At 26 years of age, Ruth Walfridsson arrived in Mukimbungu, the first station of the Mission Covenant Church of Sweden/Svenska Missionsförbundet in the Lower Congo. Two years later the newlywed “missionary bride” had become a widow. But she stayed on for many years and committed herself to the work of transforming spoken kikongo into a written language.
Walfridsson was a teacher who also wrote school books and letters, and she was a translator of Biblical texts and other Christian literature. Even though it was considered improper for women to evangelize, she went off to remote villages all by herself. In her string boots and hat, high collared dress, carrying under her arm placards with pictures of Christ on, she must have formed an unusual sight.
Ruth Walfridsson’s collection contains many objects from the every-day sphere: the handicraft products of school children, baskets for the transportation of peanuts, cauldrons for cooking and traditional costumes and ornaments made of plant fiber. She hoped for her “Congolese sisters” that they would begin to dress more like her. By way of this collection we get special insights into the lives of women in this upsetting period of colonization.