Go Swedes! Preserving Hyllningsfest in Lindsborg

Hyllningsfest parade float featuring traditional Swedish costumes.
Credit: Lindsborg Old Mill & Swedish Heritage Museum

Hyllningsfest in Lindsborg has long been a tourist favorite. Generations of festivalgoers from Kansas and across the country have flocked to the McPherson County community to enjoy Swedish music and crafts, take part in traditional folk dances, and cheer on the parade. Those lucky enough to score tickets to the smörgåsbord can indulge in authentic foods like Swedish meatballs, fruit soup, and lutefisk—dried cod rehydrated into a distinctive gelatinous dish, served as part of the traditional Christmas feast in Nordic countries. The official Hyllningsfest program of 1999 touts the event as “part Swedish, part American Midwest…a rollicking good time.” But this biennial festival is more than just a good time; Hyllningsfest is a crucial part of the region’s history and culture.

“For people here in the community, we’re surrounded by so much that’s Swedish on a daily basis…we just take it for granted. It’s so much a part of our lives,” explains Lenora Lynam, executive director of the Lindsborg Old Mill & Swedish Heritage Museum and project director of the Hyllningsfest Photo Digitization Project, which is supported by a Cultural Preservation grant.

The festival dates back to 1941, when Lindsborg city leaders, observing that their traditions were being lost to the younger generation, decided to hold a festival honoring the area’s early Swedish arrivals. It was called Svensk Hyllningsfest (“Swedish-honoring festival”), now more commonly referred to simply as Hyllningsfest.

Even though Swedish influence remains a staple of everyday life in Lindsborg, community members can’t afford to take it for granted. That is why Lenora is leading the effort to digitize the museum’s collection of slides, photos, and film, all about the festival. The photos and memorabilia from each decade serve as time capsules, preserving distinctive cultural moments. 

Cold War-era homecoming parade float reading “Go Swedes” and “Up ’N Atomize.”
Credit: Lindsborg Old Mill & Swedish Heritage Museum

Much of the work of scanning photographs and digitizing film has been completed. Now, Lenora and her team are digging deep into newspaper archives to verify photo dates—a job that is a lot like detective work. Lenora describes scouring photos in newspapers and old festival programs to find lists of the floats that appeared in each year’s parade, which can then be matched with photographs in the collection. In the future, Lenora hopes to expand the project to digitize photos from community members, many of whom have decades of mementos from festivals past.

Lenora Lynam digitizes slides for the Hyllningsfest Photo Digitization Project.

“We need to be intentional about collecting this stuff and preserving it for the next generation, to preserve our Swedish heritage. With every generation, it gets a little more diluted, and so it’s important to keep that alive.”

Photos and videos from the digitization project can be found on Instagram @lindsborgmill.
 

Join the Movement of Ideas

APPLY for an HK Culture Preservation grant. Culture Preservation grants are for projects that preserve and create access to historical or cultural resources that document stories of life in Kansas are available. Contact Leslie VonHolten, Director of Grants and Outreach, for more information. 
 

The 2025 grant deadlines are:

• February 28, 2025
• May 16, 2025
• October 3, 2025

Need ideas? Explore other HK-funded photo digitization projects on the Kansas Stories blog : 

Find out how a mysterious donation of photos in an old freezer box led to the digitization of 1,000 photographs by a local photographer in Garnett in “Snapshots of History.”

Learn how the Inman Museum Association digitized hundreds of slides documenting community life from the 1870s and on in “Slides Rule.”

How did an HK grant help the Stafford County Historical Museum preserve thousands (and thousands and thousands) of glass plate negatives?  Watch this short film and find out!
 

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