Olof Olsson (31 March 1841 – 12 May 1900) was a prominent Swedish-American Lutheran clergyman who served in several churches in the American Midwest.

[4] He was educated at the universities of Stockholm and Uppsala, and was graduated at the latter in 1861, after spending a year (1859–1860) in the Missionary Institute at Leipzig.

[6] He edited Nytt och Gammalt, a newspaper, at Lindsborg, Kansas, in 1873,[7] and Luther-Kalender, an annual (Rock Island, Illinois, 1883).

He published in Swedish At the Cross (Rock Island, Illinois), which was reprinted in Sweden; Greetings from Afar, being Recollections of Travels in England and Germany (1880; also translated into Norwegian and published in Norway); and The Christian Hope, Words of Consolation in Suffering and Sorrow (Chicago, 1887).

He also helped edit Korsbaneret, the annual church year book as well as the first hymnal of the Augustana Synod published in the English language.

[5] They had at least seven children, four of which lived into adulthood: Anna, Maria (Mia), Lydia, and Johannes (Hannes).

[1] She was the daughter of Jonas Peter Nilsson, a farmer who owned a share in a mine, and Maria Lovisa (Maja Lisa) née Ersdotter.

During a family trip to Europe in 1889, Mia and her younger sister Lydia took lessons in "fancy work."

Lydia attended Augustana College between 1892 and 1895, taking courses such as phonography, typewriting, chorus, and voice.

Lydia was appointed the Augustana College library attendant in 1894, and promoted to the assistant librarian in 1895.

[10] Lydia died 1 March 1958, and was buried in the family plot at Riverside Cemetery, Moline, Illinois.

Johannes Samuel (4 July 1877 – 23 September 1967), often called Hannes, was the Olssons' only surviving son.