One of my immigrant ancestors, my great-great grandfather, Rasmus Pedersen, was born on May 22, 1852, in Frejlev, a tiny village on the island of Lolland, Denmark. His father, Peder Olsen, was a blacksmith. Rasmus and his brothers were also trained to be blacksmiths. Starting with brother Hans in 1879, the entire family migrated to the United States by 1882, most of them settling near Waupaca, Wisconsin.
Rasmus married Karen Pedersen in April 1880 and they arrived in Racine, Wisconsin in time to be recorded in the 1880 US Census for that place. While living in Racine from 1880 to 1883, Rasmus worked as a blacksmith and the couple welcomed two daughters – Gertrude and Marie. Shortly after Marie's birth, the couple joined many other Danish immigrants, settling in Howard County, Nebraska. They helped establish the new village of Nysted, not far from the town of Dannebrog.
It was about this time that Rasmus adopted the more American-sounding name of Robert Petersen. He is recorded in the 1885 state census of Nebraska under that name, and he used it for the rest of his life.
The reason for this post is that I recently learned of another family member – also a descendant of my Danish blacksmith ancestor – who made the same name choice.
Robert and Karen's daughter, Marie, married C.A. Christensen in 1904. The eldest of their nine children was born in 1906 and named Oswald. Official documents record his name as Oswald Robert Christensen. However, at a recent family reunion, a member of his immediate family informed me that he was named Oswald Rasmus by his parents, and that he also chose to use Robert instead. We don't really know when or why he decided to make the change. Perhaps it was around the time of World War One, when many immigrants and children of immigrants preferred not to have "foreign" names. That is speculation on my part, however. "Uncle Os" was the eldest brother of my maternal grandfather, Clifford "Kip" Christensen.
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