Ludvig Nordström(1882-1942)
- Writer
Ludvig Nordström, born 1882 in Härnösand, was a Swedish journalist, author and artist, best known for his radio series and book, "Lort-Sverige / Dirt-Sweden" (1938) documenting the very low standards of living and housing in the Swedish countryside. After a short period of studies of history of literature at Uppsala University in 1902, Nordström was hired as a journalist at Sundsvalls Tidning. There he published several books on the bourgeois life of the small town and its painful transformation under the influence of trade and industrialism. He developed a strong belief in the importance of communications which appeared in the pavilion, "Svea Rike", at the Stockholm exhibition in 1930. It contained, among other things, a telephone exchange that showed Sweden's instantaneous contacts with the world's metropolises. Nordström's radio report on "Lort-Sverige", broadcasted in the fall of 1938, covered 48 days and 11 000 kilometers of travels by car, was an instant success, discussed and debated as the reminder of an environment most Swedes no longer believed existed in their country. Ludvig Nordström passed away in 1942, an early death mainly caused by a hard, intense and wandering life.