Sörmlands Museum. CC BY-SA
Frank Otto Skeppstedt, his wife and four children pose for the studio photographer in this formal portrait, that doesn’t give away anything about their extraordinary family history. At the time this picture was taken, the Skeppstedts (now Shipstads) had settled in St. Paul, Minnesota after having migrated from Sweden. Frank Otto worked at a foundry but barely brought in enough to feed his family. Yet young Eddie Shipstad – one of the boys in this portrait – was to become a household name in the American entertainment industry. It all started when Eddie joined Oscar Johnson in skating on the frozen lakes of St. Paul. Soon they were practicing stunts and got hired to perform during professional hockey games. From these early ventures, in 1936 the Ice Follies were born: the first traveling extravaganza on ice, that would thrive in San Francisco for almost 3 decades. A son and a grandson were named after Eddie Shipstad, both following in his footsteps as an ice show director.
