In search of our Finnish roots

 Lennart Elg, October 2020

The first known ancestor of our Elg family was a Finnish settler who arrived in what is now the village of Säfsnäs in the early 17th Century - Pål Larsson Turpoinen. Pål was one of the first to settle in the area, and many Swedes with roots here count Pål among their ancestors. For many years, the main source for this was oral history, recorded by Finnish linguist Carl Axel Gottlund in the early 19th century. The community of Finnish settlers had a strong tradition of oral history, but the interviews were conducted 200 years after they arrived.

Finnish migrants

Life in the woods

When Pål and other Finnish-born settlers arrived in the area they were neither "illegal" nor "immigrants". Finland was part of Sweden since the 13th century, and would remain so for another two centuries, until we lost Finland in a war against Russia in 1809. And the King of Sweden provided tax incentives for settlers, not only to develop the economy, but also so he would get early warning if Danish troops crossed the border to march on Stockholm. The area is close to Norway, which was then controlled by our traditional arch-enemy, the Danes.

The Finnish settlers aquired somewhat of an outlaw reputation, since they preferred to settle deep in the forests, far from Swedish homesteaders. Pål first shows up in a police investigation from 1622, suspected of hunting moose, which all belonged to the Crown.. Pål was a suspect in this investigation, but - as usual - rumour preceded the sheriff and he found no hard evidence. Pål was not convicted, though remains of a slaughtered moose had been found close to his cabin.

In later documents, Pål is referred to as sheriff for the Finnish community (finnelänsman). This indicates that he had become a man of substance in his community, and also that he spoke Swedish in addition to his Finnish mother tongue, and could communicate with Swedish authorities.

Slash and burn farming

These Finnish homesteaders practised a highly efficient form of slash-and-burn farming which made it possible for them to subsist in remote forest areas, far from Swedish farmers. They would cut down an area of forest and burn the vegetation. The ashes would provide rich nutrients for the soil for a couple of years. However, once these were depleted they would have to clearcut a new area.

Iron mills

The situation would change as an emerging, but primitive, iron industry was growing in the beginning of the 17th century. Smelting was powered by charcoal, and charcoal was also required to reduce the iron oxide to pig iron. The Forest Finns with their demanding slash-and-burn agriculture were suddenly considered an economic threat by increasing the cost of charcoal as they burned off now valuable timber. The burning of the forests was officially forbidden in 1647 and the Finns were obliged to support the iron factories by providing charcoal at an artificially low price.

  

Traditional charcoal pile.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charcoal_burner

An iron mill was founded ca 1720 at Gravendal, around 10 miles southeast of Säfsnäs. Here our ancestors found work in the blacksmith shop, and blacksmithing became a family tradition for more than 200 years... The name Elg was adopted by Petter Jansson around 1770, when he became a master blacksmith, and this trade was taught from father to son for at least four generations. Petter was a 3rd great-grandson of Pål Larsson Turpoinen, and at least the fourth generation to be born at Elgsjöhöjden (the Hill above Moose Lake – elg is Swedish for moose). Most of us are descended from Petter´s son Lars Elg (1789-18539, who became a master blacksmith at Gravendal, a few miles south of Älgsjöhöjden.

 

18th century blacksmith shop, with a small waterpowered drop hammer

By the end of the 18th century the very existence of the Forest Finns was forgotten and they were considered to have assimilated into the Swedish population. But they were not, as was clearly shown by Finnish linguist Carl Axel Gottlund.

Gottlund made two trips to the Forest Finns, the first in 1817 to Dalarna and the second, a longer one in 1820--21 to Värmland. He collected folklore and other ethnographic data as well as geneaological information. The last mentioned was partly because he wanted to improve the social circumstances of the Finns and to prevent the Sweden from taking their land ownings. It has been estimated that in the beginning of the 19th century there were about 40.000 Finns, still using Finnish as their mother tongue, in central Scandinavia, of which about 14.000 in Värmland.

 

Carl Axel Gottlund

DNA research

Recently, genealogists have come to suspect that Pål is identical to a man of that name who grew up in a small village called Pihtipudas in central Finland, and who disappears from Finnish records in 1603.

One clue has been that the name – now spelled Turpeinen - still lives on in Pihtipudas. Now, DNA testing done by my distant relative Per-Göran Jansson has shown that both Per-Göran and another Swedish descendant of Pål Larsson Turpeinen shares genes with a member of the Pihtipudas Turpeinens, going back to around 1600. So it appears that the origins of Pål Larsson Turpoinen/Turpeinen have been confirmed. And since he disappears from Pihtipudas in 1603, his birth if probably closer to 1580. I have parish records which show that Per-Göran and I have a common ancestor in this line as far back as 1710.

At present, we do not yet know for sure whether it was Pål Larsson Turpeinen or his father who left Pihtipudas. We also know nothing about his life before the first reliable information about his existence in the Säfsen area appears in 1622.

You can find the location of Pihtipudas here:

https://www.google.com/maps/place/Pihtipudas,+Finland/ 

The Elgs are descended from Pål´s son Jan/Johan. In an ”it´s a small world” moment, Ritva has found that, according to MyHeritage, she is related by marriage to Jan´s brother Erik Pålsson Turpoinen..

Pihtipudas

Today, Pihtipudas is a small town of around 4100 inhabitants. On a trip to Finland in 2018, we stopped in Pihtipudas, and met our distant cousin Juha Turpeinen, who we had found through the DNA research of Per-Göran Jansson. Juha showed us remains of the early settlements. Close to the church is a museum dedicated to the early settlers, and also a statue dedicated to the slash-and-burn farmers.

Juha Turpeinen and Lennart, studying our joint ancestors

History of Pihtipudas

Before abt 1550, the area where Pihtipudas lies today was unpopulated, used for hunting and fishing. Around 1550, land for slash-and-burn farming was running out, and the Swedish kings encouraged cultavation of new land in order to increase tax revenue.Pihtipudas started to develop as a center for the new settlers. One of the first settlers was Tapani Turpeinen. Tapani founded a large family in the area, a 1638 survey lists five farms owned by Turpeinens.

Still, the farming methods used continously required new land, and migration continued, both north, and west across the Baltic sea, to Sweden. We do not know whether it was Pål Larsson Turpoinen or his father Lars Pålsson Turpoinen who migrated, or what triggered the migration across the Baltic in this case: It may have been social unrest at the time, it may have been the risk of being conscripted to the army, it may have been a son knowing he was not in line to enherit the family farm. Also, the king of Sweden offered tax incentives for Finns who settled in the west forest regions of Sweden. This was partly for economic development, but also to provide early warning against our traditional enemy, the perfidious Danes, who ruled Norway at the time.

Monument to the slash-and-burn farmers, Pihtipudas, Finland

Trip to Värmland

 

Map of central Sweden

In the autumn of 2020, we made a trip to the northwestern part of Värmland county. There were once Finnish settlements on both sides of the Norwegian border. On the Norwegian side, there is actually a farm, Turbeinstorpet, named after a descendant of Pål Larsson Turpeinen who was the first settler there. Värmland has the best collection of preserved old buildings and artefacts. One of the museums also had a café where we could try the forest Finns staple food, ”hand porrige”.

Hand porridge

”Hand porridge” was a staple food of the forest Finns, nourishing and easy to take along. The end result is dry lumps which can be picked up by hand with no need for fancy cutlery. It is made with a flour ground from toasted oats.

Lingonberries are a Swedish specialty, they resemble cranberries but have a lot more flavor.

Serves 4

• 4 cups of water
• 1 tsp salt
• 1 lb of toasted oat flour
• Pork loin or bacon
• Lingonberries

1. Fry the pork or bacon, and set aside. Leave the fat in the pan and keep it warm.
2. Bring the water to a boil with salt, and turn off the heat.
3. Sprinkle the flour on top of the water, use a ladle to push it into the water but do not stir.
4. Put the lid on for 10 minutes.
5. Stir gently. The aim is to get a dry and lumpy porridge, so you can pick up lumps and eat with your fingers.
6. Drizzle pork/bacon fat over the porridge, serve with bacon and lingonberries.

 Smoke cabins

In addition to their proficiency at slash-and-burn farming, the forest Finns brought their own style of buildings, known as ”smoke cabins”.  Simple cross timbered log cabins, the earliest examples were heated with an open fireplace, but these was soon replaced with massive stone ovens, which could store heat overnight.

  

Traditional smoke cabin.

The window is a later addition. Originally, there were only openings to let light and air in, which could be closed with wooden shutters.

Instead of a chimney, which would let out not just the smoke but also most of the heat from the oven, the hot smoke was let out into the room, to collect under an insulated ceiling supported by two strong ridge poles. From there the hot smoke radiated heat across the whole room. A hatch in the ceiling regulated the escape of hot smoke, and a set of hatches in the walls regulated the inflow of fresh air.

When properly adjusted, this system was both more efficient and provided more comfort than the traditional fireplace connected to a chimney. This type of building were used for centuries, the last permanently occupied smoke cabin was abandoned in the 1950´s.

Smaller versions of these buildings, without the top smoke vent, were used and are still popular as ”smoke saunas”.

 

 

 

Western justice

 The first Elgs to emigrate were the family of Christina Elg and Jan Bork. In the autumn of 1868, son Gustaf Edvin set off for Omaha, Nebraska. He was 19 at the time. Half a year later, his parents follow, along with daughters Emma Fredrika and Augusta Sofia Bork.

Jan Bork dies only half a year after his arrival, and is buried on the family farm in Sanders County, Nebraska. Christina and her daughters later move to Laramie, Wyoming, where Emma Fredrika’s husband John Lindstrom has found work as a tie hacker for the Union Pacific Railroad.

Augusta Sofia marries a Charles Connors. Apparently the marriage is not happy, and Augusta Sofia leaves Connors for another man, with dramatic consequenses, as told in this article from the Sept. 1 1892 issue of the Laramie Boomerang.

Apparently, Mr Cowper was not seriously affected by this treatment, as the couple stayed of in Laramie, and the family is still there.

Carl-Erik Elg 1913 - 1993

Carl-Erik and mother Elsa, abt 1925

My grandfather Karl August Elg and grandmother Elsa Karlsson were both from Bergslagen, the old industrial heartland in central Sweden. They met, however, in Gothenburg, where their only son Carl-Erik was born in 1913. By 1916 the family moves to Ludvika. Here my grandfather came to work for more than 40 years as a toolmaker in a mechanical workshop owned by his older brother Axel.

As my father grew up, he developed an early interest in both photography and amateur radio.

Carl-Erik with homebuilt transmitter, 1939.

Another early interest in international affairs. As a young man he learned the synthetic "world language" Esperanto, and had pen pals around the world who shared his interest. Soon amateur radio came to fill the same need. Here he was one of the early pioneers: His license to operate a transmitter was formally approved by the government in session, and was signed by the King.

After mandatory basic army training, he studied industrial management at a Technical College. Photos from that time show serious young men in coat and tie, ready to take on the burden of developing Swedish industry. In a carnival procession from 1938, the students can still joke about Hitler, but reality would soon catch up with them.

Serious students

When the second world war broke out, all radio amateurs had to hand in their transmitters to the government, and Carl-Erik was soon called up for military service. When the Soviet Union attacked Finland in 1939 his unit was sent to the far north of Sweden, where they prepared to defend the Swedish border if Soviet troops broke through the Finnish lines. In the spring of 1940 his unit was sent home to demobilize, but on April 9, 1940, Hitler attacked and soon occupied Norway. So instead of going back to civilian life, his unit was sent to the Norwegian border, as the first line of defense if the Germans decided to attack Sweden.

Across the border, they could see German occupation troops. All contact with the other side was of course strictly prohibited, but both sides were eager for news about the progress of the war. Eventually, a set of rituals developed where men from both sides laid down their arms and met in no-mans-land to exchange news and cigarettes.

Meeting in no mans land. Carl Erik far right.

Mobilization in Sweden created a large need for radio operators. Many radio amateurs were transferred to the signal corps, and after a winter on the Norwegian border, my father came to spend the rest of his active duty at his regiment's headquarter, manning the base station there. While still only a vice corporal he commanded a group of young and lively WACs. When they were not occupied with their own traffic, they tried to follow both allied and German transmissions, to get news of the war. When the allied troups landed in Normandy on D-Day, they listened to Eisenhower adressing the troops, hours before the news was announced by Swedish broadcasting. Carl-Erik's experiences led to a life-long interest in the history of WW II. His last trip abroad was to the invation beaches in Normandy.

Carl-Erik was also a pioneer in color photography. I have found color slides going back to 1941 (the first color slide film was sold in the US by Kodak in 1935). At that time color slides was the only medium for color photography. When color prints appeared on the market, he was not satisfied to pick up a set of prints at the camera store. He started experimenting with making his own enlargements - a complex chemistry process with many steps involved. As usual, he built his own equipment to control time and temperature, and exchanged long letters with the chemistry suppliers when he found ellors in their instructions.

Engaged, 1944

During 1944, a certain young lady begins to appears frequently in his photos, and in 1946, Carl-Erik marries Inga Britta Svangren. Next year Lennart is born, and when daughter Elisabet arrives in 1949, the family is complete. They have outgrown their first apartment, and buy a house where Lennart and Elisabet grow up. Here Carl-Erik can develop his love for gardening, and fill the rooftop with strange antennas..

After graduating in 1938, Carl-Erik spent his whole career with ASEA (now ABB) in Ludvika. Initially he worked as a production engineer, helping to introduce time/motion studies (MTM) at ASEA. Later he trained the next generation of production engineers. His lauguage proficiency meant that he was often asked to host foreign visitors to ASEA. Some of these became life-long friends.

Amateur radio was also instrumental in giving the family friends acroos the globe. Carl-Erik was more interested in radio as a way of making new contacts before the internet, than in the technical challenges. We hosted visiting amateurs, and made a number of holiday trips abroad to meet friends he had metcacross the radio, before the charter industry had made international travel commonplace.

His Interest i photography was life-long. Carl-Erik documented their many trip in both photo albums, and edited 8 mm movies and later video films. He passed away in 1993 of a massive coronary bleed, as he was stepping out of the camera store where he had picked up another roll of processed film.

-oOo-

Now that I am retired myself, I am struck by the similarities between our lives:

My father worked at ASEA in different capacities for most of his career, I came to work in basically the same government organization from 1980 until I retired in 2012. Carl-Erik became a pillar in his speciality, but had no interest in seeking a management position. I decided early on never to take a management job, but aspired to become a "guru" in my field instead (and judging from the speeches when I retired I might have succeeded in the end..).

My feeble attempt at rebellion involved majoring in psychology instead of engineering, but I came to work my whole live with the interaction between economics and technology, the same specialty my father had pursued in his engineering degree. We even discovered mutual contacts from our work.

Carl-Erik bought my first camera when I was ten, and taught me to take photos as well as making prints in the darkroom. He started the family history project which I have carried on for more than 30 years.

Carl-Erik made new friends abroad through amateur radio, I have made the same through the internet, pursuing my interests in both genealogy and railroad history. Carl-Erik passed away in 1993, the same year the World Wide Web was launched. He bought an early home computer/word processor which he used to keep up correspondence across the world, but he just missed out on the computer as a networked communications device. I am sure he would have loved to immerse himself in both the internet and digital photography.

The mystery of Alexander Elge – finally solved!

When we first visited the Johnson ranch, back in 2007, Margaret gave me a copy of her history of the Johnson ranch. According to this, the ranch was first settled by Alexander Elg and his wife Sophia, in 1879, which is supported by old land records. According to Margaret´s history, brother Jacob – Everett´s grandfather – takes over the ranch in 1888, after Alexander´s death. There is no record of his death, or of what becomes of his wife Sophia.

Jacob was born in 1852 in Liljendal, Sweden, a son of blacksmith Johan Elg  and his first wife, Kajsa Håkansdotter. Kajsa dies when Jacob is only one year old, and Johan later marries Anna Olsdotter. In total, 14 children are born in these marriages, of which 10 boys and 2 daughters survive. Most of them will later emigrate.

Back in Sweden I start to search for Alexander, but he is nowhere to be found in the parish records, and there are no gaps in the record where he could have slipped through. However, it is not unheard of for emigrants to change their names.

I have two suspects, all other sons are accounted for in Swedish parish records.

Erik Johan Elg, b. 1844, cannot be found in Swedish records. I find a Johan Erik Elg, b. 1844, who emigrates with his wife Kristina to Chicago in 1869, from a place near Liljendal. I have no direct evidence that this is our Erik Johan Elg.

Per August Elg, b. 1850, emigrates in 1868, no destination noted.

Returns from the dead..

Here the story could have ended, but a couple of years later I get in touch with another branch of the family, in Montana. They are descendants of two brothers and a sister from Johan Elg´s second marriage, who emigrate to Montana to dig for gold.

It takes a while to follow their emigration, as they emigrate from Oslo, and do not appear in Swedish emigration records. But finally I find the passenger list from their arrival in New York, March 19, 1887, on the s/s Britannic. And now it gets interesting! The list shows:

* Alexander Elge, 26, US citizen

* Marie Elge, 18, spinster

* Edward Elge, 20, laborer

* Otto Elge, 24, farmer

* Beata Elge, 24, wife

* Ernfrid Elge, 3, son

Alexander is listed with the rest of the family. Note also that all have changed the spelling of the family name, the ”-e” makes it easier to pronounce for English speakers.

It seems too much of a coincidence that two mysterious Alexanders should appear in the same family. More likely it was Alexander´s wife sophia who passed away in Laramie, and Alexander decided to make a fresh start.

Debra Jacobs found a marriage records which shows that Alexander August Elge from Sweden marries Eva June Smith in 1895, in San Bernadino. This seems to indicate that Alexander is Per August Elg. There is a problem in that the passenger list from 1887 lists his age as 26, which would place his birth around 1860, rather than 1850, a bit young to have married and started the Laramie ranch by 1877. On the other hand, the Alexander Elg who marries in San Bernadino in 1895 is 45 years old, which matches Per August's birth year of 1850. And, unlike the arrival record in New York, the Norwegian departure record lists his age as 36, matching Per August’s birth year.

On the wrong track?

By now I was feeling rather confident, when a register search turns up a person who was actually named August Alexander Elg, born in the same province in 1853, and also a blacksmith like ”my” Elgs. Not only that, the family emigrated in 1882. Have I been barking up the wrong tree all along? A search of the parish records showed that this man was from another part of Värmland province. And US census records show that after emigration the family settled in Chicago, where he spent the rest of his life with his Swedish wife, without any gold-mining adventures.

 Final confirmation

Final confirmation of my original story arrives, when I find a digitized newpaper story in the collection of the Swedish National Library. This story was published in several Swedish newspapers in March 1887:

The – not – lost son. Under this heading, one of our correspondents reports:

A blacksmith at Liljendal named Elg had 14 children, of which 10 sons and 2 daughters survive. 18 years ago, the then 18 year old son A. emigrated to America, where he has predominantly occupied himselm searching for gold, first in California with mixed success, but later in the Rocky Mountains in Montana, where in company with an English prospector he discovered a rich gold vein; also he is part owner with five others in a silver mine in the Rocky Mountains.

On October 5th last year, he embarked on the long and expensive journey back to Sweden, to provide for his parents in their old age, and arrived there in good health on November 9th. There is no mistaking the joy on his arrival, his father had assumed he was dead as they had not heard from him for seven years. 

However, now the golden boy opened his purse and purchased all kind on necessities for the household. Later he deposited a substantial amount with his father to meet future needs.

On March 1, he started the long journey back to his mines, but this time in the company of an 18 year old sister and two brothers, one of them accompanied by his family.

The 1890 census shows Alex Johnson listed as a boarder with Per August/Alexander´s half sister Maria Sophia Elge and her husband Nels Nelson, who ran a boarding house for miners in Helena Montana.

Per August ”Alexander” Elge passed away on April 3, 1896, and is buried in Redland, California, just outside San Bernadino, where he married Eva June Smith only a year before

Bear encounter

Another chapter in the saga of Per/Alexander August Elge. From Los Angeles Times, Saturday June 1892. Thanks to Debra Elge Jacobs for finding this! 

Origins

The first known ancestor of our Elg famiy was a Finnish settler who arrived in what is now the village of Säfsnäs in the early 17th Century - Pål Larsson Turpoinen(see http://web.telia.com/~u85435856/history/finnish.html ). Many Swedes with roots in the area can count Pål among their ancestors.

For some years, genealogists have suspected that Pål is identical to a man who grew up in a small village called Pihtipudas in central Finland, and who disappears from Finnish records in 1603.

One clue has been that the name - spelled Turpeinen - still lives on in Pihtipudas. Now, DNA testing has shown that a Swedish descendant of Pål Larsson Turpeinen shares genes with a member of the Pihtipudas Turpeinens, going back to around 1600. So it appears that the origins of Pål Larsson Turpoinen/Turpeinen have been confirmed. And since he disappears from Pihtipudas in 1603, his birth if probably closer to 1580.

When Pål and other Finnish-born settlers arrived in the area they were neither "illegal" nor "immigrants". Finland was part of Sweden since the 13th century, and would remain so for another two centuries, until we lost Finland in a war against Russia in 1809. And the settlers had been invited by the Swedish king, to develop unsettled areas.

You can find the location of Pihtipudas here: https://www.google.com/maps/place/Pihtipudas,+Finland/

Frances C Elge - pioneer Montana Lawyer

Frances Caroline Elge (1906 - 1991) was the daughter of August Elg and Judith Ericsson (see http://elgfamily.blogspot.se/2009/11/children-of-johan-elg-and-mysterious.html ). The following text is posted with permission from the editor of The Billings Gazette. Illustrations have been added by me. I will have more information about Frances´ family in a later post.

For 50 years, she's fought for women

By ROGER CLAWSON

Of The Gazette Staff

Monday, Nov. 3, 1980 - The Billings Gazette

When the beautiful young daughter of a Swedish immigrant entered the rough and tumble of Capital City politics, the opposition screamed "Rape!”

Frances C. Elge's political career has spanned a half century — from her own campaign wars in Lewis and Clark County, her service as secretary-treasurer for the first congresswoman, to her on-going fight for the Equal Rights Amendment.

"Born a feminist," she will be back in Helena if the 1981 Legislature attempts to rescind its ratification of the ERA.

And she will be right at home.

It was in Helena in 1932 when she entered politics.

With the ink still fresh on her license to practice law, she ran for public administrator. Then, as now, it was a minor office, but "Fran" Elge made national headlines when her probate of an old man's estate uncovered a hoard of moldy bills in a tarpaper shack.

"An old man died in the county hospital and $750 in war bonds were found under his mattress," she recalled.

" I went to his home, a tarpaper shack, and a neighbor warned me not to go inside. She said I would find the place crawling with vermin."

Public Administrator Elge padlocked the door, waited for a killing frost and then entered to find $5,000 in an old bread wrapper.

The story made the national news wires and Fran was flooded with letters from heirs and pretenders from across the nation.

She also shared the national limelight as a defense counsel in the famous Baldwin Radio Mail Fraud case. The case involved a stock promotion, the inventor of the Baldwin headset, and a number of salesmen.

Also on the defense team was Sam Ford, a former state Supreme Court Justice and a future Montana governor.

The young lawyer was in good company when she lost after the case went all way to the U.S. Supreme Court.

Nor was it a disgrace to lose to the man acting as prosecutor: Wellington Duncan Rankin, the state's most noted lawyer, largest individual landowner and perhaps Montana's richest man.

”W.D.” as he was known was young Elge's friend and mentor. His sister, former Congresswoman Jeanette Rankin would become an Elge inspiration and cause.

It was on "W.D's" urging that Fran ran for the county attorney's post in Lewis and Clark County.

That's when the opposition screamed, ”Rape!”

It was clearly a sexist campaign tactic. In those days women were not allowed to sit on Montana juries. "Women were not supposed to be exposed to the lurid testimony of the courtroom," Fran explained.

Her opponent was Undersheriff Walter Nylan, who had been admitted to the bar but had let his license lapse 10 years earlier.

Nylan backers asked, "Do you want to put a woman in the position of prosecuting rapists?"

Before the election, the number of statutory rape cases on the docket began to accumulate, reaching an even dozen before the election.

 Fran countered with a newspaper ad which included the endorsement of a number of the state's most respected lawyers.

"It was plain, I was better qualified," she said. The voters in 1934 agreed.

She clearly was the best looking prosecutor in Montana.

 In two years, she only lost one case.

You guessed it. The defense attorney was the man who lent her lawbooks to begin her career - W.D. Rankin.

"It was a murder case," she recalled. "There had been a highway accident and a woman shot the man who caused it."

At the coronor's inquest, the sheriff reported she had said:

"I shot him and I hope I killed him."

It appeared to be a solid case, but between arrest and trial a few things happened.

First, the sheriff became smitten by his prisoner. The prisoner hired W.D. Rankin and Rankin evolved a couple of new angles.

The sheriff - now a prisoner of love - testified, "She might have said, 'I shot him and I hope I didn't kill him."

In the closing arguments, W.D. told the jury his client was pregnant. "You wouldn't want the baby to be born in prison," he said.

They didn't.

The woman was acquitted.

She never had a baby.

And the sheriff insisted he wasn't the fatter.

But prosecutor Elge had a few angles of her own.

When Kid Jackson, a former boxing champion, sauntered into the "Bucket of Blood" and shot owner Johnny Philips, Fran scrambled to find witnesses.

She found Alice Shahaha, a Yakima Indian, who enterprized as a roller of sheepherders and "lady of easy access," in the mental hospital at Warm Springs.

Alice had been sent there by Billings Police on a trumped-up-charge of drug use, Fran recalled.

The prosecutor knew Alice was straight because months earlier Ms. Shahaha and one of her "sisters of the night" had come to Fran's office to ask for a jail term to kick their narcotics habits. Fran obliged with 30 days for vagrancy and watched the pair gain weight as their earnings began to go for food instead of into their pusher's pocket.

Alice was given the full treatment at a beauty salon before taking the stand. She made an excellent witness.

A second prostitute took the stand wearing fine white gloves. She, too, gave credible testimony. Fran was grateful - grateful that the gloves she had given the witness hid the needle tracks on her hands.

Justice prevailed and Kid Jackson was convicted.

Justice took various forms during her tenure as prosecutor.

When a 70-year-old woman was brought in on a shoplifting charge, the Sheriff asked, "What are you going to do with her?"

Fran replied, "I'm going to give her a talking-to and turn her loose."

The sheriff, who profited from feeding prisoners, left muttering, "She ought to be taught a lesson."

Fran said, "If she hasn't learned by now, she isn't going to."

Juveniles were lectured on Saturdays and their parents made to pay for their vandalism. "I never sent a kid to reform school," she recalled.

In 1939, Fran was lobbying the state Legislature for the passage of the Women's Jury Service Act.

As county attorney, she had faced only all-male juries. ("Of course," she said, "that inurred to my benefit.")

In the course of the battle, she enlisted the aid of FDR's Butte campaign manager, a woman with political savvy and clout who lined up a labor-farmers union coalition in support of the bill.

After the bill had passed and women became peers sitting in judgment, Fran was in the presence of two judges when one turned to the other and said, "Say, Judge Downey at Butte has ladies on his jury.

"And do you know, they are showing 'remarkable judgment."

Fran Elge, considered a lawyer, not a woman, by her collegues, never batted an eye.

In 1940, she became Jeanette Rankin's campaign secretary-treasurer.

Rep. Rankin was the first women to be elected in 1916 to the U.S. House of Representatives. She lost her bid for reelection when she was one of only a few to vote against America's entry into World War I.

The war machines were loose again in Europe when Miss Rankin took the the campaign trail in 1940.

Fran served as ghost writer for pro-Rankin articles that appeared in the Montana Catholic Register. Rankin's opponent was Catholic but in trouble with his constituents over a bad debt at Carroll College.

"We carried the Catholic vote," Fran recalled, "although Jeanette was probably not Catholic."

Congresswoman Rankin returned to Washington. The Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor and she stood alone opposing the U.S.'s entry into World War II. That vote cost her a career.

Fran left Montana for Washington as Jeanette's administrative assistant and later held "a number of very good jobs," including a post on the Admiralty Claims and Litigation staff of the Maritime Administration.

In the nation's capital she met the same sexual discrimination she had first encountered in her race for county attorney.

 

She used "political connections" to fight discrimination and resented having to do so. "Being better qualified than the men I served with should have been enough."

 

In 1954, she returned to Montana and served as an administrative law judge for the Department of the Interior in Billings until her retirement in 1970.

 

She was back in Helena in 1971, lobbying for feminist legislation.

On the list was the repeal of a law that made it illegal for women to work more than 8 hours a day - a law that gave employers a handy excuse not to hire women.

A second law which banned discrimination on the basis of race, color or creed was amended to bar discrimination on the basis of sex as well.

But a third piece of legislation in the package, Fran avoided.

Feminists were being smeared as "a league of baby killers" and Fran refused to dilute her influence by taking a stand on an abortion bill.

A charter member of the Montana Council for the Equal Rights Amendment Ratification, she has testified at every legislative hearing considering adoption or rescission of the ERA.

"And I will continue to testify at every hearing," she vowed.

Anyone attempting to debate the ERA with Fran will find her dipping into her purse for a card that carries the full text of the amendment in three paragraphs.

"That's what it says. And that's all it says," she will tell them.