THE SEWALL FAMILY

Sewall is an old and prominent name in the history of St. Louis Park. At one time there were as many as seven Sewall families living on Goodrich Ave. Our thanks to Sewell descendant Eben W. Graves, who is working on the second volume of the Sewall genealogy, the first having been published in late 2007. Horace P. Sewall, his children and his grandchildren, will be in the second volume. For more about the Sewall family, see "Something in the Water." 

In 1900 three Sewall brothers, Albert, Sam and Leon, as well as their father, Horace P. Sewall, lived in St. Louis Park. Albert, Sam and Leon were sons of Horace's second wife, Sarah Jackman. The family moved to Minnesota from New Hampshire.

ALBERT SEWALL

Albert was the first to move to Minnesota, about 1882, and he was probably in St. Louis Park about 1892. Shortly after 1900 he and his family moved to South Dakota, and before very long some of them had gone on to Medicine Hat, Alberta. Horace Sewall, the father of the three brothers, and his second wife, came to Minnesota in the early 1890s and lived with his son Albert. Horace and his wife went with Albert's family to South Dakota, where she died, and he went to Alberta.

Albert's brothers Sam and Leon came to Minnesota in the late 1880s and moved to St. Louis Park sometime between 1895 and 1900. In the first Park directory of 1933-34, there are no less than 10 listings for Sewalls.


SAM SEWALL

Sam (born 1862) was originally named Charles Orrin [with a different spelling] Sewall, but in the early 1900s he starts to appear in the records as Sam. Sam seems to have moved back and forth between St. Louis Park and Minnetonka, where his children Roy and Edna were born, and maybe others. By 1905 Sam was here to stay. He earned his living as a teamster and, later, as a carpenter.  He lived in a house at 3690 Wooddale (built in 1908), which was demolished in 2011 to make room for an expanded fire station.

Sam and wife Ida's (born 1872) Children:

Charles  (see below*)
Fred
Roy  (see below**)
Melvin
Edna Gerber
Beulah Simpson
Evelyn Wickstrom

*Charles Sewall, son of Sam, was a long time employee of the Monitor Works. He married Ellen Johnson, from another early St. Louis Park family. Their children were Clinton, Fern, Kathryn, Loren, and Willis. Loren was a long time employee and executive with the Park’s Minnesota Rubber Co. Several Sewall relatives have worked for the firm during its more than half century in the community.
 

**Roy Oren Sewall, the son of Sam Sewall,  was born in 1895, and came to St. Louis Park in 1904. He graduated at Park in 1913 with a class of 13. In school he was very active in sports.  In 1933 he lived at 4800 Vallacher (built in 1927).  In the chaos of the 1930s, when beer halls opened all along Excelsior Blvd. with the repeal of Prohibition, Roy waged a strong campaign against the profligate drinking. On that platform he was elected Mayor and served in the 1935 calendar year. He was not re-elected.  In 1951 Roy worked at the GM Stewart Lumber Company and served as the secretary of the Lumberman's Association. Roy's children were Russell L. Sewall, Grant L Sewall, and Dala Rae.  Roy died on February 17, 1973 at Park Nursing Home

LEON SEWALL

Leon was the brother of Albert and Sam Sewall.  He lived for a while in Minnetonka [the records for all Sam and Leon seem to vary between Minnetonka Hills and Minnetonka Beach] before moving, by 1900, to St. Louis Park. Leon was a dairy farmer and built a home in Brookside near Xenwood Ave. When Leon died in 1913, his wife Gertrude was left with a large family including several small children. A native of Norway, Gertrude was a practical nurse who worked with Dr. James Blake of Hopkins. Among many work experiences, she cared for patients during the 1918 flu epidemic. She was, however, forced to turn to others to help care for her own children. Friend Nellie Carlstrom helped with small daughters Dorothy and Gretchen, although the two young girls also spent some time in an orphanage. Gertrude married for a second time in 1921 and moved to Oklahoma. She returned to St. Louis Park later and lived for many years with her son (in-law?) Jack on Brunswick Ave. in “Center.”

Leon Sewall and his wife Gertrude had six children, all born in Minnesota:

Orman:  born in 1895

Ralph was born in 1898 and worked for Hennepin County.  Son Bob was born in a white two-story house behind the Congregational Church, which was torn down for a parking lot.  Ralph's wife died when Bob was two years old, and Bob was taken in by the Peterson family, who lived by a grocery store, ice house, and jail located east of Wooddale at Highway 7.  When the Highway was built in 1934 the property was torn down.  Bob and the Petersons then moved to a house at Goodrich and Alabama.  Mary Peterson made the meals for prisoners in the jail; Bob's uncle Earl was a policeman.  Bob was Supervisor of Buildings and Grounds for the Park school system for 25 years, retiring in 1974.  Under his watch eight schools were built. 
 

Gordon:  Born in 1901, worked for City, grading streets. Married Mae Forbisher; sons Donald (1922), Harvey "Red" (1926) (cook at Jennings), Duane "Duke" (1930) (Insurance). Gordon died in a car accident in February 1948 at age 47. He had been in the Seebees in both the World Wars. Gordon and Mae divorced and she married George White. She died in 1975. In about 1940-41, Gordon was burned badly in a fire and received some of the first skin grafts.

Earl:  born in 1904. He and his brothers all began to work at an early age to help support the family. He married Irene in 1923, and the couple raised seven children. During at least part of the prohibition period, Earl served as police officer for the Park. Children include Irene, Jerry, Douglas, Orlayne. Earl died at age 77.  Irene lived in the family home at 5912 Cambridge Street for more than 50 years. 

Dorothy:  born in 1909

Gretchen:  born in 1913.  reportedly married Elsessor and moved to Texas, but Gretchen's children were born in Hennepin County., and there is some evidence that William Elsesser died there and that she lived, aged 97, in Minneapolis very recently.


 

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This information comes from a variety of sources: newspapers, books, yearbooks, phone directories, interviews, etc. Given the varied sources, we cannot guarantee that all of this information is correct, and welcome any additions and corrections. Please contact us with your contributions and comments.