FAMOUS AMERICANS.

Dunstan Times, Issue 3380, 27 June 1927, Page 2

FAMOUS AMERICANS.

George Washington was of Swedish descent, not Danish, as is popularly supposed, and he knew it. An Englishman ? That was much later in his ancestry, and the way his forebears spelled their names proves they came from Sweden. Theodore Roosevelt was another famous American with -Swedish blood, but he did not know it. A year after his death it was ascertained that one of his mother’s ancestors was a member of the Swedish colony of Delaware. These facts have been unearthed by Dr Amandus Johnson, former professor of history at the University of Pennsylvania and president of the American Sons and Daughters of Sweden, and telegraphed to the New York “World” by its Chicago correspondent. His researches are being carried on through a, fund of £300,000 set up to establish the part Sweden has played in the building of America. Dr Johnson now announces that Washington’s ancestor’s undoubtedly went to England front* Skane, the- home province of the Crown Prince of Sweden. All the invaders were called Danes at that time by the inhabitants of England, although they were Scandinavians and Germans of all kinds. The first President, Dr Johnson declares, himself referred to his Swedish ancestry, turd was a member of the Scandinavian Society of Philadelphia. The professor also advances the theory that Mendelian students of heredity may claim the presence of Swedith chromosomes in Rooseveilt’s blood, although unknown to him, accounts for his interest in Scandinavian literature and for his hunting proclivities.