Kolding Photos

Armand - Hans - Roy T.

This photograph has been in our family for a long time. I've seen it many, many times over the past 50+ years. The boys in the photo have always been identified as my grandfather and his two brothers. My grandfather, Roy T. Johansen was the youngest son in the family. His two older half-brothers that he grew up with were Armand Madsen (left), and Hans Madsen (center).

For years I've only seen this photo of the boys cropped from the Cabinet Card mount, so I never saw the name of the photographer and the location of his studio. I've searched for Kolding and only found a town by that name in Denmark. With this new information, I'm not too sure who they are. The good news is that the facial resemblance for the three boys matches other photos we have for them, so they still might be identified correctly.

Johan Johansen's sister and her husband

Armand was born in Denmark, Hans was born in Michigan, and my grandfather was born in Nebraska. My grandfather never mentioned that he had been to Denmark when he was about 10 years old. No extended family member has ever mentioned that the three boys, or even the family, had traveled back to Denmark sometime around 1910. The time frame is an estimate based upon the year my grandfather was born, 1900, and he looks to be 10 years old in this photo. Are the boys who we think they are?

Recently I located another family photo that was taken in Kolding. This photo is of my grandfather's aunt and uncle, the wife being the sister of my grandfather's father:



Johan Roy Tolve Johansen (aka Roy T.), my grandfather
Johan Johansen, my great-grandfather (Roy T's. father)
Johan Johansen had two sisters, Kjerstine and Anna Marie. I do not know which of the two sisters this photo is of and I also don't have the marriage information for either of the two sisters.

In summary, we have two photos in our family that were both taken in Kolding, Denmark. Did the Johansen-Madsen boys go back to Denmark? Which sister is in this photo? Don't know.