DANISH ROOTS

Robert Rasmussen was born August 21, 1894, in the village of Hunsery, in the vicinity of Maribo, Denmark. His full given name was Karl Julius Robert Rasmussen.
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His parents were Christian Robert Theodor Rasmussen (1866 - ?) and Johanne Josephine Andrea Jensen (1868 - 1937). Johanne Jensen’s maternal family came from Schleswig, a German province near the Danish border; her paternal family came from the vicinty of Aarhus, Denmark. Her four grandparents (Robert’s maternal great grandparents, were all born in the late 1700s.

Robert’s direct male ancestors were Jens Rasmussen (1836-1824) and Rasmus Ditlev Rasmussen (1801-1883). There is no further information on male ancestors.

        Photo Right: 4 Generations (l.to r.) Christian (1866-?) Jens (1836-           1924), Tove (1921-1997), Robert (1894-1974). Photo c.1922

However, with the wife of Jens Rasmussen, Catherine Mathilde Callesen (1837-1918), Robert’s ancestors can be traced (through male or female lines) to Jacob Schade, 1540 -?, born in Glogow, Poland. Schade is a German/Dutch name which derives from “to do damage” and may refer to someone who was a robber knight. So Jacob Schade may have been an unemployed robber knight, or mercenary, or his father was .... or more probably .... we’ll never know.

What we do know is that Jacob Schade’s son, Peder Jacobsen Schade, 1571-1641, was born in Varde, in midwestern Jutland. Peder was a silkweaver, probably in Kalundborg on the biggest Danish Island, Zealand, where his son was born, Hans Pederson Schade 1599-1671. Hans was a Rector.

Nearly all of Robert’s closest ancestors were from small villages in the Maribo area of Denmark.

On December 17, 1920, Robert married Karla Emilie Maria Aarslew-Jensen (1897-1950), from Nykobing, Falster, Denmark. Karla’s family was in the shipping business. Needing ballast for their outbound ships, they began making bricks which were sold at the destination, with goods being shipped to Denmark replacing the bricks as ballast. Gradually the brick making evolved into a business which sold building and construction materials. Aarslew-Jensen Proffcenter Co. is still in business. At some point in her move to the United States, Karla brought with her a captain’s sea chest which I remember being a a corner of the dining room of Robert’s home on Outer Drive, Detroit. A center panel from this chest was passed to Robert’s daughter, Tove, and eventually inherited by Chris.