Find a Swede

Swedish Genealogy

Swedish Ancestry 101

Resource Toolkit to Kickstart Your Swedish Family History Research


Hej!

I'm Annika, the professional Swedish genealogist behind Find a Swede. A born and raised Swede living in Gothenburg, Sweden. There’s a good chance this is where your ancestor stepped on a ship to start a new life.

Find a Swede began with a DNA test, which let me see firsthand the struggles my distant cousins had connecting with their Swedish roots. I founded Find a Swede to bridge this gap and to make our shared Swedish heritage accessible to descendants of Swedes around the world.

About Annika

Annika, Swedish Genealogist

Do It Yourself

The Swedish Genealogy Glossary

The Swedish Genealogy Glossary is based on my cheat sheets for translating Swedish genealogy records and documents. You can get it for $29.

Shortcut to Sweden

Shortcut to Sweden is soon to be re-released as a membership with lessons, Q&As, translations, and resources.

Shortcut to Sweden re-opens around 16 October.

Done with You

Fika with Annika

Fika with Annika is a day to get your questions answered. We'll chat online to uncover your family history. You get access to my expertise for a fraction of the cost of hiring me to do the research for you. The price is $129.

Done for You

Swedish to English translations for genealogy

Swedish to English translations for genealogy is our service for translating your documents and records. Starts at 700 SEK.

Swedish Genealogy Research

Swedish Genealogy Research is where you can dive deep into your ancestor's life, from birth to migration. With our packages, your report includes records with translations, maps, photos and more. Starts at 12,000 SEK.

Shortcut to Sweden

Make Sense of Your Swedish Family History

Since February 2022, I've hosted Shortcut to Sweden, a newsletter focused on the Swedish records, history and culture that make sense of your family history.

Introducing the Shortcut to Sweden Membership

Shortcut to Sweden is currently being transitioned into a membership with more resources and interactive elements. The leading principle is to provide the most relevant information in the easiest way possible. Signups are closed while we add the new features.

What's Included

The Genealogy Chronicles is a monthly three minute read on Swedish records, language, culture, history, and geography. It's sent to your email and posted in the course portal that currently holds over 40 lessons.
The Q&A is your monthly opportunity to get answers to your questions on Swedish family history, including brief translations. It's delivered to your inbox and added to the course portal.
The Resource Library is a searchable database of the resources I use that is updated every other month.
The Translation Library is a searchable database of translations from my cheat sheets and is updated bimonthly.

The Shortcut to Sweden membership will be available for $11/month for a limited time. The doors open around 16 October 2023.

Client Reviews

Shortcut to Sweden

Shortcut to Sweden has provided the insights into Swedish culture, language and history that I totally lacked but that are essential to understanding the genealogical information you uncover when researching Swedish ancestors.

Annika's knowledge of available online resources also opened up a whole new world of research opportunities that brought me closer to my research subjects.

Totally worth the price in savings of time and filling in knowledge gaps. Thank you!!

Greg Holt

Translations for Genealogy

During the last year I have been cleaning out my parents' home and found many documents/photos that belonged to both sets of my grandparents. My father's parents immigrated from Höganäs, Sweden in the late 1800s and early 1900s.

I found a document belonging to Papa, my grandfather. the only words I could translate was his name, church, army and king. I knew you were the one person to translate this document and shed some light on Papa's history and, you did.

As you said, the document was from the King of Sweden allowing Papa to end his military service and was given permission to leave the country for North America. There was a touching statement within the document from Papa's pastor stating that he was a good man. No one in my family ever knew that Papa served in the Army or what he had to do to come to America.

Annika, I can't thank you enough for giving me such a wonderful story about my beloved Papa. Several years ago, I traveled to Hoganas and saw the town where Papa grew up and, was fortunate to meet my third cousins. I hope I can return again to learn more about my Swedish family. If I have additional questions that need answering re: Swedish genealogy I will definitely seek out your expertise.

Jan Lindblad MacQueston

Swedish Genealogy Research

We found Annika online and read her website and newsletters before hiring her. Overall we had a wonderful experience with Annika on our recent genealogy project. We had gone as far back in our family tree as my amateur skills would allow as we do not speak or read Swedish.

We wanted to know more about our ancestor who had emigrated from Sweden to the US in 1887. Annika was a great communicator as the project progressed and the final report was well researched and organized.

We were thrilled to get so much information about our ancestor and his life (family, work, travels, etc.). It was shared in a way that we could in turn download and print and/or share with others in the family which we appreciated! Can't thank her enough for working with us on this valuable project! She even kindly sent us a postcard she'd found which represented the area our ancestor came from after our project concluded.

We look forward to working with Annika on other projects as we explore our Swedish lineage. I recommend her to anyone needing professional assistance to discover their Swedish roots.

K. Grahn

From the Blog

Midsummer in Sweden

The Swedish midsummer has medieval roots Maybe you’ve heard of the Swedish celebration of Midsummer, or midsommar as we call it. Swedes often joke about it being our unofficial national day. Midsummer celebrations have an old history in Sweden. It was first documented in the year 1555. At the time, Swedes celebrated Midsummer by dancing […]

Gothenburg

The main emigration port One day over a century ago, your ancestor stepped on a ship to leave Sweden. Hopefully it was a clear day with brisk winds. Most likely it happened in Gothenburg on the Swedish west coast. About 80% of Swedish emigrants, or 1 million people, left the country from the ports in […]

Swedish immigrant Alma 1869-1932

Alma spent most of her adult life in Manchester, New Hampshire. She died in 1932 and as far as I can tell she led a quite ordinary life and that’s what makes her interesting.