shorten the time. Our tentative scheule for the rest of March is posted below. Days and starting times are going to move around, with hope that it will be easier for some to join that have not found Wednesday a good fit for participating. We have found over hte many months of doing these Zoom sessions, that no matter how big or small the group, we always have fun. We always hope you will be able to join us.

Here is connection information for TUESDAY. :

You are warmly invited to join our Zoom meeting on TUESDAY.

Topic: Family Zoom Conversation ... Steve Lindgren will facilitate a discussion focusing on our accomplishments as we approach 150 Zoom sessions.

Time: Mar 14, 2023 07:30 PM Central Time (US and Canada)

Join Zoom Meeting
https://us02web.zoom.us/j/6531363825
Meeting ID: 653 136 3825
For the remainder of March our Zoom sessions will be as follows:
Sunday, March 19th, 3:30 PM Tentative pending availability of a presenter.)
Thursday, March 24th, 7:30 PM
Wednesday March 29th, 7:30 PM


Let's Keep in Touch!
	
	

Warmest regards,

Bruce

(218) 348-3325 or bflind@cheqnet.net

Fostering Family Connections
Saturday, 4 March2023
	
Greetings 

Artificial Intelligence (AI) is now roaring at us with the newest upgrades from Microsoft and their Windows OS. You may have experienced the seemingly big distance between your iPhone and your PC with some workaround to get pictures from your iPhone. Mine is to locate the photo on the iPhone, and then send it to my PC using eMail. A little clumsy but it works OK for an occasional photo or two. But it would be much easier if my PC simply opened the photo files on my iPhone and iCloud. Although that is currently doable now with Windows 10, it, along with other clever additions, will be easily automated with Windows 11.

Unfortunately the upgrade to Windows 11 with way too many current Windows 10 computers is blocked by hardware deficiencies. Which apparently for most of us means shelling out to buy a new computer and that is too steep a price for my Swedish soul. A quick check on Amazon for a Windows 11 PC equivalent to my current desktop would cost around a $1,000 or more. Since I prefer Open Source software, much of which will not likely run in the Windows 11 environment, I would be hanging on the horns of a dilemma. If I choose to upgrade, I will also face more expense finding and buying (or renting indefinitely) equivalent software, some of which I only use occasionally. All of this could easily add another $1,000 or more to may cost of upgrade.

But, there is a powerful incentive with Windows 11, and that is to gain access to the future; tools of Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning (AI/ML). I have often said that if I was 20 years younger, I would take off my socks, roll up my pants and wade into the waters of AI/ML developing requisite skills with one of the compatible programming languages such as Python. With Windows 11 and recent upgrades, there is much of AI/ML that is reachable without writing a single line of code. What ever you may want to do—write an essay, calculate future value of an asset, reduce or expand a recipe for a Swedish version of Norwegian krumkake—first try talking to your PC with a request (in any language) that the PC do it for you. Some of that is currently free but don't expect that to pertain indefinitely; a pay plan will be ready for you sometime soon. Microsoft has not been known for its charity, the Gates Foundation notwithstanding. (If you want something from the Gates Foundation, make a detailed proposal and don't even think about asking for anything less that a couple million dollars.)

But Microsoft is not the only game in AI/ML. Google (YouTube), Meta (Facebook), Apple and Amazon are actually wagging the tail of the AI/ML dog. Not that we should be misled into thinking that a dog with a wagging tail is always friendly. These dogs are clever and know where your thoughts and money are kept. Beware offers that seem too good to be true. Hey SERI, what should I do?
	
	

JOTTINGS:

    The Bowl (Amy's Wooden Bowl) is safely on the way to Ames. Laura Gardner will pass it along to daughter Grace for safekeeping for another generation and hopefully more. I have recently revised the Editors Note on the Post provided by Linnae on the provenance of the bowl.
    I just did my taxes for 2022—full disclosure, Patti assembled everything for our CPA—and again found that none of my computer expenses are deductible as they were when my consulting business was active. Zoom and lindgrensonline does not qualify as charity either. Fortunately all costs are manageable.
    My latest listen (Audible Book) as mentioned last week is The Song of the Cell by Siddhartha Mukherjee, MD, PhD. He is a wonderful storyteller and highlights so many things about cell biology that I taught for many years, yet he bring almost poetic writing to his descriptions and stories of the people who made the important discoveries of the past decades.
    Brave New Workshop, an improv theater in Minneapolis has a current show entitled “Smelling Elon's Musk.” The subtitle: The Future is Now, but Does It Include Us?will not likely engender a love story with the oligarchs taking control of our economy, technologies and democracy.
    Holding your breath for Republicans to criticise either Fox News or its darling Marjorie Taylor Green is going to deprive you and our democracy of much needed oxygen. It is impossible to imagine the angst of Senate minority leader Mitch McConnell when Green calls for all Red States, presumably the contiguous states of Florida, Georgia, South Carolina, Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana and Tennessee to form a new nation. Whew!


ZOOMING

We keep going with hope that others will join us. It is time to begin trying something new. Accordingly this will be the last of the routine, two-hour Wednesday evening sessions. Here is a (tentative) schedule for the month of March: Wednesday, 8th 7:00-9:00 PM; Tuesday, 14th 7:30-8:30 PM; Sunday, 19th, Thursday, 23rd 7:30-8:30; and Wednesday, 29th, 7:30-8:30. Let me know how you feel about this change.

My hope is that by adding some flexibility to the Zooming schedule, it will easier for some family members to join. We know other obligations on Wednesday evening have made participation difficult. I have always said, and this is still true, you can always jump on and jump off at any time.

I will continue to send Roots & Shoots each week with connection information and a bold reminder of the the times and dates. I continue to hope to raise topics of interest to stimulate fun and interesting conversations about our family history, connections and the world writ large. Without being intrusive or snoopy, it is great to hear about travel and toil among our connected and extended family.

We will continue to highlight Questions of Interest, along with some special topics that may bubble up in the course of our conversations. Special presentations are encouraged on virtually any topic you find of interest. Feel free to be formal or casual at what ever is your comfort level.

You are warmly invited to join this upcoming Zoom Conversation:

Bruce Lindgren is inviting you to a scheduled Zoom meeting.

Family Zoom Conversation

Time: Mar 8, 2023 07:00-9:00 PM Central Time (US and Canada)

Join Zoom Meeting by Clicking the Link Below:

https://us02web.zoom.us/j/6531363825

The Meeting ID is: 653 136 3825 (This is usually not needed, except when joining for the first time and when you dont have the Zoom application installed on your personal computer or device (iPhone, etc.)

Let's Keep in Touch!
	
Warm regards,

Bruce

(218) 348-3325 or bflind@cheqnet.net
	

From Bruce Lindgren (Son of Obed and Verona Lindgren)

Greetings to all.

Thank you for taking a few minutes to click links and read some of the newsletter copy that has been embedded in our family website. While the Roots & Shoots newsletter is an attempt to find a new direction for family communications after our legacy of 90 years of the Round Robin, it is my hope that we will also forge new directions. It may be too much to hope or too ambitions to find a path forward that engages new generations, but here are a few thoughts that take a different tack.

Our World is HOT! Elizabeth Kolbert wrote in The New Yorker about the IPCC Report that was issued earlier this month. She lamented that this report comes after 30 years of inadequate attention to recognize and do enough about the problem of our changing planetary climate. The International Panel on Climate Change report required sign-off from most of the 162 member countries of the IPCC. This report, unlike its predecessors, is not optimistic about human intervention preventing regionally dangerous and economically devastating weather events that will cause tornadoes, cyclones, hurricanes and other storm events. Rising ocean levels are already wreaking havoc with coastal regions. Replacements for fossil fuels have been so slow in coming, the report says, that it is no longer possible to prevent more damage including losses of life and further impoverishment.

Minneapolis after George Floyd … is still struggling with the appropriate response for the Minneapolis Police Department. Proposals to “defund police” are too far beyond the pale but there is no decent clarity as to what should be done to reform a department that has relied too much on violence in dealing with situations that too easily get out of control. Defusing tensions … too many guns on the street and police can’t take chances guessing who may or may not have one. Black people do have a legitimate complaint about profiling, but their protests are too often lacking in details of the specific changes and action that need not be implemented. Solutions will require a joint effort. Perhaps a neighborhood-based initiative to begin removing guns from people displaying belligerent and irresponsible behaviors would be a step forward. But we are not about to see instant solutions that are satisfying. A world without police is not likely to be a world in which we want to live.

COVID-19 and the Delta variant. Hope you are all vaccinated and doing your part to testify on behalf of vaccination. The new Delta variant is causing a new round of concern and need for caution. This pandemic is still far from over, even though we have a little better chance of avoiding hospitalization and death from the virus. But we are all in this together and for a long stretch of time. Your influence is important to those you love and find your self involved with contacts where you are able to influence someone on getting vaccinated. A third booster shot will be in the offing soon.

XXX

Our collection of family information comes through personal communication and the conversations on Zoom every Wednesday evening. What follows are a few jottings. Our hope is that all newsletter readers will keep us posted about what is happening in your part of the universe.

New Rochelle News

Jonathan Coss has been providing a multitude of great materials for our website and Zoom calls for several months. Recently he sent along a series of email notes about his contact with a Lutheran Minister, Rev. Tim Anderson, from Altona, IL. The contact uncovered marriage records of the Johnson’s & Burma’s in the late 1800. J. P. Johnson and Johanna Dorothea Burman lived in Altona, were married there and had three children, Easter, Lizzie and Frank I. before moving to Lanyon where Amy, Obed and Nellie were born. This fills in important gaps for the John and Lizzie Lindgren side of our relationships.

Jonathan, also recently. sent along really great information about his grandfather, Jam,es A. Coss, who was a professor of chemistry at Morningside College and published a paper in 1920 with co-author William A, Noyes who was a preeminent chemist and chemistry department chair at the University of Illinois,

Jonathan has become our go-to person when we are seeking archival information about family members and history. Recently we asked Jonathan to look into the history of rural schools particularly in Iowa. Last week he provided an outstanding list of sources to help us better understand the rural schools in Iowa, such as those our ancestors attended. Two of our correspondents, Dick Lindgren and Ann Dunnigan, attended one-room schools. Let us know about other relatives who may have attended a rural one-room school.

Atlanta Angles

Anne Blitch, Ted Lindgren’s daughter, has helped her father join several of our Wednesday evening Zoom conversations. We’ve missed Ted and Anne’s presence over the past few weeks because Ted had an unfortunate accident and fell from his wheelchair suffering a broken hip. Fortunately the hip was surgically repaired and we all hope for Ted’s continued improvement. Anne is a corporate attorney and finds time to provide support for Ted, who is now well into his 80s.

Denver Dispatches

Jay Lindgren celebrated the marriage of his daughter in June.

He has limbered his big cruiser BMW Motorcycle and enjoyed a recent trip to see the great landslide that caused problems along I-70.

Jay surprised all of us on Zoom when he appeared clean shaven after all the months of the pandemic where he cultivated a monumental beard.

Jay has also been involved in development of Wikipedia pages. Two you may want to see are: Jon Lindgren and Obed Simon Johnson.

Heart of San Francisco

John William Johnson who prefers to be called JJ is the grandson of Obed Simon Johnson. He spent the first half of his life in Europe. He is a collector of historic and unusual guitars and told a story of being engaged in ballet in his youth while living in France. One of his brothers still lives in Switzerland where he teaches music. JJ’s daughter lives on a Mediterranean island off the coast of Spain. JJ looks forward to visiting her annually but travel has been curtailed by COVID-19 travel restrictions.

JJ has also been actively researching the life of his father, James Waldemar Johnson. He has compiled details that we hope to add to his father’s website page soon.

Des Moines Developments

Jon and Elaine were wonderful hosts for JJ when he traveled from San Francisco to meet family members at Dick’s 90^th Birthday in June. Dave and Bruce Lindgren joined JJ, Elaine and Jon for dinner and a great conversation the evening before the birthday. Jon and Elaine’s granddaughter is busy writing applications for medical school admission. Jon’s brother Dick has been providing encouragement and tips about medical schools with maybe a little bias for his alma matter, the University of Iowa Medical School.

Madison Memo

Dick continues to keep track of family connections inside and outside of the Frank and Amy lineage. Dick keeps a wealth of information about ancestors and ancestors lives, work and offspring. He and his children have made several trips to Sweden to find the birthplaces, memorials, homes and churches of both Johnson and Lindgren ancestors. In June, Dick’s daughter Laura read to several of us from a wonderful journal she kept about their first trip when she was 19yo. Every so often Dick puts together interesting document packets and pops them in postal mail to keep our records complete and safely disbursed. This is important because it provides redundancy of family artifacts, which we expect will provide security and safe-keeping.

Tulsa Talk

Pat Heath and husband Jim are very regular participants in our Zoom conversations. Steve Lindgren and Jim frequently keep us informed about their respective golf pursuits. A few week ago we received the sad news of the untimely death in a motorcycle accident of her nephew Scott Dickerson, son of Pat’s brother, Jim Dickerson. Scott’s daughter Sarah has participated in Zoom conversations and has also provided photographs which we hope to use soon in a web-page memorial for Scott.

From Dave Lindgren, Stillwater, MN (Obed and Verona Lindgren’s second of three sons)

Hello everyone, we are gradually doing more each month as COVID-19 conditions allow, but I keep close track of our local positive infections. I found the diversion of the Zoom calls and genealogy investigation this past year and the trip to Iowa in June to celebrate Cousin Dick’s birthday a real fun getaway. I want to send a special thank you to Dick’s family for arranging the party. Hopefully, another reunion will be possible sometime soon.

I’m keeping busy with my interest in cars, boats, motorcycles and repairs (fixing things that break) and of course the Zoom meetings. I think I got most of my mechanical aptitude and interest from Obed and Frank early on. I retired from teaching vocational education at the secondary high school level about 20 years ago and have had the time to pursue these hobbies. Now you know a little more about me and I hope to share more about my immediate family in future Newsletters.

I hope you will share some of the same, but I do realize available “time” is sometimes scarce. Hopefully, maybe some will find something to share. I’m sure anything provided will mean a lot to other interested family members reading the Newsletter.

The past year or so has been interesting to look back at Lanyon Lindgrens and other relatives. Trying to remember and somehow relate to all those relatives in and around Lanyon has been a challenge, but well worth the effort. Most of the names we have investigated I have heard over the years, but not really understood much about who they were and how they fit into the Frank and Amy’s generation.

Everyone needs to meet our second cousin, John William Johnson or JJ as he likes to be called. JJ is the grandson of Dr. Obed Simon Johnson. We have enjoyed visiting with JJ out in San Francisco on the Zoom calls. You will all like him, I guarantee it. It will be fascinating to learn more and more about his family and how we can relate to their life experiences past and present.

The one thing I’ve really thought a lot about recently is how tough and hardworking our relatives were in Lanyon. Farming isn’t an easy occupation. Bruce has worked on consolidating past knowledge about the family on the website. Many contributions from family sources have been consolidated to give, hopefully, future generations a look back. I have been particularly interested recently in the Altona, IL aspect of the migration to Lanyon. Mainly J.P. Johnson and Johanna Dorthea Burman (wed to J.P.—my great grandparents) as well as Johanna’s brother John Burman and another sister Helen Burman Lundeen.

At present, our website, is a retrieval and documentation project. The newsletter is the latest thought and effort to keep the ball rolling. It would be great to get the Gen 3 (my daughter) and Gen 4 (Bruce’s and Steve’s kids) involved in preserving the present as well. Today it is relatively easy to consolidate the digital emails or .doc contributions into a newsletter that will be a permanent achieve. We all know something about our cousins, but having an appropriate extended knowledge of contemporary Lindgren relatives would be very interesting to many of us. Aunt Irene seemed to know a lot about all of the “Grands” (Gen 2) and their kids, but now it is gradually disappearing and we need to preserve our family history as best we can. All of your thoughts are very important in this effort and I hope many are willing to contribute.