author
Amandus Johnson
1877–1974
A Swedish-American historian and museum founder, he devoted much of his life to uncovering the story of New Sweden and the early Swedish presence along the Delaware. His books helped bring a little-known chapter of colonial American history to a wider audience.
1 Audiobook
The Swedes on the Delaware, 1638-1664
by Amandus Johnson
About the author
Born in 1877 in Sweden and later active in the United States, Amandus Johnson became a leading historian of Swedish-American history. He is best known for his major study The Swedish Settlements on the Delaware, 1638–1664, a work that explored the New Sweden colony and its place in early American history.
Johnson also taught Scandinavian languages at the University of Pennsylvania and played an important role in preserving Swedish-American heritage beyond the page. He helped found organizations devoted to that history and became the founding curator of the American Swedish Historical Museum in Philadelphia.
His writing and public work were closely linked: he was not only researching the past, but also building institutions to keep it remembered. He died in 1974, leaving behind books and historical projects that remained important to the study of Swedish life in early America.