Women's History and Literature Inspired The Foremothers Café

The Foremothers Café is inspired by Helen Lundström Erwin's historical novel, Sour Milk in Sheep's Wool about women’s struggle for equal rights at the turn of the 20th century, Sweden.
In the book, Hanna’s cafe becomes the central meeting place for women advocating for suffrage and women's equality, and a space that grows into a nurturing and supportive community. It's Hanna's community and her passion that inspired Helen to create The Foremothers Café. It launched in May 2022 and has been a thriving Cultural Center and Women’s History Museum in Virtual Reality ever since.

The cafe is set in Lund, Sweden in 1918, the year Sweden held its only national suffrage march, which was joined by thousands of women from the whole country. You will find several details from this march at The Foremothers Café, including on the cover of Sour Milk in Sheep's Wool, which you will find in the café’s book corner.
A creative version of the banners carried during this march is hanging on our wall, historically accurate in all respects, except for the fact that it's written in English.

Contraceptive use was a very divisive concept during this time, and it was illegal to spread information about its “propaganda.” It would take a few more years before Elise Ottesen-Jensen began to lecture about the benefits of them. Her portrait is hanging in a frame on the wall among our other honored foremothers. Did you know that Ottar, as she was also called, co-founded International Planned Parenthood? 

Swedish women are not the only women honored here, Sojourner Truth, is as well. Did you know that she was a suffragist as well as an abolitionist, or that she was the first Black woman to win a lawsuit against a White man?

Advocacy is not the whole story, not in the book, and not in our history. Many women were raising large families, enduring frequent childbirth, and living in poverty. Some worked long hours in factories for about two-thirds of men’s wages, while others were stigmatized for having children out of wedlock. For many, daily survival left little energy to speak out, even if they longed for change. While our cafe building is centered on advocacy, we are expanding our VR World by adding historical buildings that will include more women's stories.