Nyhetsbrev från Svenska kyrkan San Francisco, januari 2021

Idag vill vi fira att Lisa Wiborg fyller 95 år! Lisa är fortfarande mycket aktiv i kyrkan, är hedersledamot i kyrkorådet på livstid, är alltid ett stort stöd och besitter en oerhörd kunskap och erfarenhet hon gärna delar med sig av. När pandemin är över och vi kan träffas igen vill vi gratulera Lisa personligen men vår kyrkorådsordförande Karl Mettinger har intervjuat Lisa om hennes liv som ni kan läsa nedan. Lisas livserfarenhet kan ge inspiration och hopp under dessa svåra tider. Vi vill tacka Lisa för allt hon gjort för församlingen.

Vi vill också önska alla ett gott nytt år! Vi tror, hoppas och ber för ljusare tider 2021 då vi med vaccinets hjälp kan ses mer som vanligt!

Meet Lisa Wiborg, who has been not only a rock of our church for decades but also a Rocking Star among young and old Scandinavians of the Bay Area for more than 60 years.

Who is she? What can we learn from her remarkable life?

She was a rising star already as a young teenager and over her lifetime she received many Awards and Honors. At age 13 she was recognized as Best Sales Person of the Year in  “Julfemman”, a Christmas lottery organized every year by Svenska Dagbladet to support the needy and homeless in Sweden. First Prize was a trip to Stockholm to meet the Queen. This was not the last time she would meet and befriend royalties and dignitaries. In fact, she would host many of them including the future king of Norway in her beautiful residence a block away from Palace of Fine Arts in the Marina District, where I met her for this interview.

After reading her biographies that I had collected, I still had some questions:

1. How are you holding up in the Pandemic? Each time I call you seem busy reading novels, and last time I asked you said you were up to one or two dozen of novels since March. Is that your secret how to keep mentally strong and sharp in the midst of the historic challenges of the COVID?

In fact this is nothing new. I survived the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake, when I had to evacuate my apartment. I also lived through the Second World War and I will never forget the restrictions, poverty and hunger I witnessed during my teenage years. My response was, what could I do to help? So I joined the Lottakåren, a defense organization enrolling teenage girls volunteering to help our soldiers. As soon as I turned 18 and got my driver’s license, I joined Bilkåren, the young women driving trucks and buses for transport of soldiers and supplies to the Norwegian boarder. Part of the mission was to support the underground defense movement of Norway, where, it turned out, my future husband and his best friend the Crown Price of Norway played active roles. I learned to be strong, brave, and self-reliant. I learned to change tires and spark plugs, etc. I even slept in the tents with the soldiers in the forests close to the border, I felt like one of them despite I was just a young girl.

To live a life for others and to be open for new adventures have remained the mottos for my life ever since. After the war I continued my volunteering while working in a bank in Örebro, my home city.

When I was 27 I won a scholarship to study languages in London for a year. Two years later I was ready to discover USA and perhaps even to immigrate. After arriving in Rochester I met a family who invited my help driving to Atlanta, a city which lived in my dreams after reading “ Gone with the Wind”. They also insisted I came with them to Florida and that’s how I got my life’s first and only speeding ticket. Then they left me on my own and I continued exploring the continent by Grey Hound Buses all the way to Chicago.

2. How did you end up in San Francisco? How did you meet your husband?

I continued  my journey and arrived by bus to San Francisco. When I saw the wonderful vistas overlooking the Bay and the Bridges, I said to myself: This is where I want to live. I was never afraid of meeting new people or of trying my luck. I knew banking, I knew English and I knew how to treat customers. So I applied for and got a job with the American Trust Company, nowadays Wells Fargo, on 225 Market Street. I also joined the Young Scandinavian Club och met many new friends including some diplomats from the Consulates who came to our dance events twice a month. We could be up to 300 persons attending.

I was born a leader and in 1961 I was appointed the first Woman to become Chair of the club and later I was appointed a Life Time Honorary Member of the Club. In January 1964 I was invited to meet a Norwegian delegation headed by Crown Prince Harald. I was introduced to Christian Fredrik Wiborg a shipbroker. He came from a Norwegian shipping line family and, like the Crown Prince, he had served in the Norwegian Underground during the WWII. I immediately realized this is the Man of My Life and we married on June 19 the same year. The subsequent 15 year were the happiest time of my life but unfortunately he died in 1979. We also hosted Crown Prince Harald, who later became King Harald V.

I also met the Swedish Crown Prince Carl Gustav, when he was 20 and stationed on board Älvsnabben, a visiting mine layer of the Swedish Navy. In 1973 he became King Carl XVI Gustav and I met him the following year to receive the Royal Vasa Order, Commander of 1st Class. When he returned to our city in 1976 just before he married Silvia, I had the honor of presenting him with an engagement gift on behalf of the Swedish Colony in San Francisco.