BRENT ERICKSON | When a search for your Swedish roots leads to the wrong tree

A Weekend Throwback: Earlier this summer, while in Washington, DC, for the Swedish National Day and Midsummer Celebrations, I met with Brent Erickson, a man who spent most of his life deeply involved in United States politics, now retired and a full-time artist and painter. And he told me he had a story to tell, about his Swedish great-grandmother, wagon trains across the prairie, Sand Hills of Nebraska, whiskey & turpentine - and the Swedish Royal Family.

- All in all, impossible to resist.

So, I packed up my Volvo and Airstream to meet up outside his home in Alexandria the following afternoon, set everything up, pressed REC - and this is the story he told.